Politicians, technocrats and public officials as privatisation actors in Greece: A sociological account.

The article proposes a historical and structural study of the politicians, public officials, managers and experts involved in privatisation policies in Greece. The historical review traces the types of political actors who promoted privatisation since the mid-1990s, emphasising the role of technopols—economists who have built their careers at the intersection of university, economic policy and private companies. Multiple correspondence analysis is applied to datasets containing socio-professional information on key politico-administrative actors and managers working for agencies implementing privatisations. The results suggest that the field of privatisation policies is structured around an opposition between, on the one part, the partisan world that is objectively close to trade unions and social movements and, on the other part, an alliance between EU officials and corporate economists, while technopols still play an intermediary role between European economic orthodoxy and domestic economic governance. • We study the social structures of privatisation policies in Greece. • Economists technopols have been from the mid-1990s the main privatisation actors. • The crisis and the bailout agreements increased pressures for privatisation. • Privatisations are assigned to an autonomous institutional system outside the state. • Institutions responsible for privatisation are dominated by corporate economists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]