Received: 10 January 2018 Revised: 12 June 2018 Accepted: 7 August 2018

DOI: 10.1111/1467-8500.12343

R E S E A R C H A N D E VA L U A T I O N

Governing public–private partnerships: A

systematic review of case study literature
Wei Xiong1 Bin Chen2 Huanming Wang3 Dajian Zhu1

1 Department of Public Administration, Tongji

University, Shanghai, China
2 Austin W. Marxe School of Public and Inter-
national Affairs, Baruch College, The City
University of New York, & Sustainable Devel-
opment and New-Type Urbanization Think
Tank, Tongji University, New York, USA
3 Department of Public Administration, Dalian
University of Technology, Dalian, China
Correspondence
Huanming Wang, Department of Public
Administration, Dalian University of Tech-
nology, Dalian, China.
Email: whm715@163.com
Funding Information
National Natural Science Foundation of
China; Grant Number: 71702132, 71774023,
71303028, and 71734001.
Abstract
Governance plays a critical role in determining the suc-
cess and failure of public–private partnerships (PPPs). We
conducted a systematic review of case study literature on
PPP governance and developed a governance framework
consisting of 21 issues in four groups: institutional, orga-
nizational, contractual, and managerial. Then, we inves-
tigate the dynamics of governance issues, including the
relative importance, interrelationships, and connections
with PPP success and failure. Results suggest that PPPs
should emphasize cooperation, trust, communication, capa-
bility, risk allocation and sharing, competition, and trans-
parency in their governance. We also found that the gover-
nance practice of emphasizing dominant and direct factors
and ignoring recessive and indirect ones has hindered PPPs’
success.

KEYWORDS
governance, literature review, public–private partnerships, social network
analysis

1 I N T RO D U C T I O N

A public–private partnership (PPP) is an innovative procurement approach in which public and private
actors co-operate to develop infrastructure and deliver public services, sharing the risks, costs, and
benefits (Koppenjan, 2005). Governance plays a critical role in determining the success and failure of
PPPs. Governance refers to a dimension of jointly determined norms and rules designed to regulate
individual and group behavior (Ostrom, 1990). As a particular type of collaborative governance, PPP
governance is about steering the decision and action processes in the private, public, and civic sectors
(O‘Leary, Gerard, & Bingham, 2006). Usually, PPP systems have a theoretical framework and a set of
key issues for governance (Emerson, Nabatchi, & Balogh, 2012).

Aust J Publ Admin. 2019;78:95–112. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/aupa © 2018 Institute of Public Administration Australia 95
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96 XIONG ET AL.

Some scholars have proposed general frameworks for PPP governance (Johnston & Gudergan, 2007;
Rufin & Rivera-Santos, 2012; Yang, Hou, & Wang, 2013), but none have provided a full picture. For
instance, Yang et al. (2013) proposed a framework for PPPs that covered a wider range of governance
issues concerning transaction relationships and environments, but ignored the transaction actors, that
is, the organizational issues of the private sector and the government. Rufin and Rivera-Santos (2012)
developed a governance structure comprising formal and informal governance issues but focused on
micro issues, such as equity, contract, scope and nonequity hostages, and trust, and ignored macro ones,
such as institutional environments.
Many researchers have investigated a wide range of PPP governance issues, usually referenced as
success or failure factors, drivers, lessons, experiences, best practices, challenges, obstacles, and bar-
riers (Abdel-Aziz, 2007; Abdul-Aziz & Kassim, 2011; Akintoye, Hardcastle, Beck, Chinyio, & Asen-
ova, 2003; Chou & Pramudawardhani, 2015; Jamali, 2004; Jefferies, Gameson, & Rowlinson, 2002;
Li, Akintoye, Edwards, & Hardcastle, 2005b; Ng, Wong, & Wong, 2012; Qiao, Wang, Tiong, & Chan,
2009; Zhang, 2005a; Zhang & Ali Soomro, 2015). However, all of the literature focused on the relative
importance of governance issues in different contexts, such as sectors and countries, but ignores the
interrelationships of governance issues that might influence the governance efficiency of most systems
(Emerson et al., 2012).
This article proposes a framework of PPP governance that integrates the fragmented governance
experience in previous research. The research questions are as follows: (1) What is currently known
about the governance of PPPs? (2) How do different governance issues affect each other? and (3) How
do different governance issues affect project success or failure? This article is organized as follows:
First, we introduce the theory of PPP governance. The next section presents our data and methods.
Subsequently, we investigate the dynamics of governance issues. Then, we discuss our findings. The
article concludes with a summary of the insights and contributions of this study.

