Denationalising

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. The act of shifting control of public assets back to private hands involves removing government oversight and promoting privatization initiatives
2. A transition where ownership and management rights are restored to the private sector from governmental entities signifies a movement towards privatization
3. The process whereby the management and ownership of assets is transferred from public to private sectors illustrates a shift towards reduced governmental control

Etymology: "Denationalising" is the present participle of "denationalise", which in turn is built from "nationalise" with the prefix "de-", meaning "reversal of". To nationalise something is to bring it under state ownership, so to denationalise is to return it to private ownership. The English verb was formed on the model of the French "dénationaliser", the French word having the same structure: "de-" plus "nationaliser". The prefix does the work here. Attached to a verb, "de-" signals undoing an action, as in "decentralise" or "deregulate", so the term describes a process of reversal rather than a new idea. The base, "nationalise", traces back to "nation", from Latin "natio", a birth or people, which is why the core notion of the word is a people or a state taking hold of something collectively.