Multi-level Governance of Public Investment

Abstract

This series is designed to make available to a wider readership selected studies on regional development issues prepared for use within the OECD. Authorship is usually collective, but principal authors are named. The papers are generally available only in their original language English or French with a summary in the other if available. The opinions expressed in these papers are the sole responsibility of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect those of the OECD or the governments of its member countries.

Exploring relevance, public perceptions, and business models for establishment of private well water quality monitoring service

“…The laboratory testing will ensure; water safety and peace of mind (11), proper testing (5), prevent disease (3), accessibility (2) and affordable (2).…”

“…Since 2008, most developed countries switched from highly expansive fiscal policies to the tightest in decades primarily focusing on public investment, including public water. 2 Apart from water resource management, developed countries also gave top priority to good and effective multilevel governance involving a number of stakeholders at basin, municipal, regional, national, and international levels. 3 It is interesting to note that the discourse has specifically focused on public water systems, leaving aside the issues regarding private drinking water (essentially private ground water wells).…”

Creating Conditions for Effective Public Investment

“…Not only does literature suggest that governance matters for public investment at the national level (Dabla-Norris et al, 2011, Rajaram et al 2010), but at the regional level there is also likely to be better implementation of and greater returns to public investment in the presence of sound institutional quality, particularly for substantially lagging regions (Rodríguez-Pose, 2012;Milio, 2007) The OECD found weaknesses in sub-national governance were among the factors that hindered the implementation of stimulus packages in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis (OECD, 2011a;Allain-Dupré, 2011). …”

“…What improvements can be made over past practices? One answer lies in recent research: the implementation of recovery packages across OECD countries revealed that both national and sub-national actors may lack the appropriate tools and governance arrangements to make the best use of investment funds (Allain-Dupré, 2011;OECD, 2011a).…”

Asymmetric yardstick competition: traditional procurement versus public-private partnerships

“…A relatively good performance in the provision of public services is "rewarded" through a higher probability of the administrator being confirmed in office; a relatively bad performance is "penalized" through a lower probability, instead. In this paper, the yardstick competition mechanism is applied to sub-national contexts in which governments are directly responsible for the development of local infrastructure projects, as is the case in a number of countries (Allain-Dupré 2011). Developing an infrastructure project entails, first, financing and building the infrastructure; next, managing it to provide a service to citizens.…”