2 THE T HEORY OF PPP GOVERNANCE

A large number of studies established the theory of PPP governance across disciplines, including pub-
lic administration and construction management. In general, this literature rests on either questionnaire
surveys (Yang et al., 2013; Zhang, 2005a; Zhang & Ali Soomro, 2015) or case studies (Bloomfield,
2006; Hayllar, 2010; Klijn & Teisman, 2003; Silvestre & De Araujo, 2012). Moreover, studies usually
have a specific perspective that typically falls into institutional (Beisheim & Campe, 2012; Cappellaro
& Longo, 2011; Chou, Tserng, Lin, & Huang, 2015; Klijn & Teisman, 2003; Nijkamp, Van Der Burch,
& Vindigni, 2002; Panayides, Parola, & Lam, 2015b; Tserng, Russell, Hsu, & Lin, 2012), organiza-
tional (Ahmadjian & Collura, 2012; Hayllar, 2010; Kort, Verweij, & Klijn, 2016; Marschollek & Beck,
2012), contractual (Albalate, Bel, & Geddes, 2015; Hodge & Greve, 2005; Reeves, 2008), and man-
agerial issues (Forrer, Kee, Newcomer, & Boyer, 2010; Jefferies et al., 2002; Reeves, 2011; Vecchi &
Hellowell, 2013).
Institutional issues reference the involvement of the public sector and its ability to institute an envi-
ronment where a partnership can flourish (Panayides, Parola, & Lam, 2015a). In particular, issues
are authority, legislation, regulation, and market openness. Authority denotes the specialized public
agencies, for example, PPP-supporting units and knowledge centers at national or subnational gov-
ernment levels that aim to provide the key functions and services of PPPs, including policy guid-
ance, capacity building, project promotion, assuring finance, and approval of projects (Jooste & Scott,
2012). Legislation—PPP law—establishes a clear institutional framework for developing, procuring,
and implementing PPPs, and gives this process priority over sector laws such as budget law (World
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XIONG ET AL. 97

Bank, 2000a). Regulations also establish a clear institutional framework for developing, procuring,
and implementing PPPs, but do not necessarily take priority over sector laws (World Bank, 2000b).
Market openness refers to a free market to which all economic actors have access, rather than a closed
market dominated by a monopoly or oligopoly, or a protected market to which entry is conditional on
certain financial and legal requirements that effectively prevent some economic actors’ participation
(Panayides et al., 2015a).
Organizational issues concern the structure, behavior, and culture of the contracting parties in PPPs
to reduce conflicts between them (Henisz, 2006). The issues have transparency, trust, cooperation, com-
munication, public participation, and stakeholder involvement. Transparency comprises two elements:
“external” transparency, that is, the extent to which internal information is visible to the public, and
“internal” transparency, which refers to the availability of information and the ability to make infer-
ences from it by the public procurer and the private party (Reynaers & Grimmelikhuijsen, 2015). Trust
in PPPs suggests joint image building, goal sharing, and common actions among private participants
inside the consortium, between the private sector and the government, and between the government
and the public (Koppenjan, 2005). Co-operation is a relationship in which the public and private part-
ners behave beyond their conflicts of interest and work together to achieve the maximum total surplus.
Co-operation encourages mutually beneficial situations and prevents the dominance of one partner or
opportunistic behavior (Hofmeister & Borchert, 2004). Communication suggests that public and pri-
vate partners should have open, consistent, and timely conversations and meetings, internally and with
each other (Samii, Wassenhove, & Bhattacharya, 2002; Silvestre & De Araujo, 2012). Public participa-
tion and stakeholder involvement are frequently treated as the same issue in the literature, but actually
refer to distinguished governance issues. Public participation involves the general public in PPP deci-
sion making, such as in project planning, pricing, and service quality evaluation (Chen, Hubbard, &
Liao, 2014). In contrast, stakeholder involvement is the engagement of project participants such as
capital investors, financial institutions, construction contractors, and operation and maintenance com-
panies, at the early stages of PPPs (Edelenbos & Klijn, 2006).
Contractual issues emphasize the process of contract design, negotiation, execution, and amendment
to maximize financial benefits and achieve output performance (Hurk & Verhoest, 2014). Issues com-
prise risk allocation and sharing, political support, credibility, easy specification and measurability, and
flexibility. Risk allocation and sharing indicates that risks should transfer to those who manage them
best, who can prevent the risk from occurring at the least cost, or who can burden realized risk at the
least cost (United Nations, 2008). Political support includes financial support, such as traffic-demand
guarantees, subsidies and tax waivers, or institutional support, such as exclusive right guarantees and
streamlining of approval processes (Brandão, Bastian-Pinto, Gomes, & Labes, 2012). Credibility indi-
cates that the government and the private sector should honour their liabilities strictly according to the
agreement. Government credibility is crucial for the protection of private investment, especially when
the regulatory and legal systems are not mature (Yang et al., 2013). Easy specification and measur-
ability suggests that output specifications of PPP projects describe local governments’ requirements
for public goods and services. Based on this notion, tenderers can compete and their performance can
be easily measured and monitored (Murphy, 2008). Flexibility is the ability of the contract to address
uncertainties in the long-term concession period, which includes contingency arrangements and con-
tract renegotiations (Xiong & Zhang, 2016).
Managerial issues focus on the process control of PPPs, including its preparation, bidding, design,
finance, construction, and maintenance, aiming to increase efficiency and effectiveness (Koppenjan,
2005). Issues in this group include capability, competition, accountability, affordability, innovation,
economic feasibility, and financial accessibility. Capability refers to the capability of the private sec-
tor, such as their wealth of expertise, considerable experience, high profile and good reputation, and
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98 XIONG ET AL.

