  Both the in-plane and the out-of-plane resistivities (\rho_{ab} and \rho_{c})
are measured in high-quality La_{2-x}Sr_{x}CuO_{4} (LSCO) single crystals in
the lightly- to moderately-doped region, x = 0.01 to 0.10, and the resistivity
anisotropy is determined. In all the samples studied, the anisotropy ratio \rho
_{c}/\rho_{ab} quickly increases with decreasing temperature, although in
non-superconducting samples the strong localization effect causes \rho
_{c}/\rho_{ab} to decrease at low temperatures. Most notably, it is found that
\rho_{c}/\rho_{ab} at moderate temperatures (100 - 300 K) is almost completely
independent of doping in the non-superconducting regime (x = 0.01 to 0.05);
this indicates that the same charge confinement mechanism that renormalizes the
c-axis hopping rate is at work down to x = 0.01. It is discussed that this
striking x-independence of \rho_{c}/\rho_{ab} is consistent with the idea that
holes form a self-organized network of hole-rich regions, which also explains
the unusually metallic in-plane transport of the holes in the lightly-doped
region. Furthermore, the data for x > 0.05 suggest that the emergence of the
superconductivity is related to an increase in the c-axis coupling.
