Privatization, recognized as one of the most important economic policy reforms from the 1970s, has attracted significant attention from scholars, and the literature on the topic is now vast. Yet there is little agreement on the reasons why governments privatized. Three dominant paradigms explaining European Union (EU) privatization put forward distinct motivations. The 'British paradigm' assumed that market-friendly ideology played a significant role in a path towards a global programme inspired by the UK experience. The 'multiple logics' approach observed that the UK was an anomaly, not a leader, and that EU privatization was so diverse that there were few, if any, common logics. The 'European paradigm' emphasized the importance of Europe in the context of a changing world and placed EU privatization in the context of economic and political integration. This article tests all three paradigms using comparative data on EU privatization by country and sector. Pragmatic concerns connected to European integration requirements, particularly in sectors such as telecommunications, transport and utilities, were of the utmost importance in motivating governments to privatize from the 1990s. Europe is thus a powerful explanatory factor when considering ongoing EU privatization.

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This paper explores the relationship between the nature of Spanish Savings banks and the extent of their market success during the twentieth century. It deals with the key factors that have made so good a performance possible, such as: their ability to promote private saving, to cooperate with government economic policy, to adapt to changing circumstances, to operate in particular geographical areas, and to cooperate with one another. Finally, the paper deals with this last factor in depth. The competitive cooperation model is used to explain the outstanding role of the Spanish Confederation of Savings Banks in making the strategic alliance among the Spanish savings banks possible.

This article provides a historical overview of the factors leading up to debt crises and the default mechanisms used by governments to solve them, ranging from repudiation and restructuring to inflation tax and financial repression. The paper also analyses the Spanish governments' graduation to responsible public debt management under democracy and the last debt crisis starting in 2010. After analysing the evolution of the outstanding public debt, budget deficits, the Spanish economy's ability to borrow, the central government's debt affordability and the profile of public debt, the article concludes that the Spanish case confirms the main hypotheses of concerning international debt crises: short-term borrowing enhanced the risk of a debt crisis; insolvency problems arose when governments were unwilling or unable to repay debt; debt crises took place after large capital inflows; most outright defaults ended up being partial defaults; public debt level became unsustainable when it rose above 60-90 per cent of GDP; default trough inflation became commonplace when fiat money displaced coinage; financial repression was used as a subtle type of debt restructuring; and defaults endangered the creditworthiness of the Spanish Finance Ministry and forced disciplined fiscal policies.Keywords: public debt, default, restructuring, inflation tax, financial repression, fiscal policy JEL Code: E31, E4, E6, F3, F4, H6, N10, N23, N43, H63, F34 * Received 13 May 2012. Accepted 6 September 2012. I am very grateful to Pablo Martín-Aceñ a, Elena Martínez and María Á ngeles Pons for inviting me to deliver this paper to the two conferences they organised on financial crises at the Pablo de Olavide University in Carmona (Seville) and at the Fundació n Areces in Madrid and for their helpful comments. I would also like to thank the participants at these conferences for their useful suggestions and comments, especially Gerardo della Paollera. Finally, I wish to thank Leandro Prados de la Escosura, Andrés Hoyo, Javier 353 RESUMENEste artículo proporciona una visió n histó rica de los factores que crearon las crisis de la deuda y de los métodos utilizados por los gobiernos para resolverlas: el repudio, la restructuració n,el impuesto inflacionista y la represió n financiera. También analiza la graduació n de los gobiernos españ oles en la gestió n responsable de la deuda pú blica en la democracia.Se analiza la evolució n de la deuda pú blica en circulació n, los déficits presupuestarios, la capacidad endeudamiento de la economía españ ola y del gobierno, así como el perfil de la deuda soberana. El artículo concluye que el caso españ ol confirma las hipó tesis principales sobre las crisis internacionales la deuda con respecto a: los préstamos a corto plazo aumentaban el riesgo de las crisis de la deuda; los impagos ocurrieron cuando los gobiernos no quisieron o no pudieron pagar la deuda;las crisis de la deuda tuvieron lugar después de grandes entradas de capital extranjero; las bancarrotas acabaron convirtiéndose en restructuracion...

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