the capability of the government, such as their skills in project implementation, contractual issues,
supervision, and performance monitoring (Jefferies et al., 2002). Competition means sufficient tenders
exist in the market and the market continues to be functional throughout the concession period. Where
market operators are few, governments should ensure equal opportunity in the tendering process, so
nonincumbent operators can enter the market (United Nations, 2008). Accountability in PPPs refers
to the creation of proper safeguards and mechanisms in the project to ensure the agreement does not
compromise public values for the sake of private profits (Forrer et al., 2010). Affordability concerns
the public and the government. The public's affordability measures the extent to which end-users can
afford the price of public services in tariff-based PPP projects, and local government affordability is the
extent to which the government can accommodate contingent payment liabilities in annuity-based PPP
projects (United Nations, 2008). Innovation includes the application of new technology in construction,
maintenance, and operation; the adaptation of new business models, such as recycling economies and
sharing economies; and creating innovative financing methods for the consortium, such as asset-backed
securitization (Jefferies et al., 2002). Economic feasibility and financial accessibility indicate that the
private sector is willing to invest only if the project is economically feasible, yielding an attractive rate
of return. At the same time, the private sector must also have access to sufficient financial resources,
such as debts, revenues, and subsidies (Zhang, 2005b).

3 DATA AND MET H O DS

3.1 Data: PPP case study literature

This article uses case study literature as secondary data to draw information of PPP governance. The
case study literature identifies governance issues in single or multiple PPP projects, usually in a par-
ticular context, such as country and sector. For instance, Rui and Berg (2011) investigated two cases
in the water sector of Portugal and revealed that accountability, competition, transparency, capability,
and economic feasibility can influence the success of PPPs. Liu, Zhao, and Wang (2010) focused on
stadium projects in China and found that political support, easy specification and measurability, risk
allocation and sharing, flexibility, and credibility are important for PPP success. Because PPP gover-
nance issues vary by context, the case study literature provides samples to study underlying dynamics
across contexts, including relative importance, interrelationships, and connections with PPP success
and failure. We excluded literature based on questionnaire surveys because their findings tend to be
fuzzy in context. For example, the survey in Yang et al. (2013) was conducted in 12 countries and
Zhang (2005a) in 13, and both did not limit to a particular sector. Questionnaire survey studies pro-
vided general experience across nations and sectors and we will compare their findings with ours in
Section 5.
The literature review process followed Wang, Xiong, Wu, and Zhu (2018). First, we searched the
literature related to PPPs in the ISI Web of Science database, from the earliest available date to Decem-
ber 30, 2016 (about 45 years). Keywords used were public–private partnership or PPP, private finance
initiatives or PFI, build–operate–transfer or BOT, design–build–finance maintain or DBFM, transfer–
operate–transfer or build–operate–own–transfer, and governance. This step yielded 692 peer-reviewed
articles in leading journals. Second, we read the abstracts of the selected articles and chose articles
on studies that were case-based. Finally, we read the details of the articles and identified governance
issues. After this process, we retained 52 articles, among which 34 articles concentrate on success
and 18 on failure. They contained data from 122 cases in 27 countries and 18 sectors, as shown
in Table 1.
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XIONG ET AL. 99

