Global Auction of Public Assets:

£18.00

380 pages | Paperback

ISBN: 978 0 85124 7731

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Description

Public sector alternatives to the infrastructure market and Public Private Partnerships
By Dexter Whitfield

Public infrastructure in the 21st century is confronted with new challenges – adapting to climate change, meeting the economic, energy, water, transportation and social infrastructure needs of megacities in Asia, megaregions in North America and European city regions.

Public infrastructure provides basic human needs – homes, water, energy for light, heat and cooking; the transport of people, raw materials and goods by road, rail, sea and air; hospitals, schools, sports and cultural facilities; communications networks; facilities for the criminal justice system; and civic and governmental buildings for democratic governance, social and political activity.

Public infrastructure supports economic growth, increases productivity, generates employment, creates opportunities for the production and supply chains in construction and services, and improves community well-being.

Wider adoption of Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) and growth of the global infrastructure market, financed by investment funds and pension funds, could fuel a new era of public asset sales. Already, the refinancing and the sale of equity in PPP projects has led to the buying and selling of public hospitals, schools, prisons and roads, furthering exploitation and profiteering.

PPPs are promoted by the World Bank, IMF, development banks and via bilateral agreements in developing countries and the industrialised north. This is the first critical analysis which explores PPP programmes in the UK, France, Ireland, Germany, the US, Canada, Russia, Australia, China, India, Brazil and South Africa.

Yet over US$500bn of PPP projects have failed, have little democratic control or transparency, are costly, lack innovation and are approved on narrow value for money or fraudulent public sector comparators. PPPs are ultimately publicly financed, either directly by government or indirectly through user charges, fares and tolls.

The Guardianpublic article, 17th Jan 2011, on PPP equity sales.

Profiteering from public private partnerships
Dexter Whitfield, Guardian, 10 December 2009

Reviews:
Capital & Class 35.3 (2011) – Hugo Radice, University of Leeds, UK

International Journal of Governmental Financial Management Vol. X No. 2, 2010 – Stewart Smyth, Queen’s University Managment School, Belfast

Privatising the Public Sector: Two books expose the defects of Public-Private Partnerships – Keith Reynolds, The CCPA Monitor, October 2010

New book challenges privatization claims – in CUPE, March 31st 2010

Selling off the family silver – Duncan Bowie, Chartist, March/April 2010

Public cost and private benefit – Michael Barratt Brown in Red Pepper, Feb 2010

Socialist Review – Nick Grant, January 2010

Truthout – Friday 15 January 2010, Op-Ed