6.7.1.2 Choosing Public-Service Providers

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When the State decides to provide funding for services, it has choices to make about how to deliver them. These are largely economic choices, as examined in chapter 3:

· It can recruit its own public servants (3.5.3.1).

· It can involve civil society (3.5.3.2).

· In some cases it can allow a range of private companies to provide the services in a free market (3.5.3.3).

· It is possible to contract private companies as monopolies (3.5.3.4).

· It can choose private financing for public infrastructure projects (3.5.3.5).

It can be argued that value for money is the single most important criterion in these choices, but there are also political considerations:

· Some collectivists disapprove of allowing profit in public-service delivery (3.5.3.6).

· State provision makes it easier to achieve equality in service delivery.

· The French government holds a large stake in its partly-privatised utilities, as a concession to its public-service unions.[1] This has resulted in a statist approach, even though consumers in other countries have benefited by allowing competition.

· As a matter of principle, individualists tend to prefer services to be delivered by private companies operating in a free market; in education, though, this can give wealthy children an advantage.

· State administration of key industries can provide opportunities for corruption, as has been shown in numerous countries – including the uses of Venezuelan oil revenues,[2] for example.

· Private companies might, by making financial donations, affect the likelihood of being awarded public-service contracts (6.4.5).

· Localisation enables more choices to be made available (6.6.2).

· Use of civil society and private companies makes it easier to roll back the frontiers of the State in response to changed circumstances, or in accordance with people's wishes.