Overview of public-private partnerships in sub-Saharan Africa: emerging risks and narratives

Abstract

 Powerful global actors including international finance institutions, multilaterals and funders promote neoliberal policies across Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), prioritising public-private partnerships (PPPs). Assumptions are that private sector resources will solve public sector deficiencies and ensure effective and efficient development and service delivery. SSA governments are creating required PPP-enabling environments to attract such investments. This article reports on a desk review of 128 academic and grey literature documents about SSA PPP development covering the period 2013-2022. Rather than present a detailed audit, the article identifies risks and narratives at both population and State levels emerging from PPPs across diverse countries and sectors. This initial overview contributes to building an evidence base about PPP risks and can be used to inform a comprehensive feminist analysis of PPPs. It also sets the context for the more specific case studies and articles in this issue of Feminist Africa.

Accelerating PPP costs shrink fiscal and policy space, undermining government efforts to drive national development priorities. Negative effects on employment, livelihoods and access to services exacerbate burdens for disadvantaged women, as they assume increased unpaid care responsibilities when healthcare and education services decline, and as they support families with fewer productive resources. Citizen-state relationships and national sovereignty weaken as States are increasingly accountable to financial actors. There are, however, some signs of a growing momentum to reclaim the role of the State and to make an accountable public sector work in the interest of the people.