Public-private partnerships: problem or solution? Features and trends in EU-28

The recent global economic and financial crisis has generated new challenges for all public governments. In a number of countries, anti-crisis packages included higher public actions, realized also through Public-Private Partnerships (Burger et al., 2009). Public-Private Partnership (PPPs) combines the resource of government with those of private agents in order to realize social aims (Skelcher, 2005). In this paper, we realize a brief literature review on PPPs models and we present PPPs in EU with a specific focus in Italy. The trends demonstrate a rethinking about Public-Private Partnership in developed countries and it underlines the constraints and challenges for successful PPP projects.