Public works are a broad category of infrastructure projects, financed and constructed by the government, for recreational, employment, and health and safety uses in the greater community. They include public buildings, transport infrastructure, public spaces, public services, and other, usually long-term, physical assets and facilities. Though often interchangeable with public infrastructure and public capital, public works does not necessarily carry an economic component, thereby being a broader term. Public works has been encouraged since antiquity. For example, the Roman emperor Nero encouraged the construction of various infrastructure projects during widespread deflation.
Overview
Public works is a multi-dimensional concept in economics and politics, touching on multiple arenas including: recreation, aesthetics, economy, law, and neighborhood. Essentially, it represents any constructed object that augments a nation's physical infrastructure. Municipal infrastructure, urban infrastructure, and rural development usually represent the same concept but imply either large cities or developing nations' concerns respectively. The terms public infrastructure or critical infrastructure are at times used interchangeably. However, critical infrastructure includes public works as well as facilities like hospitals, banks, and telecommunications systems and views them from a national security viewpoint and the impact on the community that the loss of such facilities would entail. Furthermore, the term public works has recently been expanded to include digital public infrastructure projects. For example, in the United States, the first nationwide digital public works project is an effort to create an open source software platform for e-voting. Reflecting increased concern with sustainability, urban ecology and quality of life, efforts to move towards sustainable municipal infrastructure are common in developed nations, especially in the European Union and Canada.
While it is argued that capital investment in public works can be used to reduce unemployment, opponents of internal improvement programs argue that such projects should be undertaken by the private sector, not the public sector, because public works projects are often inefficient and costly to taxpayers. Further, some argue that public works, when used excessively by a government, are characteristic of socialism and other totalitarian or collectivist forms of government because of their 'tax and spend' policies and excessive bureaucracy. However, in the private sector, entrepreneurs bear their own losses and so private-sector firms are generally unwilling to undertake projects that could result in losses or would not develop a revenue stream. Governments will invest in public works because of the overall benefit to society when there is a lack of private sector benefit or the risk is too great for a private company to accept on its own. According to research conducted at the Aalborg University, 86% of public works projects end up with cost overruns. Some unexpected findings of the research were the following:
Technically-difficult projects were not more likely to exceed the budget than less difficult projects.
Projects in which more people were directly and indirectly affected by the project turned out to be more susceptible to cost overruns.
Project managers generally did not learn from similar projects attempted in the past.
Generally, contracts awarded by public tenders include a provision for unexpected expenses, which typically amount to 10% of the value of the contract. This money is spent during the course of the project only if the construction managers judge that it is necessary, and the expenditure must typically be justified in writing.
