PPPSD · Privatization, Partnership and Public Service Delivery

Final Activity Report Summary - PPPSD (Privatization, Partnership and Public Service Delivery)

During the last 20 years, there has been a major international wave of privatisation, which has shifted many public sector activities into the private sector. The majority of these cases follow a traditional model where the government privatises and then establishes a relationship with the privatised provider. This, however, is only one model of privatisation. There are many circumstances where it is inappropriate and in more recent 'privatisations' there is a growing emphasis on different models, e.g. public-private partnerships (PPPs), in a range of sectors, notably for public services. These types of privatisations and partnerships are becoming of enormous significance, both in terms of the focus of public policy and their aggregate economic scale. However, these newer privatisation models have received far less attention from researchers. At the outset, the main objective of this conference series was to understand the interrelationship between government and private sector in privatisations and partnerships. The first conference, 'Partnerships between government and private sectors', was hosted by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), on 22-23 February 2007. There were 58 participants. It included a significant element of analysis of the experience of transition and developing economies to identify common themes. This analysis, combined with theoretical presentations, aimed to bring out overarching issues to form a core research agenda. The opportunity to hold this event in collaboration with the EBRD was beneficial, given the critical role that it plays in transition and developing economies. The second conference, 'Government and governance', was held at the IESE in Barcelona in the 4-5 April 2008 and had 28 participants. The third conference, 'Institutions and institutional change', was held at the Centre for Market and Public Organisation (CMPO), University of Bristol on 9-10 June 2008 and had 35 participants. The fourth conference, 'The role of incentives, information and the private sector in the delivery of public services' was held at ECARES, Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB) on 10-11 December 2009 and had 23 participants. These conferences moved forward the frontiers of the aforementioned research topics by bringing together theoretical and applied economists to make a step change in the development of the relevant theory, identify and fill gaps in our understanding, and confront the theory with the evidence. We gained insight from studying the relationship between government and privatisation in the transition experience and from the growing experience of partnerships in the developing world. Another aim of this conference series was to target the needs of less-experienced researchers. In order to achieve this, such researchers featured heavily on the conference programmes. Almost all of the less-experienced researchers who participated in the conferences either presented a paper or acted as a discussant. This allowed these researchers to interact with senior researchers and their peers, receiving commentary on their research as well as advice on how to move forward with it. These sessions were complimented by presentations from the senior researchers who were invited to these conferences due to the high quality of their research. This exposed the less-experienced researchers to some of the more advanced areas of their field whilst providing them with first-hand experience of professional presentation skills. When acting as discussants for senior researchers, the less-experienced researchers were forced to think critically about research from senior level academics, allowing them to question research and think innovatively. In addition, informal settings such as conference dinners and coffee breaks provided a setting in which participants could further interact and network.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union