Can DSS promote ethical decision making? The case of public procurement

In recent times, managers have been faced with increasing levels of regulations which constrain their decision making and introduce unprecedented requirements for transparency and compliance. Public procurement, which is an important economic activity as well as a powerful governmental policy tool, is one area where the level of regulation has reached unparalleled proportions with serious implications for decision makers and organisations. This paper looks at public procurement in a European context to identify the implications of various legal frameworks for decision makers and for developers of decision support tools. Leveraging considerations proposed in current literature on the need for a critical approach in understanding the impact of information systems, it considers which role a DSS application could play in supporting managers engaged in public procurement. The paper concludes that public procurement creates a highly regulated setting for decision makers that goes well beyond simple constraints in how to select suppliers. There is therefore a critical role for DSS tools to play in shaping the decision making of managers engaged in PP decisions and in particular to promote ethical decisions.