Experimental methods for investigating co-production

In addition to descriptive and definitional questions, there remain important causal questions about the antecedents and consequences of coproduction. In this chapter, we review studies in public management and related fields that used randomised experiments as a method of research to investigate important causal questions about co-production. Our review reveals that the experimental investigation of co-production is on the rise, particularly in recent years, and that such studies have been published in many of the field's top journals. While these experiments have been varied in their policy focus and the type of experiment they used, certain policy areas like environment and certain types of experiment such as field and survey experiments have been studied and used more often than any other policy areas and experiment types. Gaps in the existing literature, as well as issues for future research along these lines, are discussed.