TABLE 1 Selected case study literature for social network analysis (SNA)
Literature Concerns Countries Sectors
Jefferies et al. (2002) Success Australia Stadium
Ball, Heafey, and King (2003b) Success UK School
Samii et al. (2002) Success India Automotive components
industry
Rui and Berg (2011) Success Portugal Water
Jamali (2004) Success Lebanon Telecommunication
Liu et al. (2010) Success China Stadium
Hofmeister and Borchert (2004) Success Switzerland Multisectors
Singh and Prakash (2010) Success India Public health
Liu and Wilkinson (2014a) Success Australia and New Zealand Prison
Fombad (2015) Success South Africa Rail link
Goldstein and Mele (2016) Success United States Urban development
Taylor and Harman (2016) Success Australia Urban development
Nisar (2013) Success UK Community
Lenferink, Tillema, and Arts (2013) Success The Netherlands Transport
Alam, Kabir, and Chaudhri (2012) Success Australia Transport
Teicher, Alam, and Gramberg (2006) Success Australia Employment services
Nolte and Boenigk (2011) Success Haiti Disaster response
Gardesse (2015) Success France Urban development
Panda (2016) Success India Transport
House (2016) Success Indonesia and Philippines Water
van den Hurk and Verhoest (2015) Success Belgium Sport infrastructure
Abednego and Ogunlana (2006) Success Indonesia Transport
Deakin (2002) Success UK Social exclusion
Johnston and Gudergan (2007) Success Australia Transport
Nijkamp et al. (2002) Success The Netherlands Urban development
Jacobson and Ok Choi (2008) Success United States Public works
Soliño and Vassallo (2009) Success Spain Subway
Barrows, MacDonald, Supapol, Success Canada Hospital
Dalton-Jez, and Harvey-Rioux
(2012)
Pongsiri (2003) Success Thailand Electric utility
Gibson and Davies (2008) Success UK School
Chen and Hubbard (2012) Success China Transport
Weiermair, Peters, and Frehse (2008) Success Austria Tourism development
Klijn and Teisman (2003) Failure The Netherlands Railway station
Hayllar (2010) Failure Hong Kong Multisectors
Silvestre and De Araujo (2012) Failure Portugal Highways and water supply
Reeves (2013) Failure Ireland Multisectors
Reeves and Ryan (2007) Failure Ireland School
Velotti, Botti, and Vesci (2012) Failure Italy Municipality
(Continues)
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100 XIONG ET AL.

TABLE 1 continued
Literature Concerns Countries Sectors
Reich, Hershey, Hardy, Childress, and Failure United States Public health
Bernheim (2003)
Hodge and Greve (2005) Failure UK Prisons
Ham and Koppenjan (2001) Failure The Netherlands Port
Devkar, Mahalingam, and Kalidindi Failure India Water
(2013)
Awortwi (2004) Failure Ghana Solid waste
Koppenjan (2005) Failure The Netherlands Transport
Wang and Zhao (2014) Failure United States Transport
Beh (2010) Failure Malaysia Transport and water
Liu and Wilkinson (2014b) Failure Hong Kong and New Exhibition venues
Zealand
Gestel, Willems, Verhoest, Voets, and Failure Belgium School
Garsse (2014)
Mistarihi, Hutchings, and Shacklock Failure Jordan Transport and water
(2013)
Lieberherr, Klinke, and Finger (2012) Failure German Water
Higgins and Huque (2015) Failure Hong Kong Theme park

3.2 Method: Social network analysis

Social network analysis (SNA) is a strategy to investigate and visualize social structures through the
use of network and graph theories, for instance, scholars study publication, citation and co-citation
networks, collaboration structures, and other forms of social interaction networks (Ozyar & Gurdalli,
2002). A social network comprises nodes (individual actors) and links (relationships). In this study, the
PPP governance framework is the social structure under investigation. Individual nodes refer to partic-
ular articles and governance issues. Relationships include connections between governance issues and
literature, the interrelationships among governance issues, and the relationships between governance
issues and success/failure outcomes. We used Netminer 4 software to process the social network data
and convey the results of the analysis.

