ABSTRACT
Public/private partnerships have become a catchword in recent years in many OECD countries, especially when considering ways to reorganize the provision of public services. However, contracting-out welfare services can pose serious problems for public/private partnerships. Governments clearly need to balance considerations of efficiency and social goals in public/private partnerships for providing welfare services, but how? How can you encourage a long-term commitment to providing high-quality services, and not just making a profit? How can you measure the performance of private nonprofit service providers? How can you insure that the interests of the users/clients will be taken into account in the internal decision-making? The dilemma of balancing profit and social goals in public/private partnerships is conceived quite differently in the US and Europe and the traditional solutions to this dilemma also differ. For example, the Bush government wants to involve more ‘faith-based’ organizations in the provision of welfare services, while the Social Democrats in Sweden want to promote nonprofit organizations and to prohibit the provision of some welfare services by for-profit organizations. But, how can such different proposals contribute to resolving the difficult problem of balancing profit and social goals?
