should these transfers be gradual or immediate what are the impacts of shocking an economy built around central control can firms be effectively depoliticized 
as the struggles in eastern europe in the 1990s show it can be very difficult for a population to adjust from complete state control to suddenly having political and economic freedoms in romania for example the national agency for privatization was charged with the goal of privatizing commercial activity in a controlled manner private ownership funds or pofs were created in 1991 the state ownership fund or sof was given the responsibility of selling 10 of the state s shares each year to the pofs allowing prices and markets to adjust to a new economic process but initial efforts failed as progress was slow and politicization compromised many transitions further control was given to more government agencies and over the course of the next decade a bureaucracy took over what should have been a private market 11these failures are indicative of the primary problem with gradual transitions when political actors control the process economic decisions continue to be based on noneconomic justifications a quick transition may result in the greatest initial shock and the most initial displacement but it results in the fastest reallocation of resources toward the most valued market based ends 