Public Procurement and the Public.Private Value Conflict in the Transport Sector - A Research Model

Abstract

It may be contested that a citizen in today’s Sweden is seen as equal part citizen equal part customer in the eyes of those supplying common societal functions. This comes following the privatization of a multitude of public sectors, giving profit-seeking private companies an increased role in the supply of traditionally public goods and services. In the public transport sector, private traffic companies hold public procurement contracts with the county traffic authority who through such contracts are able to place demands on how the traffic service is to be supplied. However, theoretically, the public and private actors stand on conflicting value foundations, with the public entity placing focus on social values and the private company economic values. Does this then mean that the employees supplying traffic services may deviate from conditions placed in procurement documents and instead follow a more economically inclined decision-making process, ultimately affecting the citizens/consumers of society? In this study, a research model is developed to be used towards the end of exploring the existence of value conflicts within any case involving public procurement. The focus is thus on the decisions made and the values held by those employees directly supplying the service (hands-on employees). The research model is created through a discussion of theory and method; it is tested using a case from the Swedish public transport industry; and it is altered and finalized based on insights from the test-phase. The resulting research model, dubbed the Public-Private Values in Public Procurement (PPVPP) research model, is thus created to be used by researchers as well as for evaluations of specific public procurement cases in which value-conflicts may be of interest.