PUBLIC PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS: ADDED VALUE BY ORGANIZATIONAL FORM OR MANAGEMENT?

TLDR

Public‑private partnerships (PPPs) are conceived as a means to create added value through cooperation, with literature emphasizing that higher degrees of PPP should yield better outcomes by combining public and private knowledge, resources, and organizational forms. The study asks whether the organizational form itself is crucial for outcomes or whether managerial strategies and intensity are more decisive. Using a large survey of participants in Dutch environmental projects, the authors examined the relationship between PPP degree, managerial strategies, and project outcomes. They found that while PPP degree initially correlates with better outcomes, this link vanishes once managerial strategies are accounted for, indicating that organizational form has no significant impact and that managerial efforts should be prioritized.

Abstract

The central idea of public private partnerships (PPPs) is that added value can be achieved from greater co‐operation between public and private actors. In general, the literature speaks of PPPs in which public and private actors develop a more or less sustainable co‐operation through which they realize products, services, or policies together, share risks, and develop an organizational form to arrange this. The assumption is that a higher degree of PPP leads to more and better outcomes because public and private actors combine their knowledge and resources. One can find a wide array of organizational forms in which this co‐operation is organized and the literature pays a great deal of attention to these forms. But is this organizational form really so important, or are the intensity and type of managerial strategies more important for the outcomes? Based on a large survey of individuals involved in Dutch environmental projects, we show that although the degree of PPP correlates positively with the outcomes of projects, this correlation disappears when we include in the analysis the number of managerial strategies employed. The organizational form does not have significant impact on outcomes and the conclusion we draw is that scholars and practitioners of public private partnerships should pay greater attention to the managerial efforts necessary to develop and implement PPPs.