La gestion contractuelle des services publics. Une critique de l'approche par les droits de propriété

This paper deals with efficient organizational choices for the provision of public services. To better apprehend observed contracts of public-private partnerships (ppps), we depart from the property rights literature to distinguish between ownership, rights to make ex post decisions, and rights to perceive residual benefits. Indeed, such rights can be temporarily transferred to a private firm, even if ownership of the assets remains public. Hence, such a separation allows to analyse the large continuum of contracts from full private to full public management. Under some conditions, our results show that there is always a degree of private involvement that is socially efficient. Classification JEL : D23, L33, H4, H11