公私協力夥伴關係的弔詭
陳敦源、張世杰
《摘要》
從一九九○年代末期開始，新公共管理在理論與實務方面，已逐漸被新治理的論述及相關實務活動所取代。理論上，新治理比新公共管理更強調公私部門之間的合作與信任關係；在實務上，目前將公私協力夥伴關係視為是「後新公共管理時代」解決公共問題的萬靈丹。這種樂觀的氛圍，讓人容易忽略公私協力夥伴關係運作的一些弔詭現象，關鍵的是，這些現象所引發的非意圖結果，讓學界與實務界不得不正視，新治理的論述對於契約型政府和以第三者政府作為政策工具的限制條件，仍缺乏深入的分析討論。本文將先從學術界與實務界對公私協力夥伴關係的定義開始討論，發現到目前為止大家對這定義仍然是莫衷一是，但不少學者專家相信協力式網絡關係的經營，是公私協力夥伴關係成功的核心要件。接著，本文從公共政策價值選擇的兩難困境和非意圖結果的角度，指出公私協力夥伴關係所可能會出現的弔詭現象，因此，學界或實務界若對公私協力夥伴關係抱持過度天真的期待，將會忽略弔詭現象對公私協力夥伴關係所造成的運作困境，以及所產生公共資源的浪費。不過換個角度來看，如果學界與實務界能夠領會這些弔詭現象所帶來之反省效果及其背後的學習意涵，將更能以務實與平衡的態度來推動公私協力夥伴關係的各類型方案。
[關鍵詞]：公私協力、新公共管理、新治理、弔詭、非意圖結果
The Paradoxes of Public-Private Partnerships
Don-Yun Chen , Shih-Jye Chang
Abstract
From the late 1990s onwards, New Public Management (NPM) has been gradually replaced by the new governance discourse and relevant practices. Theoretically, compared with NPM, the new governance accentuates collaboration and trust between the public and private sectors. Practically, academics and practitioners nowadays tend to conceive public-private partnerships (PPPs) as a panacea to public problems in the era of post-NPM. This kind of atmosphere makes it easy to overlook some paradoxes, including the creation of unintended consequences, in the operation of PPPs. These paradoxes imply that the new governance discourse has yet to devote more analytical discussion to government by contract and the limits of third-party policy tools. This article attempts to indicate that there are some types of paradoxes in the PPPs, derived from value choice dilemmas of public policy and unintended consequences. In sum, this article discovers that although there has not been a clear-cut definition of PPPs among academics and practitioners until now, there has been a general consensus that how to manage and maintain collaborative networks is the most important factor for the success of PPPs. However, this article also argues that if we are over optimistic about collaborative networks, we will fail to notice some operational predicaments resulting from the paradoxes of PPPs. Nevertheless, if we could appreciate the implication of reflective learning from these paradoxes, we will be able to implement a variety of PPPs projects in a more pragmatic and balanced way.
Keywords: public-private partnerships, New Public Management, the new governance, paradoxes, unintended consequences