Policy Case Studies: De-centralisation, non-state actors and the supply of water in Armenia, Hungary and Romania

What is the effect of privatization and decentralization on the quality of public services? What do these reforms actually mean in terms of effectiveness, efficiency and sustainability? How do they compare to centralized systems where the state and public companies have traditionally played the lead. This research project of the Metropolitan Research Institute (www.mri.hu), supported by the Open Society Foundations and the Global Development Network, investigates these questions in the context of water management in transition. Each of the studies asks whether the role of governance has been neglected in assessing public service reform; they show for example, that perverse incentives, unbalanced accountabilities, and weak rule of law can even increase the transaction costs of water sector, irrespective of the state of privatization or the nature of decentralization. Two of the main conclusions are that problems of governance are often intertwined with unbalanced growth paths and, second, that there is a real danger that transition countries might be expected to adopt quality standards which, in practice, may be unaffordable.

The workshop is organized by the Metropolitan Research Institute and hosted by the Center for Policy Studies, CEU.

Program (Download)

Presentations

• The effects of governance modes on affordability, sustainability and the efficiency of water services in three transition countries by József Hegedüs (Download)

• Performance of Public Private Partnership (PPP) models in water supply in Armenia by Lilit V. Melikyan (Download)

• Privatization in a decentralized setting - Case of Szeged Waterworks by Gabor Peteri (Download)

• Romania: Regional approach in a decentralized context and impact on service outcomes by Afrodita Popa and Adriana Pienaru (Download)

• Regional state-owned companies in a decentralized context by Andrea Tonko (Download)