Transnational capital unbound? A critical institutionalist perspective on the marketization of corporate control in Serbia and Turkey

Abstract

Although active markets for corporate control have proliferated beyond liberal market economies, marketization has not become universal and indeed takes different forms. Although there is a growing body of literature that analyses marketization, systemic underlying dynamics shaping the specific trajectory of marketization have been scarcely addressed. Drawing on a critical institutionalist perspective, this article analyzes the marketization of corporate control against the backdrop of the structural problem of overaccumulation and locates the variegated trajectory of marketization in the specific interplay between the state and different capital fractions. This article focuses on Serbia and Turkey. Serbia has witnessed a substantial marketization of corporate control which comprises the adoption of (foreign) investor friendly market-enabling regulations and a growing number of majority acquisitions which were often followed by efficiency-oriented restructurings. By contrast, in Turkey, state capital alliances hampered the marketization of corporate control, and advocated for regulations which still allow for the selective prioritization of certain capital fractions.