Institutional Differentiation of Public Service Provision in Germany: Corporatisation, Privatisation and Re-Municipalisation

Abstract

In recent decades, the provision of public services in Germany has increasingly been transferred to institutions outside the core administration. The process has resulted in a considerably changed institutional landscape with multiple effects on its steering, governance and management. The aim of this chapter is to highlight experiences with the four different institutional arrangements of corporatisation, outsourcing, privatisation and re-municipalisation in Germany. Against this background, we provide some lessons learnt for public administration and finally shift attention to the discussion on public versus private service provision.

New perspectives in the co-production of public policies, public services and common goods

“…Second, it can be seen that in recent decades, the provision of public services has increasingly been transferred to organisations outside of the local core administration. Horizontal re-organisation or corporatisation (Friedländer, Röber & Schaefer, 2021) has resulted in considerable changes in the organisational landscape. Public services are no longer exclusively and directly delivered by units of local administrations, but also by municipally owned corporations, i.e.…”

“…In Germany, the general importance of public economy organisations for service delivery has increased further over the last 20 years. Local authorities have increasingly become aware of the lack of influence on the supply infrastructure and regional development (for further reasons, see : Friedländer, Röber & Schaefer, 2021;Voorn, van Genugten & van Thiel, 2020). After decades of privatising public services, some municipalities in rural regions have terminated concession contracts that were awarded to external private suppliers in former times or in a few cases have bought back utilities (Bönker, Libbe & Wollmann, 2016).…”

A Systematic Literature Review of Infrastructure Governance: Cross-sectoral Lessons for Transformative Governance Approaches

“…Infrastructure planning, while long core to urban planning, now occurs within a global ‘infrastructure turn’ (Dodson 2017) whereby infrastructure delivery has become a major target of transnational capital investment while becoming disconnected from wider urban planning strategies and processes, exacerbated by neoliberal, fragmented governance contexts (Gleeson, Dodson, and Spiller 2012; Graham and Marvin 2001; O’Brien, Pike, and Tomaney 2019). This fragmentation extends to core realms of infrastructure governance, which encompasses planning and delivery (Dodson 2017; Legacy 2017), infrastructure funding (O’Brien, Pike, and Tomaney 2019) and processes of social legitimacy (Taşan-Kok, Atkinson, and Martins 2020).…”

“…Infrastructure planning, while long core to urban planning, now occurs within a global ‘infrastructure turn’ (Dodson 2017) whereby infrastructure delivery has become a major target of transnational capital investment while becoming disconnected from wider urban planning strategies and processes, exacerbated by neoliberal, fragmented governance contexts (Gleeson, Dodson, and Spiller 2012; Graham and Marvin 2001; O’Brien, Pike, and Tomaney 2019). This fragmentation extends to core realms of infrastructure governance, which encompasses planning and delivery (Dodson 2017; Legacy 2017), infrastructure funding (O’Brien, Pike, and Tomaney 2019) and processes of social legitimacy (Taşan-Kok, Atkinson, and Martins 2020). Fragmented governance regimes weaken the capacity for integrated infrastructure implementation aligned with diverse public interests (Campbell and Marshall 2000; Searle and Legacy 2021), and challenge the pursuit of transformative governance approaches that can recognise the realities of, and strategically act to address the social and ecological imperatives of multiple intersecting crises.…”

Kommunale Handlungsfähigkeit im europäischen Vergleich

“…In diesen Fällen ist grundsätzlich mit kommunalen Steuerungsverlusten bis zu dem Punkt zu rechnen, dass die Kommunen ihre Gemeinwohl-und Daseinsvorsorgefunktion nicht mehr adäquat ausüben können. Dieser Erkenntnis ist eine der wesentlichen Lehren aus der NPM-Bewegung und sie hat in einer Reihe von Kommunen inzwischen einen Post-NPM-Trend ausgelöst, der in einigen Sektoren auf eine "Rückkehr des Öffentlichen" und eine Wiederbelebung der kommunalen Leistungserstellung hinausläuft (Wollmann 2016;Friedländer et al 2021).…”