4 A NA LYSI S A N D F I N D I NGS

4.1 Governance issues in PPP case study literature

Following the theory of PPP governance, we identified 21 governance issues in 52 case studies. We
applied three steps to identify the governance issues and the process was manual-based. First, we read
throughout the 52 articles and identified all keywords related to PPP governance. Then, we refined
similar keywords into a particular governance issue. For instance, we refined the keywords “com-
petitive procurement,” “competitive bidding,” and “open bidding” into “competition.” After that, we
identified the impact of governance issues on success or failure. For instance, the governance issue
of “competition” refers to a “high degree of competition” in success and an “absence of competition”
in failure. This step yielded a 52 × 21 matrix of case studies and governance issues. Next, we applied
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XIONG ET AL. 101

FIGURE 1 Governance issues of public–private partnerships (PPPs) identified from literature [Colour figure can
be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]

SNA and constructed a two-mode network illustrating the relationships between governance issues and
articles (Fig. 1). The most frequent governance issues in the articles were cooperation (18 instances),
trust (17), communication (16), capability (16), risk allocation and sharing (14), competition (13), and
transparency (12).

4.2 Interrelationships between governance issues

As shown in Figure 2, we constructed a one-mode network to illustrate the interrelationships between
governance issues. The scale of the node denotes the importance of the governance issue, and the width
of the link measures the co-occurrence of linked governance issues. Because we identified four groups
of governance issues, we explored the interrelationships between them. First, we calculated density
scores as percentages of the number of existing relationships out of all possible relationships, within
and between groups. Further, we applied the external–internal (E–I) index to measure how externally
or internally oriented each group in the network was (Chen & Krauskopf, 2013). The E–I index takes
the number of ties of group members to outsiders, subtracts the number of ties to other group members,
and divides by the total number of ties. The E–I index values range from –1 to 1. With an E–I index
approaching 1, all links are external to the subunits. A score approaching –1 indicates that all links
are internal. If links are divided equally, the index will equal zero (Krackhardt & Stern, 1988). Table 2
presents the density scores and E–I indices of groups in networking relationships.
In Table 2, percentages on the diagonal show the within-group network-density scores: 58%
for institutional issues, 67% for organizational issues, 43% for contractual issues, and 37% for
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102 XIONG ET AL.

FIGURE 2 Interrelationships among the governance issues of public–private partnerships (PPPs) [Colour figure
can be viewed at wileyonlinelibrary.com]

TABLE 2 Density scores and external–internal (E–I) index of network and groups
Institutional Organizational Contractual Managerial Group E–I
Institutional 0.58 0.23
Organizational 0.33 0.67 0.21
Contractual 0.07 0.24 0.43 -0.12
Managerial 0.27 0.23 0.09 0.37 -0.32

managerial issues. The percentages off the diagonal represent the between-group network-density
scores. For instance, the network-density score between institutional issues and organizational issues
is 33%. The E–I indices further demonstrate that institutional issues and organizational issues, which
both occur at a macrolevel, are externally oriented with E–I indices of 0.23 and 0.21, respectively.
The density scores and E–I indexes demonstrate that (1) because the within-group network-density
scores are greater than the between-group scores, we claim governance issues cluster in the prescribed
groups; and (2) because the between-group density score varies, we argue that larger values indicate
closer relationships. In particular, organizational issues influence contractual issues, with a between-
group density score of 0.24; institutional and organizational issues influence managerial issues, with
between-group density scores of 0.27 and 0.22, respectively; and institutional issues influence organi-
zational issues, with a between-group density score of 0.33. Figure 3 illustrates the interrelationships
of groups.
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XIONG ET AL. 103

