Strategic objectives in public procurement, such as environmental or social considerations, are being increasingly referred to under the umbrella term of sustainable public procurement (SPP). The concept of sustainability is intrinsically multidimensional, encompassing environmental, social, and economic aspects. However, the existing literature on SPP highlights the generalization that the regulation and practices of public procurement are biased toward the environmental dimension. There is conflicting evidence from countries in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) that calls for further investigation. Analyzing how SPP is actually constituted in SSA and contrasting it with the situation in the European Union (EU), as a spotlight on the Global South and North, contributes to a better understanding of sustainability in public procurement. The comparative analysis will help with understanding processes related to the integration or disintegration of sustainability dimensions in SPP. Our results indicate a contrary orientation on the environmental and the social dimensions in the EU and SSA. Although there is no sign of a comprehensive integration of all dimensions in SPP, there are developments toward the integration of the ‘missing’ dimension in the respective regional setting. Thus, at the moment, achieving a multidimensional implementation of SPP appears to be more a matter of expanding SPP practices of the ‘missing’ dimension than of pushing for integrated concepts.

Public procurement refers to the purchasing of goods, services and works by governments and public authorities. Given the difficulty in defining a common core of social considerations applicable to the generality of public contracts, this paper aims at proposing a distinction between two categories of social objectives: on the one hand, the promotion of work standards and fundamental human rights as a hard core, and on the other hand, the promotion of inclusion and supplier diversity as a further step of the social-oriented approach. This concerns not only the mere procurement process but also the entire supply chain, leading to distinguish between the basic responsible supply chain involving the respect of internationally recognised human and labour rights, and the pro-active responsible supply chain promoting inclusion and supplier diversity. Based on this distinction, this paper analyses if basic working conditions and fundamental rights can be generally taken into account in public procurement. Implications of this assumption affect different levels of the procurement process and policy: from policy considerations to tender design, from economic efficiency matters to monitoring issues.