IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/pal/palcom/v11y2024i1d10.1057_s41599-023-02549-2.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Contract management of municipal public services: the Slovak experience

Author

Listed:
  • Beáta Mikušová Meričková

    (Matej Bel University
    Pardubice University)

  • Juraj Nemec

    (Matej Bel University
    Masaryk University)

  • Nikoleta Jakuš Muthová

    (Matej Bel University)

Abstract

Contracting out services in the public sector should convey efficiency gains compared to the in-house delivery of these services because of the competition element. However, results from practice do not confirm this assumption. Generalising the reasons for this situation is still problematic, but there is no doubt that the quality of managing the processes of contracting out of public services should be the factor. The aim of this paper is to contribute to the discussion on contract management in the public sector by analysing the quality of contract management in Slovak municipalities in the context of contracting out risks as defined by the principal-agent theory. The study uses own methodological approach for quantifying the determinants of the quality of contract management in relation to the contracting out risks using Saaty’s expert method. In total, 7 variables were constructed, and 3416 contracts are evaluated. Similarly to most existing studies, the results indicate severe problems in the quality of contract management in municipal sector, which increase the risks associated with contracting out. The most prevalent reserves in the quality of contract management of contracted local public and ancillary services in the Slovak municipal conditions are related to the selection of the public procurement procedure; the irregular monitoring of the quality of external production; and the type of payment. The outcomes clearly show that potential increases in efficiency via contracting out are unequivocally limited by the low quality of contract management.