FIGURE 3 Interrelationships of subgroups

FIGURE 4 Degree centrality of governance issues in success and failure networks [Colour figure can be viewed
at wileyonlinelibrary.com]

4.3 Connections with success and failure

The literature rests on the notion that a successful PPP is defined as one that runs the full course of
the concession period and achieves the intended aims, such as providing sufficient quality and quantity
public goods (Abdel-Aziz, 2007), improving efficiency and value-for-money (VfM) (Ball, Heafey, &
King, 2003a; Grimsey & Lewis, 2005), and fulfilling societal and environmental objectives, such as
equity for underdeveloped areas, affordability for people with low incomes, stakeholder satisfaction,
environmental protection, resource conservation, and so on (Koppenjan & Enserink, 2009; Pattberg,
2012; Pinz, Roudyani, & Thaler, 2017). In contrast, PPP failures refer to contract suspensions due
to conflict, legal proceedings, or technical faults; early termination caused by performance failure in
delivering quality and quantity public goods; project nationalization for societal and environmental
considerations; and postevaluation, revealing that efficiency and VfM were not achieved (Panayides
et al., 2015a; Zhang & Ali Soomro, 2015).
Governance issues play critical roles in determining success and failure outcomes, but their relative
importance differs in different networks. Success and failure networks develop separately; Figure 4
presents the degree centrality of governance issues. Degree centrality suggests the co-occurrence of a
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104 XIONG ET AL.

governance issue and a particular outcome, that is, success or failure (Scott, 2000), thereby upholding
the importance of a governance issue in the network.
The results shown in Figure 4 demonstrate that success (left) and failure (right) networks differ sig-
nificantly in the importance of 21 governance issues. First, governance issues, in general, have higher
degree centrality in success networks than in failure networks. Second, five governance issues are very
important for success (with degree centrality >0.75): cooperation, trust, transparency, competition, and
risk allocation and sharing when no very important governance issues arise for failure. Third, contrac-
tual issues are important in the success network (with degree centrality >0.50), but not important at all
in the failure network (with degree centrality <0.25).

5 DIS CUSSION

5.1 Critical governance issues

The results show that, in all cases, the most frequent governance issues are cooperation, trust, com-
munication, capability, risk allocation and sharing, competition, and transparency. The golden triangle
of cooperation, trust, and communication in organizational issues plays the most important role in all
governance issues of PPPs. Like a marriage, PPP requires the actors to cooperate toward common goals
and compromise with each other to maximize the total surplus (Forrer et al., 2010). Moreover, trust
is instrumental in reducing transaction costs, improving investment, and stabilizing relations, and in
stimulating learning, knowledge exchange, and innovation (Koppenjan & Klijn, 2004). Effective com-
munication builds cooperation and trust, which may increase engagement and translate into increased
commitment from those whose support is necessary for success (Forrer et al., 2010).
Zhang (2004) highlighted the capability of private contractors in practice. In most cases, stakehold-
ers assess the capability of the private sector in the prequalification stage and the bid evaluation stage,
and the evaluation criteria cover a wide range of capabilities, such as in design, finance, construc-
tion, operation, maintenance, management, and control (Zhang, 2004). However, the capability of the
private contractor is still considered critical, especially in those failed PPP cases because many PPP
projects are peculiar and the private contractor's reputation may not always be referable, such as the
PFI contract for the National Physical Laboratory terminated due to an inability of the construction
contractor (House of Commons 2006). The capability of the government is seldom mentioned because
local governments frequently employ professional consultancies and make up for their own lack of
capacity (Zhang, 2004).
Risk allocation and sharing are critical, especially for successful PPPs. Extensive literature described
how to allocate risks between the government and the private sector in PPPs. Even though various sec-
tors and countries may differ, general suggestions are the following: the government should assume
most political risks (e.g., uncertainty of government policy, government expropriation, and instability
of government) and legal risks (e.g., changes in law and regulation and an inefficient approval pro-
cess). The private sector should sole retain most financial risks (e.g., inflation risk and interest risk)
and operation-related risks (e.g., technical and management risks). The government and private sector
should share most market risks (e.g., demand and supply risks; Ke, Wang, & Chan, 2013; Li, Akintoye,
Edwards, & Hardcastle, 2005a).
Competition is critical because it improves other governance issues and contributes to the success
of PPPs indirectly. For instance, competitive bidding forces the private contractor to reveal cost infor-
mation (Maskin & Tirole, 2008), thereby improving the transparency of the project. By involving
more qualified tenderers, competitive bidding is very likely to increase the capability of the selected
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XIONG ET AL. 105

