Why Public–Private Partnerships Fail

PPP-FDiagnostic Note

Diagnosticstests the theory against one real system

SSRNpublished record

4topics

The failure of PPPs is not empirical, ideological, or managerial—it is architectural. Five structural failure modes (fragility coupling, temporal misalignment, extraction, contractual rigidity, civic opacity) recur across jurisdictions and asset classes. Part 1 of the PPP trilogy — the instrument specified to answer its architectural requirements is CADA.

Where it sits. Part 1 of the PPP trilogy. Diagnostic applying Capital and Learning trunks to infrastructure failure. Identifies five structural failure modes that any viable alternative must address — the four architectural requirements derived here are satisfied by the CADA instrument.

The long-form argument for this work still lives on the existing explainer at /case-studies/diagnoses/ppp. This page carries the abstract and the corpus metadata — the frame the argument would move into unchanged.

Key termsInfrastructure Finance · Temporal Governance · Public Value · Historic Benefaction

In the canonprobetests the theory against one real system

The paperWhy Public–Private Partnerships Fail: A Structural Diagnosis of Capital Misalignment — read it on SSRN →

Nearby in the corpus

Also in Diagnostics

The works either side of this one in the canon order — what it builds on and what builds on it.

Authority–Mission MisalignmentAMIDiagnostic Note→A Market Without a MarketAMDiagnostic Note→Compensatory ArchitectureIEDiagnostic Note→

Where to go next

Three directions out

Where to go once you have the argument — the paper it comes from, the instrument that measures it, or the next thing it depends on.

Measure itinstrumentsRun the measurement this argument implies against your own institution.→The library65 worksEvery work, by layer, with the argument and the paper side by side.→In the field2 liveWhere the argument has met real money and published dates.→