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Roles of users’ participation in the regulation of water and sanitation services in France. PHD supervisor: Claude Ménard PhD Student : Marie- Joëlle Kodjovi NGI Stock-taking workshop - March 3 rd 2008 EPFL, Lausanne – Château de Bassenges. Context :.
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Roles of users’ participation in the regulation of water and sanitation services in France PHD supervisor: Claude Ménard PhD Student : Marie-JoëlleKodjovi NGI Stock-taking workshop - March 3rd 2008EPFL, Lausanne – Château de Bassenges
Context: end of the 80’s and beginning of the 90’s: • quiet deregulation (Christelle Pezon, 2002) • consequences on prices: a big rising • the users began to complaint and participate • numerous scandals linked to corruption or embezzlement broke
Context: Evolution of texts of law to improve participation and transparency: • Compulsory procedures were established to prevent corruption (“loi relative à la prévention de la corruption et à la transparence de la vie économique et des procédures publiques, dite loi Sapin") • The users’ participationbecame an obligation. A commission with representatives of users must be consulted before a delegation and must give each year his opinion about the services performance (“loi sur l’Administration Territoriale de la République” in 1992, “loi sur la démocratie de proximité” in 2002) • At the European level - the Aarhus Convention in 1998: the countries who are signatories have committed themselves to improve public access to information, public participation in the decision-making and access to justice in environmental projects. - the Community framework for water protection and management in 2000 - the Green Book on services of general interest (Resolution A5-0484/2003) where is mentioned the importance of public participation
Theoretical issues: • According to the TCT, two assumptions can explain that there is a doubt on the ability of the public authorities to monitor the private operator and to regulate the services: - the bounded rationality of agents, especially public authorities that play the role of regulators - the fact that agents can adopt an opportunist behaviour
Theoretical issues: • There is a doubt on the ability of the public authorities to monitor the private operator and regulate the services: - It’s very difficult to really know the costs when the services are delegated - Studies tend to show that prices are higher in these cases (IFEN, 2004) even if it is difficult to compare public and private (Babusiaux, 2005) - it’s also difficult to know the service quality from the user point of view
Theoretical issues: • In this context, what can be the roles of users’ participation in the regulation of water and sanitation services? • Does it reduce information, monitoring or enforcement costs that the regulator (public authority or the judge) should support? • Does it reduce opportunism behaviour? • Does it improve services performance?
Theoretical issues: • The supposed benefices of users’ participation are controversial: • Negative points: - First, it’s not the French tradition (Brachet, 1999) - the utility is not obvious in all the cases (Lorrain, 1992) - it can increase costs by multiplying transactions and delaying the decision - agents can adopt an opportunist behavior and there is a risk of capture of users’ representatives (Caillaud and Tirole, 2006), or capture of the regulator (Stigler, 1971) so more generally a risk of information manipulation - there is still a risk of “erreur de diagnostic” (Barraqué, 2003) - users’ demand can slow the adaptation to economic shock and block necessary reforms (Spiller and Tommasi, 2005)
Theoretical issues: • However, we can assume that: • Users have some specific information concerning their own needs and concerning the quality of the delivered service (Blondiaux 1999, Warin 1993, Brachet 1994 et 2001) • They are like fire alarms (McCubbins and Schwartz, 1984), so their participation can reduce the monitoring costs supported by the regulator or needed to monitor the regulator itself • So users’ participation can help the regulator to monitor the operator and the use competence (« expertise d’usage ») can foster the improvement of service quality or performance • Users can put pressure for more transparency, help to detect corruption (World Bank, 2003) and maybe even sanction directly the other agents.
Methodology: • Modelling of the reduction of monitoring and enforcement costs • Comparative study: consultative commission, other organized participation of users or citizens, spontaneous participation...
