Public Procurement of Critical Services (ProCrits)

It will include perspectives of law and economy, and the dynamics of the tendering process for the organizational qualities that are important for resilience.

Even though procurement regulation recently was revised to take account of important societal values (environmental issues, social responsibility and worker rights, see Norwegian public procurement act §5), societal safety and inter-organizational collaboration remain absent in procurement regulation.

The ProCrits project will enhance the understanding of conditions for and consequences of different models of coordination, policy instruments and management tools, and how private actors contribute to societal security.

Specifically, the project will generate new in-depth knowledge in

1. transport of critically ill people
2. security and preparedness services

Knowledge generated in the project will be discussed with Norwegian policy makers and industry.

Law and safety

Importantly, by combining law studies with specialists on organizational safety, linking empirical research results to legal analysis of international and Norwegian law, the project will develop knowledge with relevance for public procurement legislation and practices across sectors.

By including two PhD projects ProCrits will establish a national research collaboration between UiS, UiO and NTNU Social research. Further, the Norwegian partners will collaborate with a strong international network of research competence within the field.

About ProCrits

The full title of the project is "Public Procurement of Critical Services - Analysis of Effects on Societal Safety". It is a SAMRISK project with a budget of nearly 14m NOK.

ProCrits is coordinated by associate professor Kenneth Arne Pettersen Gould at Department of Safety, Economics and Planning and will run until 2023.