contractor (Joshi & Anuradha, 2009). The tender assessment panel performs the decision making of
concessionaire selection, so competitive bidding reduces the possibility of corruption in PPP projects
(Mols, 2010). Demsetz (1968) argued that competition for the project can force bidders to lower costs,
raise quality, and be innovative. In this regard, many countries have highlighted competition. For
instance, in India, a competition law regulates the procurement of PPP projects and the Competition
Commission of India supervises the competition level not only during contract awarding, but also in
renegotiations and retendering (Joshi & Anuradha, 2009).
Transparency is critical for the success of PPPs because only if the information about construc-
tion and operation is accessible, the government can monitor the private contractor's performance and
protect public values. In theory, PPPs improve transparency because contractors’ private information
is revealed to public procurers through competitive bidding and the public has full access to written
contracts (Reynaers & Grimmelikhuijsen, 2015). However, in practice, the public procurer may have
trouble overseeing and supervising the implementation of a contract, resulting in a lack of “internal”
transparency. Moreover, the public could fail to understand highly complicated contractual arrange-
ments and be confused about budgetary and performance information (Bloomfield, 2006), resulting in
poor “external” transparency. Therefore, failed PPP cases also highlight “lack of transparency.”
Because researchers have conducted various survey studies concerning PPP success (Yang et al.,
2013; Zhang, 2005a) and failure (Zhang & Ali Soomro, 2015), we compared our research with previ-
ous survey studies. We found that trust, cooperation, and communication are not important in survey
studies, which differs from our research, perhaps because trust, cooperation, and communication are
difficult to measure in practice and practitioners prefer dominant factors over recessive factors (Rufin &
Rivera-Santos, 2012). Moreover, competition is important in our research, but not in the survey studies,
perhaps because competition works indirectly; for example, competitive bidding can force contractors
to reveal private information and increase the level of transparency (Maskin & Tirole, 2008), but prac-
titionors concentrate on factors directly influencing success and failure.

5.2 Success and failure networks

Our findings suggest that governance issues are generally more centralized in the success network than
in the failure network. The first reason might be that successful cases need to perform well on many
governance issues, while failed cases would be caused by one or a few factors. This outcome is con-
sistent with survey studies that indicated many factors are critical to the success of PPP projects (e.g.,
45 factors in Zhang, 2005a), but much fewer to failure (e.g., 19 factors in Zhang & Ali Soomro, 2015).
The second reason could be that successful cases usually performed well on common governance
issues, whereas failed cases were caused by various factors (Zhang & Ali Soomro, 2015). This finding
is in line with Leo Tolstoy's well-known saying in Anna Karenina: “All happy families resemble one
another, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” For example, the most critical success factor,
cooperation, occurred in 15 of 34 success studies, whereas the most critical failure factor, communica-
tion, was mentioned in only five of 18 failure studies. Focused on groups, we also generated interesting
insights, as follows:
Institutional issues, except regulation, are not important in success and failure networks because gov-
ernance issues in this group are only enabling factors, not determinants of success or failure (Cruz &
Marques, 2013; Geddes & Wagner, 2012). PPP law is important to secure the legitimacy of the private
sector's interests in a project (Yang et al., 2013), but many PPP-active countries, such as the UK and
China, would use PPP regulations, rather than PPP laws, to govern PPPs (Vinogradov, 2013). Hurk et al.
(2015) suggested regulation may be a precondition for a high degree of PPP activity, because most PPP-
active countries, such as Belgium, the UK, and Switzerland, have well-resourced PPP-supporting units,
 14678500, 2019, 1, Downloaded from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1467-8500.12343 by Sindh Agricultural University, Wiley Online Library on [23/09/2023]. See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons License
106 XIONG ET AL.

