Public Procurement, Innovation and Policy: International Perspectives

This book maps the latest developments in public procurement of innovation policy in various contexts and analyzes the evolution and development of the various policy solutions in broader institutional contexts. In doing so, it addresses significant theoretical and practical gaps: On the one hand, there is an emerging interest in public procurement as a policy tool for spurring innovation; yet on the other hand, the current theory, with some notable exceptions, is guided and often constrained by historical applications, above all in the defence industries. By carefully examining the cases of eleven countries, the book points to the existence of much more nuanced public procurement on the innovation policy landscape than has been acknowledged in the academic and policy debates to date.

Veiko Lember, PhD, is Senior Research Fellow in Public Management and Policy at Ragnar Nurkse School of Innovation and Governance, Tallinn University of Technology, Estonia. He is also a Managing Editor of the journal Halduskultuur-Administrative Culture. His main research interests are in public administration and innovation policy, and his recent works have covered issues such as public procurement of innovation, public-private partnerships, contracting-out and coordination in the public sector. His works have been published in various journals, e.g. in Urban Studies, Public Administration and Development, Journal of Public Procurement and Innovation: The European Journal of Social Science Research.

Rainer Kattel, PhD, is Professor and Chair of Innovation Policy and Technology Governance, and Head of Ragnar Nurkse School of Innovation and Governance at Tallinn University of Technology. He is also a co-director of its Technology Governance program, www.technologygovernance.eu. His main research area is industrial and innovation policies in catching-up economies, especially Central and Eastern Europe and Latin America. He has published extensively on innovation policy and development economics. His recent books include Ragnar Nurkse: Trade and Development (co-edited with Jan A. Kregel and Erik S. Reinert; Anthem, 2009) and Knowledge Governance: Reasserting the Public Interest (co-edited with Leonardo Burlamaqui and Ana Celia Castro; Anthem, 2012).

Tarmo Kalvet, PhD, is Senior Research Fellow in the field of innovation policy and technology governance at the Ragnar Nurkse School of Innovation and Governance, Tallinn University of Technology, Estonia. For many years, he was the founding head of the Innovation Policy Research Programme at the Praxis Centre for Policy Studies, Estonia’s leading policy think tank, as well as one of its board members. His main research interests are innovation policy (especially in small states), public procurement for innovation, and e-government, and he has published extensively on those topics in journals like Innovation: The European Journal of Social Science Research, Urban Studies, Electronic Government, Technology Analysis & Strategic Management and IEEE Computer Society.