Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) are mostly presented as a means to introduce efficient procurement methods and better value for money to taxpayers. However, the complexity of the PPP mechanism, their lack of transparency, accounting rules and implicit liabilities make it often impossible to perceive the amount of public expenditure involved and the long-run impact on taxpayers, providing room for fiscal illusion, i.e., the illusion that PPPs are much less expensive than traditional public investments. This psaper, thanks to a systematic review of the literature on the EU countries experience, tries to unveil the sources of this illusion by looking at the reasons behind the PPPs’ choice, their real costs, and the sources of fiscal risks. The literature suggests that PPPs are more costly than public funding, especially when contingent liabilities are not taken into account, and are employed as mechanisms to circumvent budgetary restrictions and to spend off-balance. The paper concludes that the public sector should share more risks with private sectors by reducing the amount of guarantees, and should prevent governments from operating through a sleight of hand that deflects attention away from off-balance financing, by applying a neutral fiscal recording system.

This article aims to examine the impact of fiscal decentralization on the performance of local government expenditure in Vietnam. By using a dataset including 63 provinces from 2012 to 2021, the research shows the more expenditure-based fiscal decentralization occurs, the better is the performance of local expenditure. Moreover, the level of provincial literacy and the size of the private sector have positive impacts on the local expenditure index, while the opposite effect can be seen in the case of the ratios of local citizens to total citizens of the country. Besides this, the study also provides some recommendations which are strictly related to the mechanism of fiscal decentralization to improve local expenditure performance of Vietnamese provinces, such as more effective decentralization of budget expenditures to local government, improving the vertical budget imbalance at local budget level, increasing local government budget autonomy, and establishing stronger mechanisms to control public spending.

Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) can be an effective way of delivering infrastructure. However, achieving value for money can be difficult if government agencies are not equipped to manage them effectively. Experience from OECD countries shows that the availability of finance is not the main obstacle in delivering infrastructure. Governance—effective decision-making—is the most influential aspect on the quality of an investment, including PPP investments. In 2012, the OECD together with its member countries developed principles to ensure that PPPs deliver value for money transparently and prudently, supported by the right institutional capacities and processes to harness the upside of PPPs without jeopardizing fiscal sustainability. Survey results from OECD countries show that some dimensions of the recommended practices are well applied and past and ongoing reforms show progress. However, other principles have not been well implemented, reflecting the continuing need for improving public governance of PPPs across countries.

Investment growth in many emerging market and developing economies (EMDEs) has slowed sharply since 2010. Investment growth performance has varied significantly across different regions, however. This paper examines the evolution of investment growth in six EMDE regions, documents remaining investment needs, especially for infrastructure, and presents a set of region-specific policy responses to address these needs. It reports three main findings. First, investment growth has been particularly weak in EMDE regions hosting a large number of commodity exporters. In regions with a substantial number of commodity-importing economies, investment growth has been somewhat resilient but has also declined steadily since 2010. Second, sizable investment needs remain in most EMDE regions to make room for expanding economic activity and rapid urbanization. A large portion of these investment needs is in infrastructure and human capital. Finally, while specific policy priorities vary across regions, several policy options to address remaining investment needs apply universally. These include more, and more efficient, public investment and measures to improve overall growth prospects and the business climate. Improved project selection and monitoring, as well as better governance, may enhance the efficiency and benefits from public investment.

The present study aimed to determine the dynamic relationship between good governance, fiscal policy, and economic growth in Oman. In the context of the current study, researchers chose a quantitative approach to answer the research questions, utilizing the latest 2023 data from the World Bank and The Global Economy databases. The data for the current study was carefully selected using variables that represent aspects of governance, fiscal policies, and economic performance. Our analysis uses Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) regression and the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) Model. These methods help us understand these factors’ immediate and long-term impacts on Oman’s economy. The results we obtained offer fascinating insights into the country’s economic dynamics. We observe bidirectional causal relationships between the Good Governance Index (GGI) and the Regulatory Quality Index (RQI) and economic growth, while Fiscal Policy Effectiveness (FPE), Government Efficiency Index (GEI), and the Rule of Law Index (RLI) exhibit unidirectional causality towards GDP. Budget Balance (BB) shows no causal relationship with GDP, implying external factors influence it. Additionally, moderation analysis underscores the significance of digital financial inclusion in amplifying the effects of governance and fiscal policies on economic growth. These findings hold practical implications for policymakers and stakeholders in Oman. Specifically, they highlight the importance of governance, regulatory quality, and effective fiscal policies in shaping the economic landscape. To foster sustainable economic development, efforts should improve governance, enhance fiscal policy effectiveness, and promote digital financial inclusion.

Fiscal decentralization is one of the policy implementations of regional autonomy, which authorizes local governments to manage their local finances independently. However, with the evolution of the times and the dynamics that are taking place, the application of fiscal decentralization worldwide is changing at each time of year. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate fiscal decentralization research temporarily over the course of four decades. The study aims to explain the development of research on fiscal decentralization over a period of four decades. This research integrates Scopus database to offer a thorough conceptual and structural overview of the field by integrating bibliometric approaches and content analysis. The research procedure begins with the determination of the scope of the research, the inclusion and exclusion criteria for the selection process, the collection of data on Publish or Perish (PoP), and the execution of bibliometric analysis on VosViewer. The research shows that the type of journal with the highest productivity has sub-topics of economy, public service, development, and environmental. The development of fiscal decentralization research has a positive upward trend and most of the top-ranked journals indicate that fiscal decentralization has links and influences with other variables. It is apparent that the most often keywords emerged and studied in the research on fiscal decentralization are related to efficiency, measure, role, degree, growth, and fiscal federalism. Meanwhile, the least frequent keywords are related to poverty and inequality, health outcome, environmental pollution, Latin America, South Africa, fiscal autonomy, corruption, OECD country, determinant, and public sector. These keywords are the future lines of research that may be used for future research on the topic of fiscal decentralization.