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As above, not so below: developing social procurement practices on strategic and operative levels
Department of Technology Management and Economics, Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden.
University of Skövde, School of Business. University of Skövde, Enterprises for the Future Research Environment. (Medarbetarskap och organisatorisk resiliens, Followership and organizational resilience (FORE))ORCID iD: 0000-0002-1989-2745
2021 (English)In: Equality, Diversity and Inclusion, ISSN 2040-7149, E-ISSN 2040-7157, Vol. 40, no 3, p. 242-258Article in journal (Refereed) Published
Abstract [en]

Purpose

Procurement is increasingly used as a strategic tool to mitigate societal issues such as social exclusion and unemployment of marginalized groups. By conducting social procurement and imposing so-called employment requirements, organizations can create job opportunities for marginalized people. Such practices are becoming increasingly popular in the construction sector, but remain scattered, which hinders the effective creation, use and dissemination of cohesive and commonly shared social procurement practices. Accordingly, this paper analyzes the creation, use and dissemination of social procurement practices in the Swedish construction sector.

Design/methodology/approach

The theory of proto-institutions, which refers to institutions under development, is applied to analyze 46 interviews with construction practitioners.

Findings

There is currently little convergence of social procurement practices, due to practices not being fully internalized across organizations and projects; interns hired through employment requirements not having strong enough incentives to engage with their internships; actors working strategically and operatively having different possibilities to create social procurement practices; and the development of maintenance mechanisms for the formalization of sustainable practices being weak.

Originality/value

This paper contextualizes efforts to increase equality, diversity and inclusion of marginalized groups in the construction sector. The adoption of an institutional perspective of practice development elucidates the institutional constellation of existing institutional logics that impact on this practice development. This paper also indicates how the work with social procurement can become more effective and efficient and maximize the social value output for marginalized people living in social exclusion. For institutional theory, it illustrates how proto-institutions can be driven by both top-down and bottom-up perspectives.

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
Emerald Group Publishing Limited, 2021. Vol. 40, no 3, p. 242-258
Keywords [en]
Construction, Practices, Employment requirements, Institutional work, Proto-institutions, Social procurement, Sweden
National Category
Business Administration
Research subject
Followership and Organizational Resilience
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:his:diva-18950DOI: 10.1108/EDI-03-2020-0054ISI: 000566033700001Scopus ID: 2-s2.0-85089857520OAI: oai:DiVA.org:his-18950DiVA, id: diva2:1461473
Note

Publication date: 26 August 2020

Available from: 2020-08-26 Created: 2020-08-26 Last updated: 2021-03-23Bibliographically approved

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Andersson, Thomas

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