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SoSe 22: Public Procurement: Collusion, Corruption, and Secondary Policy Objectives (S1)

Andreas Asseyer

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Inhalte & Qualifikationsziele

Public procurement constitutes a sizable fraction of economic activity in advanced economics. This seminar deals with some of the central problems that arise when public institutions buy goods. Public buyers often purchase goods through open inverse auctions in which sellers quote ask prices. Competition between sellers should then lead to low prices. However, competition may not be effective in achieving low prices. Evidence suggests that sellers adapt collusive behaviors – such as bid-rotating schemes – to keep prices high. As another illegal strategy, sellers may try to bribe public officials to increase procurement prices. Even if competition is effective, it may bring about undesired consequences. Typical concerns are that competition drives small and medium enterprises out of the market and does not reward sellers for the development of innovative, environmentally friendly, or socially beneficial solutions.

The seminar has three parts. The first part consists of a couple of lectures that introduce the topic of the seminar and provide the theoretical background for those auction formats that are most commonly used in public procurement. In the second part, we are going to discuss recent research papers that deal with collusion, corruption and secondary policy objectives in public procurement. After the second part, the participants write a term paper. In the third part of the seminar, participants are going to present the results of their paper.

Through their participation, the students gain an in-depth insight into state-of-the-art research on problems in public procurement. The students learn to frame the problems using appropriate theoretical tools. They also learn how to build on the theory to conduct empirical analysis.

Anrechenbarkeit: Master Economics/Master Public Economics

Zugangsvoraussetzungen: keine

Anmeldung: Anmeldung über Kursleitung nach dem ersten Termin. Die Anzahl der Teilnehmenden ist auf zwölf Studierende begrenzt.

Prüfungsleistung: Hausarbeit (ca. 15 Seiten) mit Präsentation (ca. 30 Minuten)

Kurssprache: Englisch

Kontakt: Bei Fragen kontaktieren Sie bitte die Kursleitung via E-Mail: andreas.asseyer@fu-berlin.de

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