The organizational reform New Public Management has caused new types of organizations, privatization of the public sector and partnerships with private actors. This development has resulted in a need for private actors to be suppliers for what used to be public services. These public-private partnerships are not by any chance new in Sweden, but fairly unstudied concerning the area of accountability. Much of the literature concerning accountability is focused on public accountability, and this study aims to analyze how the media exercises accountability when scandals including public-private partnerships are involved. Based on theories of how media exercises different mechanisms for accountability the study seeks to acquire knowledge of how media uses these mechanisms for accountability to criticize public and private actors when these are in a partnership. Based on a qualitative methodology a content analysis was conducted through cases chosen by a theoretical category. The cases that are analyzed are the Stockholm County Council and the sock scandal, the Migrations Agency and Ocean Gala and the corruption scandal between the City of Gothenburg and Hero Sverige AB. The result of the study showed that the media uses more of the accountability mechanisms than judging as it was described in the theoretical framework, but also that media was exercising these mechanisms more often against the public actors than the private actors.
Suggested future research includes further investigation including public-private partnerships and how these are perceived by both the media and the public. This study has shown an indicator that private actors are not put as much under pressure as public actors when a failed partnership is reported on by the media. Therefore, an evolved theory including this indicator needs to be developed.