Conclusion: Lessons from Military Procurement for Procurement Studies

Abstract

Procurement is a hugely important but understudied aspect of public policy-making, broaching the borders between it and cognate fields such as public administration and, in the case of defence procurement between public policy studies writ large and areas such as war and defence studies. The military field, however, provides an excellent set of empirical cases for the examination of some of the most problematic types of procurement—those involving large, multi-year purchases, such as the construction of megaprojects like hydroelectric dams and nuclear power stations, which share the same characteristics as do the acquisition of large complex weapon systems like warships and aircraft. This book represents an effort to bring together the insights of different fields from public management to defence studies in order to shed light on the background of some of the largest procurement projects in Canadian and Australian history, and also to advance thinking and research on the subject of procurement more generally.