The Provision of Lighthouses Services: a Political Economy Perspective
Résumé
Lighthouse is seen as the example of public goods and an illustration of market failure. Since the publishing of Coase’s article, ‘Lighhouse in Economics’, a debate about the ability of private agents to provide a public good has been raised. More recent articles debated on the interpretation of Coase’s historical example, Trinity’s House, as a failed private entrepreneurship or public provision. Our contribution provides another interpretation of economics of lighthouse. Theoretically, this debate illustrates the importance of the cost of exclusion and the cost of defining property rights in production, and how to deal with these characteristics. Another dimension concerns the institutional dimension for the provision of lighthouse services. Nor a pure private provision, nor a public production, lighthouse services are provided in particular institutional contexts of mixed economy, which has to be taken into account. This contribution deals also with the issue concerning the political dimension of the lighthouse service provision. Cost and productive dimensions are important, political stakes are not less crucial, suggesting that lighthouse service provision results from particular governance systems and has to be thought in terms of a political economy analysis.
Domaines
Autre
Origine : Fichiers produits par l'(les) auteur(s)