Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad’s 1983 announcement of his government’s intention to embark on a privatization policy represented a dramatic reversal of preceding Malaysian government policy although it was very much consistent with his own personal ideological and policy preferences as well as the then new wave of conservative market reforms beginning in the West with the election of the Thatcher Government in the United Kingdom in 1979 and the Reagan administration in the United States late the following year.

This paper reviews the Malaysian privatization policy as well as what has happened in Malaysia in the name of privatization, even though some such developments may not be considered as privatization in the strict sense of the term. Particular emphasis is placed on the likely distributional consequences of Malaysian privatization. The first part reviews the evolution of public policy from the colonial period resulting in the emergence, growth and privatization of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in Malaysia. This is followed by a review of the SOEs in the 1980s, when the privatization policy was first announced and then implemented. This review begins with a critical appraisal of the official rationale for the privatization policy. The following section reviews Malaysia’s experience of privatization, or more accurately, of what has been done in the name of privatization. More careful examination of the efficiency consequences of privatization and its implications for consumer welfare are reviewed, with a view to the likely distributional implications. The distributional implications of the under-pricing of privatized SOE initial public offers (IPOs) are reviewed next.

The final part deals with other distributional implications of privatization and other policies associated with economic liberalization in Malaysia from the mid-eighties. It begins with a review of trends in income and wealth distribution, poverty reduction as well as NEP redistribution policy efforts. The consequences of the 1997-8 financial crisis for the privatization policy are then reviewed with a view to its distributional implications. A brief conclusion closes the paper.