Theory building in public procurement
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JOPP-11-2018-017 |
| Pages | 282-305 |
| Published date | 05 November 2018 |
| Date | 05 November 2018 |
| Author | Kouliga Koala,Joshua Steinfeld |
| Subject Matter | Public policy & environmental management,Politics,Public adminstration & management,Government,Economics,Public finance/economics,Taxation/public revenue |
Theory building in
public procurement
Kouliga Koala and Joshua Steinfeld
School of Public Service, Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia, USA
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to examine the level of theory building in publicprocurement by
reviewing and classifying manuscripts published in the Journal of Public Procurement (JoPP) from 2001 to
2016.
Design/methodology/approach –The articles are divided into four important periods: discovery,
agenda setting, embracing and expansion and consolidation. The articles are classified according to a
hierarchicallevel of theory building composed of six levels: rapporteurs, reporters,testers, qualifiers, builders
and expanders.
Findings –Key findings indicatethat public procurement, in light of JoPP publications from 2001 to 2016, is
at the tester level. There is also increase in the classification of articles with high level of theoretical
contributionover time.
Keywords Public procurement, Theory building
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
As a relatively new field, public procurement scholarship is beginning to attract attention in
terms of its scholarly contributions. There are increasingly more and more articles in public
procurement being published; traditional public administration journals are recognizing the
value of scholarly contributions, and there is an emphasis of integrating public procurement
into academic programs. The interest and growth have not yet translated into a substantiated
body of theory for public procurement. This paper addresses the process of theory building in
public procurement. The articles published in the pre-eminent academic journal of the field,
Journal of Public Procurement (JoPP), are reviewed using a hierarchical level approach, and a
distinct presence of theories or theoretical content is found to exist. Meanwhile, there is a
significant presence of normative statements that serve as the foundational elements for the
field. This paper argues that public procurement is at its formulation stage, with a series of
theoretical lenses that help define the field; having gone through the stage where the main
question was whether theoretical content for the field was needed at all.
A dominance of normative statements in the literature shows that the field of public
procurement does not have its feet fully rooted into the theoretical world. It is important to
establish theories in public procurement so that actors and stakeholders in public
organizations can be strategic through prescriptive approaches that aim to promote good
governance. Despite the prevalence of normative approaches, this does not mean a lack of
progress towards developing a theory. In their search of theoretical rigor for public
procurement in JoPP,Flynn and Davis (2014) found that 50 of 172 articles(29 per cent) had
some theoretical approach.Even though this number is low, it signals an increase from2001
to 2013 (Flynn and Davis, 2014,p.142).
An important step before addressing the level of theory building is to understand what
theory building is. Lynham (2000) defined theory building as “a process or recurring cycle
JOPP
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Journalof Public Procurement
Vol.18 No. 4, 2018
pp. 282-305
© Emerald Publishing Limited
1535-0118
DOI 10.1108/JOPP-11-2018-017
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
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by which coherent descriptions, explanations, and representations of observed or
experienced phenomenaare generated, verified, and refined”(p. 162). Sutton and Staw (1995)
state that theory building entailsunderstanding of the processes that may need to be tested
and confirmed through methods. There are also numerous approaches to how theory
building takes place. Langley(1999) advocates for both inductive and deductive approaches
iteratively or simultaneously as inspiration guides the researcher to building on existing
constructs to develop new relationships fromdesign process research that selectively takes
concepts of different theoretical traditions and adapts them to the data at hand. Eisenhardt
and Graebner (2007) research the opportunities and challenges for theory building in case
studies and found that inductivetheory building from cases produces new theory from data
and deductive theory testing completes the cycle by using data to test theory (p. 25).
Eisenhardt (1989) argued that theory is developed “by combining observations from
previous literature, common sense, and experience”(p. 532). In a more defined approach,
Clarity (2010) argued thatconstruct clarity lies at the heart of theory building; that:
[...] clearly defined conceptual categories encourage researchers to generate more effective
research questions, apply appropriate and epistemologically consistent methods, and identify
exceptions to the categories that open opportunities for future research (p. 355).
Other factors that may be relevant to determining levels of theory building include the
length of time a discipline has been around and evaluating the theoretical incidence over
time (George and Jones, 2000).
The need for theory and the contribution articles should make thereto is not limited to
public procurement. The discussion occurs in the Journal of Purchasing and Supply
Management, Administrative Science Quarterly, Journal of Management, Academy of
Management Review and Human ResourceDevelopment Quarterly as well. Additionally, the
lack of plausible public budgeting theories has been addressed and analyzed by scholars
over the decades (Mitchell and Thurmaier,2012;Neuby, 1997;Straussman, 1985;Key, 1940).
The approach used in the aforementioned works has been to present a chronological
development of descriptive statements regarding the field of study and normative
statements that map professionalpractices. The chronology of literary contributionswill be
helpful to address the main questions of the paper: What is the level of theory building in
public procurement? Do these levels indicate the stage of theory formulation? First, there has
been a chronological, or set of steps, that the procurementliterature has followed beginning
with a re-examination of the state of public procurement(Thai, 2001, and also Callender and
Mathews, 2000;McCue and Gianakis, 2001;Prier and McCue, 2009;Steinfeld et al.,2015;
Steinfeld et al., 2016). Second,scholars (Flynn and Davis, 2014;McCue and Prier, 2008) have
discussed the lack of theory and observed some improvement in the use of theoretical and
scholarly approach and subsequentdevelopment. And third, there is a need for inquiry into
the traction of various approaches in characterizing the potential for a theory of public
procurement (Sniderand Rendon, 2008;Roman, 2013).
This paper will use a hierarchical approach to examine the current level of public
procurement theorybuilding. The JoPP is the largest contiguous collection of scholarly work
dedicated to public sector procurement.While other journals have documented the literature
on procurement in the private sector such as the Journal of Purchasing and Supply
Management, among others, public procurement is different because of the political factors
inherent to public sector studies (Murray, 1999;Quayle, 2000;Telgen et al.,2007;Phillips
et al.,2007). The first publication in JoPP appeared in 2001 hence this study considers the
period 2001-2016.
Public
procurement
283
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