A Comparison of Alternative Procedures for the Selection of the Private Partner in PPP Projects

In this work we compare three alternative procedures aimed at selecting a private partner in PPP projects: i.e. negotiation, auction and competitive negotiation. We show how the suitability of each of these selection mechanisms depends on many economic and institutional factors: e.g. the extent of contractual complexity, the degree of heterogeneity in firm costs, the level of competition, the probability of corruption. The main lesson of the paper is that the adoption of competitive negotiation can improve public welfare only if the institutional framework can ensure both an actual contestability of each contract and a low risk of corruption phenomena.