04Nov 2015
CFP - Research workshop on regulating government-owned utilities, Singapore, February 2016
15:59 - By Hal Colebatch
A two-day workshop hosted by the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy of the National University of Singapore will focus on the regulation of GOUs, with a specific focus on the water sector. It will bring together scholars from the domains of economics, political science, public policy and management to explore theory and evidence from both developed and developing countries. The workshop will seek to draw out lessons relevant to future policy design.
Research Workshop on
“Regulating Government-Owned Utilities”
Hosted by
Institute of Water Policy, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore (NUS) February 26-27, 2016
Most water utilities worldwide are government-owned but they are regulated in a great variety of ways. At one end of the spectrum are unitary approaches in which the utility is part of a government department and managed directly by public officials – management, policy and economic regulation functions are the responsibility of a single body. At the other end of the spectrum is a model in which utilities are fully corporatized and are regulated at arms length by an independent regulatory agency, sometimes alongside privately-owned utilities.
Governments choose governance structures and regulatory approaches for government-owned utilities (GOUs) to meet multiple policy objectives given institutional constraints. What can theory tell us about the optimal selection of governance and regulatory systems in developed and developing country environments? What does empirical evidence suggest about the effectiveness of different approaches in maximizing welfare, efficiency or other policy goals?
Theoretical and empirical papers are invited addressing subjects such as:
-
- Theoretical approaches to joint policy choice of governance structures and regulatory systems for GOUs
-
- Application of agency theory to incentive regulation under government and mixed ownership
-
- Empirical analysis of regulatory transitions without changes in ownership
-
- Management behaviour in GOUs under arms-length regulation
-
- Welfare and efficiency performance of publicly and privately-owned utilities under a single regulatory regime
-
- Design and implementation of regulatory systems for GOUs in developing countries
Selected papers presented in the workshop will be considered for a special issue in a peer-reviewed journal.
Please send your proposals to the conference organizing committee at “olivia.jensen@nus.edu.sg” by December 6, 2015. The proposal should provide a summary of the paper's main arguments, including purpose, research questions, methods, data source (if applicable), and conclusions. The length of abstracts should be no more than 400 words. Decisions on acceptances of proposals will be sent out no later than December 18, 2015. Final papers will be due on F e b r u a r y 1 7 , 2 0 1 6 for circulation to all conference participants before the workshop. Presenters delivering full papers will be eligible for full subsidies for air travel, meals and accommodation costs during the event.