Social Sustainability in Projects: Using Social Procurement to Create Employment in the Swedish Construction Sector

Abstract

Social procurement can increase social sustainability by creating employment for marginalized people. This article investigates how project organizations perceive and handle the resources from and relationships with their main contractors and clients when implementing social procurement. Analyzing 20 semistructured interviews with actors working in Swedish construction projects, the findings show how resources are lacking and relationships are tenuous, but also that the innovative capacity of actors at the project level, in a bottom-up fashion, can overcome some of these issues. This article shows how sustainability initiatives are difficult to implement in projects, and what strategies actors use to cope.