Public-Private Partnerships in Urban Development in the United States

20

regard to economic circumstances. Public-private partnerships emerged in the prosperous
postwar era in the 1950s and 1960s. In contrast, a boost of public-private partnerships
occurred in the 1980s in a situation of economic downturn. Squires entitles those partnerships
as ‘partnerships in an age of decline’ (Squires, 1991:206). In this era “local partnerships have
nurtured downtown development to service the growing service economy” (Squires,
1991:208-9). Similarly, Levine defines three significant periods of public-private
partnerships: (1) the emergence of formal public-private partnerships 1945-1970, (2) the
proliferation of public-private partnerships 1970-1985, and (3) new directions in public-
private partnerships. He assigns features to each period (Levine 1989:19-31). The first and
second partnership approaches of Levine’s categorization are traditional public-private
partnerships as discussed in greater detail in chapter II.C.1 and 2. Novel is the third category
of urban partnerships which have emerged since the 1980s. This new conception of
partnerships is similar to Stewman’s and Tarr’s social partnerships. Neighborhood
revitalization as well as more democratic development processes with greater public control
and more equitable distributions of benefits for instance through linkage policies are the most
important issues of those partnerships (Levine, 1989:29-30). Although Squires’ and Levine’s
time-determined partnership concepts are useful for a description of the evolution of
partnerships and their changes over time, they are, however, insufficient for a comprehensive
classification of public-private partnerships in urban development since both are too
imprecise. Supplemented with other dimensions of partnerships, however, these approaches
may provide a helpful base for a sound classification of public-private partnerships.

Clarke and Rich develop a typology of public-private partnerships concerning the assumption
of direct responsibility of local governments for carrying out urban program functions and
participating in partnerships (Clarke, S. E.; Rich, M. J., 1982:53). The distinction between
City/ Private, Public/ Private, Nonprofit/ Private, City/ Nonprofit/ Private, and Public/ Private/
Nonprofit partnerships appears to be appropriate and comprehensively, but Clarke and Rich
examine only partnerships generated by the UDAG program, so-called action grant
partnerships. Because the UDAG program belongs to history and chief urban circumstances
have changed since then the distinction needs to be updated.

A decent classification of public-private partnerships is the one by Hamlin and Lyons
(Hamlin, R. E.; Lyons, T. S., 1996:29-76). They classify public-private partnerships
concerning the major organizational structures and partnership activities. With regard to
partnership organizations they basically make a distinction between:

• Mixed partnerships,

• Limited partnerships,

• Condominiums,

• Government Authorities, and

• Private Corporations.

Hamlin and Lyons provide a useful overview of possible public-private organizations in the
US by comprehensively delineating various forms. They highlight possible legal
organizational arrangements and partnership enabling laws. Thus, the approach is
considerable different from the one by Squires, Levine, and Stewman and Tarr. While Squires
and Levine take social consequences of public-private partnerships into account, Hamlin and
Lyons classify public-private partnerships from a law point of view. Therefore, the results are
clearly different from each other. Relevant categories of intersectoral partnership activities
classified by Hamlin and Lyons are the following:

• Land/Related Capital,

• Labor,

• Energy,

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