Power relations and risk allocation in the governance of public private partnerships: A case study from China

2012 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 39-49 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cheng Chen ◽  
Michael Hubbard
2020 ◽  
Vol 27 (9) ◽  
pp. 2253-2269
Author(s):  
Jin Wu ◽  
Henry J. Liu ◽  
Michael C.P. Sing ◽  
Richard Humphrey ◽  
Jianfeng Zhao

PurposeThis paper investigates the policy changes made towards infrastructure public–private partnerships (PPPs). The purpose of this study is to empirically identify the policy risks associated with the development of PPPs and to assess their impacts on the projects.Design/methodology/approachA case study of the policy changes that have been implemented for PPPs in China over the past seven years has been undertaken and is presented in this study. The causal loop diagrams are applied to assess and illustrate the potential impacts of the risks as a result of such changes on PPPs.FindingsA sequence of the policy risks, which relate to PPP risk allocation, contract management and implementation, payment and abatement mechanisms and financing, has been identified. It is also found that the identified risks will generate significant but negative impacts on PPPs, leading to an ineffective project delivery, low revenue, poor service quality and even contract breach.Practical implicationsThis research provides the private-sector entities that will embark on PPPs with an insight into managing and controlling policy risks over the project's lifecycle.Originality/valuePPPs have been critical for infrastructure development worldwide. Nevertheless, they have been a controversy, as many of them were subjected to poor outputs. Consequently, a variety of political mechanisms has been implemented to enhance the governance for PPPs. Policy can bring not only benefits but also risks and, however, policy risks of PPPs with a particular assessment for their potential impacts have received limited attention. Therefore, the study presented in this paper will contribute to the identification and assessment of policy risks within the context of PPPs.


2021 ◽  
pp. 152747642110272
Author(s):  
Altman Yuzhu Peng

This article provides a feminist analysis of Chinese reality TV, using the recent makeover show— You Are So Beautiful (你怎么这么好看) as a case study. I argue that the notion of gender essentialism is highlighted in the production of You Are So Beautiful, which distances the Chinese show from its original American format— Queer Eye. This phenomenon is indicative of how existing gender power relations influence the production of popular cultural texts in post-reform China, where capitalism and authoritarianism weave a tangled web. The outcomes of the research articulate the interplay between post-socialist gender politics and reality TV production in the Chinese context.


2021 ◽  
pp. 136754942199423
Author(s):  
Anne M Cronin ◽  
Lee Edwards

Drawing on a case study of public relations in the UK charity sector, this article argues that cultural intermediary research urgently requires a more sustained focus on politics and the political understood as power relations, party politics and political projects such as marketization and neoliberalism. While wide-ranging research has analysed how cultural intermediaries mediate the relationship between culture and economy, this has been at the expense of an in-depth analysis of the political. Using our case study as a prompt, we highlight the diversity of ways that the political impacts cultural intermediary work and that cultural intermediary work may impact the political. We reveal the tensions that underpin practice as a result of the interactions between culture, the economy and politics, and show that the tighter the engagement of cultural intermediation with the political sphere, the more tensions must be negotiated and the more compromised practitioners may feel.


Author(s):  
Gerald Stell

AbstractThis study generally looks at indigenization in languages historically introduced and promoted by colonial regimes. The case study that it presents involves Namibia, a Subsaharan African country formerly administered by South Africa, where Afrikaans was the dominant official language before being replaced by English upon independence. Afrikaans in Namibia still functions as an informal urban lingua franca while being spoken as a native language by substantial White and Coloured minorities. To what extent does the downranking of Afrikaans in Namibia co-occur with divergence from standard models historically located in South Africa? To answer this question, the study identifies variation patterns in Namibian Afrikaans phonetic data elicited from ethnically diverse young urban informants and links these patterns with perceptions and language ideologies. The phonetic data reveal divergence between Whites and Non-Whites and some convergence among Black L2 Afrikaans-speakers with Coloured varieties, while suggesting that a distinctive Black variety is emerging. The observed trends generally reflect perceived ethnoracial distinctions and segregation. They must be read against the background of shifting inter-group power relations and sociolinguistic prestige norms in independent Namibia, as well as of emergent ethnically inclusive Black urban identities.


Author(s):  
Yin Wang ◽  
Zhirong Jerry Zhao

Given the current momentum for public–private partnerships (PPPs), it is critical to review the experiences of PPP highway projects to see whether they succeed in serving public benefits. This article applies a goal-centered approach to evaluate the effectiveness of nine PPP highway projects in the Commonwealth of Virginia, U.S.A., that were implemented and opened to traffic between 1990 and 2016. Virginia has used highway PPPs more for financing or risk reduction than for efficiency gains. The authors examine four elements of contract agreements—PPP type, private partner selection, financial arrangements, and risk allocation—in these Virginian projects, and find that these arrangements have been effective in accessing innovative finance and preventing cost overrun, while the evidence is limited regarding shifting revenue risk or achieving efficiency gains.


2017 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 510-533 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helen Tregidga

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate the act of shadow reporting by a social movement organisation as a form of shadow accounting within a sustained campaign against a target corporation. Situated within a consideration of power relations, the rationales underlying the production of the shadow report, and the shadow reports perceived value and limits as a shadow accounting mechanism, are investigated. Design/methodology/approach A Foucauldian approach to power/knowledge and truth is drawn upon in the analysis of a single case study. Alongside a consideration of the shadow report itself, interviews with both the preparers of the report and senior management of the corporation targeted comprise the main data. Findings The paper provides an empirical investigation into shadow reporting as a form of shadow accounting. While a range of insights are garnered into the preparation, dissemination and impact of the shadow report, key findings relate to a consideration of power relations. The perceived “truth” status of corporate accounts compared to accounts prepared by shadow accountants is problematised through a consideration of technologies of power and power/knowledge formations. Power relations are subsequently recognised as fundamental to the emancipatory potential of shadow reporting. Research limitations/implications Results from a single case study are presented. Furthermore, given the production of the shadow report occurred several years prior to the collection of data, participants were asked to reflect on past events. Findings are therefore based on those reflections. Originality/value While previous studies have considered the preparation of shadow reports and their transformative potential, this study is, the author believes, the first to empirically analyse the preparation, dissemination and perceived impacts of shadow reporting from the perspectives of both the shadow report producers and the target corporation.


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