契約課責的弔詭：政府處理履約績效不佳廠商之多重考量

The Paradox of Contract Accountability：Understanding Whether and How Much Public Managers Sanction Contractors for Unsatisfactory Performance

作為初探性研究，本研究致力於探討契約管理者如何評估裁罰的執行，以確保包商貫徹契約績效之要求。究實而論，當今全球政府已有愈來愈多的公共服務係由營利與非營利組織所提供，卻是由政府部門支付生產與服務費用。那些具有公共選擇理論背景的簽約提倡者，主張市場競爭下簽約安排將有助於降低服務成本並提高服務效率。相對地，接受傳統公共行政領域訓練的學者們，則質疑簽約之舉將有損政府服務生產與服務提供的管理能力。對於這樣的知識論戰，儘管國內、外文獻多已指出契約管理的重要性，及其對於契約課責效能所帶來的影響，遺憾的是，「契約裁罰」卻殊少出現在簽約外包與委外主題的相關研究成果中。由於裁罰是確保服務品質與契約課責的一個重要面向，實務上也體現在政府採購法的履約管理與驗收程序，故以契約裁罰作為探究主題，理應具有「見微知著」的討論效果。在上述背景下，起人疑竇的是，採購機關如何評估是否針對履約績效不佳的廠商進行裁罰？針對採購官員的深度訪談結果，本研究旨在呈現機關施行契約裁罰的多重考量與制約因素，及其對於學理上委託人—代理人理論、管家理論所帶來之重要意涵。

This research intends to focus on the discretion of public managers and examines the use of sanctions in holding contractors accountable for their performance. Currently, more and more public services around the world are paid for by governments but delivered by nonprofit and for-profit organizations. Contracting advocators, who often have roots in the field of public choice theory, champion contracting as a way to reduce service costs and enhance service efficiency through market competition. Contracting critics, who often have roots in traditional public administration fields, counter that contracting may reduce their capacity to produce services and manage service delivery. Despite the burgeoning literature acknowledging the importance of contract management and its seemingly significant contributions to the effectiveness of contract accountability, exploring the use of contract sanctions has rarely been attempted in contracting out and outsourcing studies. Against this background, an essential and intriguing question is whether and how much contracting agencies sanction contractors for unsatisfactory performance. Through semi-structured interviews with contract managers in local government, our results will contribute to the literature on ontract implementation and management capacity as well as better our understanding of how public contract managers use principal-agent theory and stewardship theory to consciously discern and overcome managerial challenges while facing contract sanctions being carried out in the public service.