The privatization process of nursing homes sector

Abstract

The object of this article is to analyze the mechanisms of privatization in nursing homes
sector. This study is based on interviews made with several actors of the industry and on the analyze of public and private reports. We show that public authorities support the privatization of the sector through several devices. First, in 1997, they built a competitive nursing homes market by revoking their privileged funding relationships with social economy and by opening the industry and the public fund to for-profit structures. They have also imposed performance criteria to the managers that lead them to increase the level of medicalization of their nursing homes. That conducts to a standardization of their activity. Secondly, the privatization process has consequences on the industry organization. It encourages the growth of for-profit structures and weakens the traditional organizations of social economy, which are faced financial difficulties. The competition between organizations leads to an economic concentration of enterprises, which finally opens the way to a progressive financialisation of the industry. The privatization is implemented by the increase of for-profit structures, by the incorporation of for-profit norms, and by the privatisation of nursing home’s financing.