but the opposite does not hold true because countries with limited PPP activity have well-developed
units, such as Serbia (Hurk, Brogaard, Lember, Petersen, & Witz, 2015). The openness of the infras-
tructure market is also a precondition for successful PPPs; however, in most cases, opening the market
is not sufficient to create an effective market for PPPs, such as in China (Yang et al., 2013).
Moreover, findings suggest that institutional issues can influence informal groups’ organizational
and managerial issues. The reason is that the supervision of counter-parties’ informal behaviors is
sometimes impossible and expensive. Institutional issues establish PPP-supporting units to educate
and guide actors in capability-building and codes of ethics (authority), set up common rules for actors’
behaviors (legislation and regulation), and provide transparent and competitive markets to cultivate
well-behaved actors (market openness).
We found some organizational issues, such as trust, cooperation, and communication, to be impor-
tant in success and failure networks and played bridging roles that connected macro- and microlevel
issues. Even though scholars and consultants often highlight the importance of organizational issues
in PPPs (Jones & Noble, 2008), in practice it is very difficult to build an organization based on a real
“partnership” between the private sector and the government due to their conflicting objectives (Klijn
& Teisman, 2003). The difficulty is that partners are likely to rely on formal procedures, such as regula-
tion and contract, rather than on informal arrangements, such as trust, cooperation, and communication
(Rufin & Rivera-Santos, 2012).
Contractual issues contribute to PPP success, greatly influenced by organizational issues. In contrast,
contractual issues are less likely to cause failures, consistent with the findings in a survey study (Zhang
& Ali Soomro, 2015). As a formal way of governance, contractual issues are transparent to outsiders—
regulators, judges, and arbitrators—so governance issues in this group are less likely to be undermined
and ultimately lead to failures. Even though some contract arrangements appear to be inappropriate,
such as transferring too much risk to the private sector, the contracting parties can correct mistakes
through ex post renegotiations (Xiong & Zhang, 2014).
Managerial issues are generally important for success—competition, capability, economic feasibility
and financial accessibility, and innovation—but are not important for failure, except capability. That
might be because managerial issues have been highly emphasized in building successful PPPs (Zhang,
2005a), and less likely to be undermined and consequently lead to failures (Zhang & Ali Soomro,
2015). Moreover, institutional and organizational issues frequently influence managerial issues because
managerial issues should follow PPP laws, regulations, and managers’ leadership (Panayides et al.,
2015a).

6 CONC LU SI ON S

This article identified 21 governance issues and found that the most critical ones are cooperation, trust,
communication, capability, risk allocation and sharing, competition, and transparency. The four groups
of governance issues have also generated interesting insights. First, institutional issues encompass
authority, legislation, regulation, and market openness. Even though they are not critical for success or
failure, they can influence organizational and managerial issues. Second, organizational issues consist
of transparency, trust, cooperation, communication, public participation, and stakeholder involvement.
They were found to be at the center of the governance framework, but practitioners can easily ignore
some of them: trust, cooperation, and communication. Third, contractual issues contain risk alloca-
tion and sharing, political support, credibility, easy specification and measurability, and flexibility.
They contribute to success, but are less likely to cause failures. Finally, managerial issues comprise
capability, competition, accountability, affordability, innovation, economic feasibility, and financial
 14678500, 2019, 1, Downloaded from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1467-8500.12343 by Sindh Agricultural University, Wiley Online Library on [23/09/2023]. See the Terms and Conditions (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/terms-and-conditions) on Wiley Online Library for rules of use; OA articles are governed by the applicable Creative Commons License
XIONG ET AL. 107

accessibility. We claim that managerial issues have been highly emphasized in building successful
PPPs and less likely to cause failures. The comparison of our research to previous survey studies shows
that practitioners emphasize dominant and direct governance issues, but ignore recessive and indirect
ones.
Overall, our research incorporates lessons learned from a wide range of case studies across vari-
ous countries and sectors, broadens the index of governance issues beyond previous constructs, and
demonstrates underlying dynamics by networks. However, SNA only involved 52 articles, which is a
small sample with which to investigate 21 governance issues. A growing number of empirical studies
concern PPP governance, so SNA models of this study can be updated in the future by adding more
cases.

CONFLICT OF IN T E R E ST
The authors declare no conflict of interest.

ORC ID
Huanming Wang http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1686-6477

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How to cite this article: Xiong W, Chen B, Wang H, Zhu D. Governing public–private part-
nerships: A systematic review of case study literature. Aust J Pub Admin. 2019;78:95–112.
https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8500.12343