Legal Regulation of Concessions: Balancing Public-Law Principles and Civil-Law Mechanisms in Infrastructure Projects

The article examines the legal nature of concessions as a principal contractual form of public–private partnership in infrastructure. It distinguishes between institutional and contractual arrangements, mapping them onto public-law and civil-law techniques, and contrasts approaches privileging private autonomy with those treating the concession as an administrative contract. The study systematizes prevalent project pathways (build–operate–transfer; build–transfer–operate; build–own–operate), the allocation of risks, service obligations, and rules on the transfer of title. It outlines legislative trends across the post-Soviet jurisdictions: broader asset eligibility for concessioning; state support measures; investor protections, including free transfer of returns and compensation; and hybrid contractual structures, including production-sharing and remunerated management features. Dispute-resolution frameworks are assessed, encompassing pre-trial negotiation, domestic courts, international commercial arbitration, and clauses on waiver of sovereign immunity. The analysis suggests a steady contractualization of public functions under continuing regulatory oversight of tariffs and service quality, while noting that direct transplantation of “English” and “French” models presupposes mature institutional practice; a unified concession law approach appears the most feasible pathway to reconcile public interests with effective investor protection.