Public-private collaboration is deemed critical for improving service delivery in the global South. This article examines how relations between state and private investors develop over time - and, by extension, how they affect service delivery - in different collaborative arrangements. Through a comparative historical analysis of two mixed-ownership water and sanitation companies in Brazil, the article challenges conventional policy prescriptions that focus on the role of institutional rules in governing public-private relations and insulating service provision from politics. The findings show the importance of understanding how organisational factors - such as the type of private participation - intersect with political processes to (re-)configure public-private relations and the direction of service delivery temporally. The cases both unflatten generic treatments of private participation and problematise the emphasis on institutional solutions that seek to depoliticise service delivery. In fact, insulation may risk closing political channels through which more progressive service outcomes can be achieved.

中文翻译：

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绝缘的极限：公私服务提供的长期政治动态

公私合作被认为对于改善全球南方的服务交付至关重要。本文研究了国家和私人投资者之间的关系如何随着时间的推移而发展——进而，它们如何影响服务的提供——在不同的合作安排中。通过对巴西两家混合所有制供水和卫生设施公司的历史比较分析，本文挑战了传统的政策规定，这些规定侧重于制度规则在管理公私关系和将服务提供与政治隔离方面的作用。研究结果表明，了解组织因素（例如私人参与的类型）如何与政治进程相交以（重新）配置公私关系和服务提供方向的重要性。这些案例既打破了对私人参与的一般处理方式，也将强调寻求使服务提供非政治化的制度解决方案问题化。事实上，绝缘可能会关闭政治渠道，通过这些渠道可以实现更进步的服务成果。