Anti-politics, Depoliticisation and Public-Private Partnerships

By combining both the perspective of depoliticisation and anti-politics a more profound and rich understanding of the PPP phenomenon is aimed for. Vice versa, by using the empirical case of PPPs new insights on the complex... [ view full abstract ]

By combining both the perspective of depoliticisation and anti-politics a more profound and rich understanding of the PPP phenomenon is aimed for. Vice versa, by using the empirical case of PPPs new insights on the complex relationship between depoliticisation and anti-politics may arise. The paper will be structured as follows.

First, we will briefly describe what is meant by PPPs and why there are a relevant case to study. In this part we will also situate PPPs in the literature on collaborative or interactive governance. Second, the argument will be made that PPPs can be seen as important example of depoliticisation by using the three faces framework of Wood & Flinders (2014). Third, this paper wants to take the next step and explain how they may contribute to the growing anti-politics trend. There seems to be increasing ‘expectations gap’ between what is promised or expected and what can be realistically delivered by politicians (Flinders, 2012). The short-term rationales and incentives of the politicians may clash with those of the wider public in the long-term. While PPPs may be politically interesting for project delivery, their end results in the long run in terms of value for money for the taxpayers are very dubious.

It is interesting to see that in some countries, actually the PPP leading jurisdictions Canada, Australia and UK, public debates are shifting from pseudo-technical discussions on PPP project performance towards more fundamental issues like long-term value, transparency and legitimacy. Their governments have to deal with an increasing critical public opinion with strong negative feelings about PPPs. In continental European countries like Belgium, France and Spain however the pseudo-technical ‘value for money’ or performance discussion between experts still dominates, with a public opinion either apathetical or ignorant about the wider societal and budgetary implications. This growing ‘expectation gap’ – explicitly present in the leading PPP countries, and implicitly present in the laggard PPP countries – between on the one hand elected politicians aiming for short-term project delivery success and on the other hand the public wanting to secure a fair and good deal in the long run for essential public goods and services may lead to rising feelings of political distrust and disappointment.

By referring to many empirical illustrations of different countries using PPPs we want to illustrate the interesting dynamics at play in terms of depoliticisation and anti-politics. We will conclude with the formulation of a future research agenda on this important but often overlooked topic.