The introduction of public–private partnerships in the Netherlands as a case of institutional bricolage: The evolution of an Anglo‐Saxon transplant in a Rhineland context
| Author | Martin de Jong,Joop Koppenjan |
| Published date | 01 March 2018 |
| Date | 01 March 2018 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/padm.12360 |
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
The introduction of public–private partnerships in
the Netherlands as a case of institutional
bricolage: The evolution of an Anglo-Saxon
transplant in a Rhineland context
Joop Koppenjan
1
| Martin de Jong
2
1
Department of Public Administration and
Sociology, Erasmus University Rotterdam,
Rotterdam, The Netherlands; and School of
Business and Hospitality, Southern Cross
University, Lismore, Australia
2
Faculty of Technology, Policy and
Management, Delft University of Technology,
Delft, The Netherlands; School of
International Relations and Public Affairs,
Fudan University, Shanghai, China; and
Erasmus Law School, Erasmus University
Rotterdam, Rotterdam, The Netherlands
Correspondence
Joop Koppenjan, Erasmus University
Rotterdam, PO Box 1738 3000DR Rotterdam,
The Netherlands.
Email: koppenjan@fsw.eur.nl
Funding information
Dutch Research Council (NWO), NSOB,
Deltares, RebelGroup, ResetManagement,
Twynstra Gudde, and Rijkswaterstaat, Grant/
Award Number: NWO-project number 409-
14-014; Additional support was received from
the Delft Initiative for Mobility &
Infrastructures (DIMI).
In this contribution, the introduction of contractual public–private
partnerships (PPPs) in the Netherlands, more specifically the use
of Design, Build, Finance, Maintenance, and Operations (DBFMO)
contracts in Dutch infrastructure management, is analysed using a
specific strand within the policy transfer and institutional trans-
plantation literature: that of ‘institutional bricolage’. This perspec-
tive states that policy transplants come to fit their new
institutional context stepwise. This contribution reconstructs the
adoption process by which the Anglo-Saxon-inspired PPP practice
is incorporated into the traditional ‘Rhinelandic’practice of infra-
structure management in the Netherlands, identifying four waves
of PPP initiatives. It concludes that these waves and the difficulties
that emerge in them stem from an ongoing struggle between actor
coalitions, one aiming to preserve the transplant in its original
shape, and others making attempts at bricolage. Shifts in power
relations explain the progress and outcomes of the process of
institutional transplantation.
1|INTRODUCTION
The UK has played a pioneering role in the development of public–private partnerships (PPPs) as a practice of pro-
curement and management of public infrastructure. The Private Finance Initiative (PFI) model was developed by the
Conservative government in the UK in the early 1990s. It has undergone various updates under the name of PPP
and PF2 since then, and has evolved into an important standard of PPP practices worldwide (Osborne 2000; Spack-
man, 2002; HM Treasury 2012). Among other countries, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Africa, Finland, Bel-
gium and the Netherlands have set up programmes that build on the UK example, introducing UK-inspired
DOI: 10.1111/padm.12360
Public Administration. 2018;96:171–184. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/padm © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd 171
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