Agents, Techniques, and Tools of Projectification

Abstract

While previous research on projectification tends to focus on why processes of projectification emerge and in what contexts, this chapter use the example of European Union (EU) project funding in Swedish local government to analyse and understand how processes of projectification unfold in terms of transformation and adaptation. Key agents in processes of projectification are located and how these agents work and with what techniques and tools are described and analysed. It is argued that processes of projectification unfold through the workings of agents sharing, at the same time as constructing, a project funding market in which they mediate between EU funding and possible EU projects. The EU project funding market is held together by mediating agents and their application of policy techniques and tools of information, roadmaps/policies, collaborations/networks, courses, and consultation. Processes of projectification are as such triggered by project-supporting incentives created top-down at the same time as several bottom-up initiatives trigger the same phenomenon. As a result, projectification is understood not only as an increasing use of EU projects but as processes of transformation and adaptation where agents create project strategies, project models, engage in project networks and train staff in project management and project methodology to handle forthcoming projects. (Less)