IS PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIP OBSOLETE? Assessing the Obstacles and Shortcomings of PPP

Public-Private Partnership has been high on the agenda of public decision makers since the 1990’s. Primarily a contractual approach to the delivery of infrastructures, goods and services traditionally provided by the public sector or by private operators submitted to tight regulation, PPP is also a very special contractual practice as it seeks to introduce market-type relationships in a context in which non-market forces play a major role. An important consequence is the overlapping of decision rights as well as property rights, which exposes PPP to a double alignment problem, organizational and institutional. Away from the ideological controversies about the legitimacy of PPP in provisioning public goods, this chapter focuses on problems rooted in the very nature of PPPs and the actual design of their supportive contracts, as well as in the institutions in which they are embedded and that define the capacity to implement and monitor these arrangements properly. 1 Previous versions of this paper were presented at conferences and seminars in Delft (TU), Lausanne (EPFL), Singapore (NUS), Paris (Sorbonne). I am indebted to participants for their comments and to the co-editors (Piet de Vries and Etienne Yehoue) for their help and supportive suggestions. Nicholas Sowels helped polishing the paper. The usual disclaimer fully applies. ha ls hs -0 06 53 09 0, v er si on 1 23 J an 2 01 2