Incentive Contracts for Infrastructure,Litigation and Weak Institutions

In this paper we revisit incentive contract design in a simple setting, after developing a model that captures the fact that in weak institutional settings the procurement of large scale public works through contracts with strong incentives for private firms, may result in excessive litigation over contract terms. This result is possible because we assume that parties in litigation can influence (by purchasing better or more legal services) the observable merits of their case. In weak institutional settings, governments have an inherent disadvantage in these litigation contests. We show that a commitment to a prespecified level of litigation effort by the government, together with weaker incentive contracts, is a more efficient procurement mechanism.Jel Classification: D8, H57, H54, K41, K23, L51     

Managing Government Exposure to Private Infrastructure Risks

The privatization of infrastructure should lead to the developmentof new infrastructure, improvements in the operation of existinginfrastructure, and a reduction in budgetary subsidies. Whethercountries reap the full benefits of privatization, however,depends on how risks are allocated. If, as is often the casein developing countries, governments assume risks that shouldbe borne by investors, they may reduce incentives for efficiencyand incur significant liabilities. To solve these problems,governments need to improve their policies and restrict theirrisk bearing to certain political and regulatory risks overwhich they have direct control. When a government provides guarantees,it should attempt to measure their cost and improve the waythey are handled in the accounts and budgets. Measurement andbudgeting are critical to improving decisions about the provisionof guarantees, to improving project selection and contract design,and to protecting governments from unknowingly entering intocommitments that might jeopardize future budgets.      

Forecasting emerging technologies: Use of bibliometrics and patent analysis

It is rather difficult to forecast emerging technologies as there is no historical data available. In such cases, the use of bibliometrics and patent analysis have provided useful data. This paper presents the forecasts for three emerging technology areas by integrating the use of bibliometrics and patent analysis into well-known technology forecasting tools such as scenario planning, growth curves and analogies. System dynamics is also used to be able to model the dynamic ecosystem of the technologies and their diffusion. Technologies being forecasted are fuel cell, food safety and optical storage technologies. Results from these three applications help us to validate the proposed methods as appropriate tools to forecast emerging technologies.