Decision-making is primarily a process that involves different actors: people, groups of people, institutions and the state. As a discipline, multi-criteria decision-making has a relatively short history. Since 1950s and 1960s, when foundations of modern multi-criteria decision-making methods have been laid, many researches devoted their time to development of new multi-criteria decision-making models and techniques. In the past decades, researches and development in the field have accelerated and seem to continue growing exponentially. Despite the intensive development worldwide, few attempts have been made to systematically present the theoretical bases and developments of multi-criteria decision-making methods. However, the methodological choices and framework for assessment of decisions are still under discussion. The article describes the situation with reviews of MCDM/MADM methods. Furthermore, there is a need for research to study the strengths and weaknesses of different decision-making methods.

Risk assessment is one of the most important factors in achieving success in public-private partnership (PPP) projects. Some relationships between risks in freeway projects have been established. The occurrence of each risk can worsen the effects of others such as a negative impact of financial risks on construction risks. This paper is aimed at prioritizing significant risks in freeway PPP projects applying a fuzzy analytic network process (FANP) method for overcoming the problems of interdependencies and feedback among different risk-ranking alternatives. Data on the study have been collected through a literature review, an interview and a questionnaire survey distributed to experts in the field of freeway PPP projects. The obtained results have shown that financial, legal and political risks are the most significant groups, although improper design, changes in the value of granted lands and the termination of concession are the most important risks. The findings help with strengthening the capabilities of developing countries for risk management in freeway PPP projects.

Construction is a sector that accepts innovations slowly. Selection of effective technological systems in construction is a complex multi-criteria task. Many decision-makers refuse innovations once faced with similar difficulties. The article presents an original approach towards a development of multi-criteria assessment and ranking technique for alternatives of technology in construction. The problem was solved using different well-known MCDM methods ELECTRE IV and MULTIMOORA. Three hybrid methods SWARA-TOPSIS, SWARA-ELECTRE III, SWARA-VIKOR were used to solve the same problem. Priority of considered alternatives was determined based on the average of alternatives performance rank. The article presents a practical case study on evaluation of different alternatives for public buildings refurbishment using typical and novel thermal insulation technologies for facades. Research results demonstrate that novel facades thermal insulation alternatives for facades have a higher performance level than commonly used ones.

Mining operations usually comprise a spread spectrum of environmental challenges, which are often unique to each mine site. This is due to the fact that mining activities, directly or indirectly, have an adverse impact on environment and ecology. For this reason, the environmental impact assessment (EIA) process has been developed for evaluation of the possible impact of mine development and operations on the environment, including the natural, social and economic aspects. In this article, an EIA methodology based on analytic network process and fuzzy simple additive weight (SAW) is proposed to formulate the environmental risks pertaining to mining projects. In the system of the proposed model, the importance weights are calculated by an ANP process. Then, fuzzy SAW is employed to evaluate the preference ratings of the alternatives. The merit of using fuzzy logic is to handle the inherent uncertainty in modelling an EIA problem by simplifying the sophisticated structure of the problem under consideration. The proposed model is utilised to assess the environmental impact generated by zinc and lead mining projects located in Zanjan, Iran to shape the future industrial and mining structure of the region. Finally, the environmental impacts are ranked from the most to the least risky.

Abstract. The construction sector constantly offers new products, more effective technologies and novel solutions aimed at improvement of the quality of human habitats and wider distribution of technologies. Currently, effective technologies that require less time and costs for production, installation and use are gaining greater significance. Among them are construction materials and technologies with increasingly popular sustainability features. Considering the above, the article offers a complex algorithm for assessing the deployment and distribution potential of a new technology/product. For this purpose, a multi-stage model of alternatives and criteria was suggested and an analytical multi-stage evaluation model has been designed. The practical example illustrates the assessment of micro environment using a combination of AHP (Analytic Hierarchy Process) and Permutation methods. The designed multi-criteria assessment model promotes accessibility of users to a technology, new product, a part of the product and a technological process.