Samenvatting

This paper examines the role of the public private partnerships in the health care systems of three European countries - The United Kingdom, Poland and the Czech Republic.
Public private partnerships were developed in the 19th century in the UK. It was a way to finance the rapid growth of the infrastructure, such as hospitals, schools or roads. Later on, the PPP spread to other countries in Western Europe and the USA. The renaissance of the PPP came in the 1970's of the 20th century. The PPPs provision became popular in non - European states, like Singapore, which used it to create a medical hub for the region.
Scholars have distinguished two schools of public private partnership - the public management school and the international theory school. The first one focuses on the impact of the PPPs at micro level. It describes the correlation between the public and private actors within the nation state. The international relations theory on the other hand, researches the significance of the PPP at macro level. This theory accentuates the influence of PPP on international treaty shaping.
The United Kingdom has been a leader of public private partnership implementation in many areas, including health care. For this reason, Poland and the Czech Republic have been using the experience of the UK. In both countries the PPP projects were developed within time framework and budget. However, Polish government has neither taken into consideration the opinion of the non-governmental organisations nor has it established an independent consultancy body. That might be the reason for the reluctance towards PPP among regional authorities. In case of both Eastern European countries the recent evaluation of the British experience has not been analysed. The total cost of the investment, including the cost of loans, is not included into final budget proposal. The new EU countries tend to focus on the positive side of the projects rather than examining the investments as a whole. Nevertheless, PPP seem to be an efficient way to improve the health care facilities standards and both the Czech Republic and Poland have been the leaders of the region.