This paper reviews the extent to which OECD countries have opened the provision of publicly funded services to competition among public and private suppliers. The paper lays out an analytical framework identifying the inherent incentive and efficiency issues associated with the provision of publicly funded services and outlines how they may be addressed via performance-related funding, benchmarking, contracting-out by public agencies and voucher schemes which allow users to choose among suppliers while maintaining public funding. Also, the empirical literature on contracting-out of technical and support services and on school choice is reviewed. In compulsory education, the provision mode is relatively uniform across OECD countries with most students by far attending public schools. However, the involvement of private institutions increase with education level and orientation towards occupational skills, and in many countries funding arrangements for public institutions are being ...