Suggested Citation

  • Beáta Mikušová Meričková & Juraj Nemec & Nikoleta Jakuš Muthová, 2024. "Contract management of municipal public services: the Slovak experience," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 11(1), pages 1-9, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:pal:palcom:v:11:y:2024:i:1:d:10.1057_s41599-023-02549-2
    DOI: 10.1057/s41599-023-02549-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1057/s41599-023-02549-2
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1057/s41599-023-02549-2?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Raymond Gradus & Elbert Dijkgraaf & Martijn Schoute, 2016. "Is there still collusion in the Dutch waste collection market?," Local Government Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 42(5), pages 689-697, September.
    2. Germà Bel & Raymond Gradus, 2018. "Privatisation, contracting-out and inter-municipal cooperation: new developments in local public service delivery," Local Government Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(1), pages 11-21, January.
    3. Juraj Nemec & Matus Grega & Marta Orviska, 2020. "Over-bureaucratisation in public procurement: purposes and results," Public Sector Economics, Institute of Public Finance, vol. 44(2), pages 251-263.
    4. Germà Bel & Jordi Rosell, 2016. "Public and Private Production in a Mixed Delivery System: Regulation, Competition and Costs," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 35(3), pages 533-558, June.
    5. Paula Blomqvist & Ulrika Winblad, 2022. "Contracting out welfare services: how are private contractors held accountable?," Public Management Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 24(2), pages 233-254, February.
    6. E. Dijkgraaf & R. H. J. M. Gradus, 2013. "Cost advantage cooperations larger than private waste collectors," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 20(7), pages 702-705, May.
    7. Dayashankar Maurya & Amit Kumar Srivastava, 2019. "Relationship between governance mechanisms and contract performance," International Journal of Productivity and Performance Management, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, vol. 69(1), pages 44-60, September.
    8. Andrei Yakovlev & Andrey Tkachenko & Yuliya Rodionova, 2020. "Who Is Inclined to Hide the Truth: Evidence from Public Procurement," International Journal of Public Administration, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 43(13), pages 1109-1120, October.
    9. Thomas L. Saaty, 1994. "How to Make a Decision: The Analytic Hierarchy Process," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 24(6), pages 19-43, December.
    10. Francisca Tejedo-Romero & Joaquim Filipe Ferraz Esteves Araujo, 2023. "Critical factors influencing information disclosure in public organisations," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 10(1), pages 1-12, December.
    11. Sjors Overman, 2016. "Great Expectations of Public Service Delegation: A systematic review," Public Management Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 18(8), pages 1238-1262, September.
    12. Juraj Nemec & Beata Merickova & Frantisek Ochrana, 2008. "Introducing benchmarking in the Czech Republic and Slovakia," Public Management Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 10(5), pages 673-684, September.
    13. Reto Steiner, 2003. "The causes, spread and effects of intermunicipal cooperation and municipal mergers in Switzerland," Public Management Review, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 5(4), pages 551-571, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Campos-Alba, Cristina M. & Prior, Diego & Pérez-López, Gemma & Zafra-Gómez, Jose L., 2020. "Long-term cost efficiency of alternative management forms for urban public transport from the public sector perspective," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 16-23.
    2. Anna Francesca Pattaro & Marco Ranuzzini & Luca Bonacini, 2019. "Inter-municipal cooperation as a solution for public services delivery? The case of Unioni di Comuni in Emilia-Romagna Region," Department of Economics 0144, University of Modena and Reggio E., Faculty of Economics "Marco Biagi".
    3. Jose-Luis Zafra-Gómez & Germán López-Pérez & Marta Garrido-Montañés & Elisabeth Zafra-Gómez, 2023. "Cost Efficiency in Municipal Solid Waste (MSW): Different Alternatives in Service Delivery for Small and Medium Sized Spanish Local Governments," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(7), pages 1-14, April.
    4. Soukopová, Jana & Vaceková, Gabriela & Klimovský, Daniel, 2017. "Local waste management in the Czech Republic: Limits and merits of public-private partnership and contracting out," Utilities Policy, Elsevier, vol. 48(C), pages 201-209.
    5. Juri Demuth & Hans W. Friederiszick & Steffen Reinhold, 2022. "Reverse Privatization as a Reaction to the Competitive Environment: Evidence from Solid Waste Collection in Germany," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 60(2), pages 217-261, March.
    6. Antonio Massarutto, 2019. "Italian waste in the circular economy: A agenda for industry regulators in Italy," ECONOMIA PUBBLICA, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2019(1), pages 9-48.
    7. Francesca Bartolacci & Rosanna Salvia & Giovanni Quaranta & Luca Salvati, 2022. "Seeking the Optimal Dimension of Local Administrative Units: A Reflection on Urban Concentration and Changes in Municipal Size," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(22), pages 1-17, November.
    8. Soukopová Jana & Klimovský Daniel, 2016. "Local Governments and Local Waste Management in the Czech Republic: Producers or Providers?," NISPAcee Journal of Public Administration and Policy, Sciendo, vol. 9(2), pages 217-237, December.
    9. Avenali, Alessandro & Catalano, Giuseppe & D'Alfonso, Tiziana & Matteucci, Giorgio, 2020. "The allocation of national public resources in the Italian local public bus transport sector," Research in Transportation Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    10. Rosta, Miklós, 2013. "New Public Management: opportunity for the Centre, thread for the Periphery," MPRA Paper 68474, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Bhatta, Arun & Bigsby, Hugh R. & Cullen, Ross, 2011. "Alternative to Comprehensive Ecosystem Services Markets: The Contribution of Forest-Related Programs in New Zealand," 2011 Conference, August 25-26, 2011, Nelson, New Zealand 115350, New Zealand Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    12. Tavares Antonio F., 2018. "Municipal amalgamations and their effects: a literature review," Miscellanea Geographica. Regional Studies on Development, Sciendo, vol. 22(1), pages 5-15, March.
    13. Daniel Schatz & Rabih Bashroush, 0. "Economic valuation for information security investment: a systematic literature review," Information Systems Frontiers, Springer, vol. 0, pages 1-24.
    14. Sahar Validi & Arijit Bhattacharya & P. J. Byrne, 2020. "Sustainable distribution system design: a two-phase DoE-guided meta-heuristic solution approach for a three-echelon bi-objective AHP-integrated location-routing model," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 290(1), pages 191-222, July.
    15. Certa, Antonella & Hopps, Fabrizio & Inghilleri, Roberta & La Fata, Concetta Manuela, 2017. "A Dempster-Shafer Theory-based approach to the Failure Mode, Effects and Criticality Analysis (FMECA) under epistemic uncertainty: application to the propulsion system of a fishing vessel," Reliability Engineering and System Safety, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 69-79.
    16. Bertomeu, M. & Romero, C., 2001. "Managing forest biodiversity: a zero-one goal programming approach," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 68(3), pages 197-213, June.
    17. Elbert Dijkgraaf & Raymond Gradus, 2015. "Efficiency Effects of Unit-Based Pricing Systems and Institutional Choices of Waste Collection," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 61(4), pages 641-658, August.
    18. Ormerod, R.J., 2014. "Critical rationalism in practice: Strategies to manage subjectivity in OR investigations," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 235(3), pages 784-797.
    19. Sunita Guru & Jitendra Nenavani & Vipul Patel & Nityesh Bhatt, 2020. "Ranking of perceived risks in online shopping," DECISION: Official Journal of the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta, Springer;Indian Institute of Management Calcutta, vol. 47(2), pages 137-152, June.
    20. Dianfa Wu & Zhiping Yang & Ningling Wang & Chengzhou Li & Yongping Yang, 2018. "An Integrated Multi-Criteria Decision Making Model and AHP Weighting Uncertainty Analysis for Sustainability Assessment of Coal-Fired Power Units," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(6), pages 1-27, May.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:pal:palcom:v:11:y:2024:i:1:d:10.1057_s41599-023-02549-2. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.nature.com/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.