Public-Private Partnership Experience in the International Arena: Case of Turkey

Abstract

Public-private partnership (PPP) models are frequently used in construction projects worldwide. The experiences of developed and developing countries vary depending on existing legal, economical, social, and political environments. Although there are some common challenges, risks, limitations, and success factors, practicing PPP framework is also dependent on country-specific factors. In this paper, first the state of the art in frequent PPP practicing regions/countries such as Europe, the U.K., and China are summarized; and a review of PPP experience in the U.S. is presented. Then, Turkey, where different PPP models have been used for nearly three decades, is analyzed in more depth as an example for developing countries. A new PPP law has been drafted to expand the legal context and types of models and overcome the existing limitations since the first introduction of PPP projects in Turkey in early 1980s. An intensive PPP literature survey has been made to present the common success factors, risks, limitations, and challenges in Europe, the U.K., China, U.S., and Turkey as well as understanding the differences in the implementations. A viable economic environment, proper contractual arrangements for appropriate risk allocation, well-established legal basis, public support, transparency, and a central unit to standardize the procedures are determined to be major factors for successful PPP projects.