This is a contribution to the debate on the contractual nature of subcontracting in the construction industry by arguing, contrary to certain views in the literature on institutional and construction economics, that the Coasian firm-market dichotomy is not blurred or pointless. By reference to...

This study involves an investigation of a hospital project which adopted an 'enhanced design and build' form of building procurement. The paper assesses the procurement system from the perspectives of the client, client's consultants, contractor, contractor's consultants, and contractor's...

This paper focuses on the environmental issues associated with the building construction process and the way in which they are currently represented in building environmental assessment methods. The primary goal is to identify the practical and methodological reasons for their scant inclusion...

Treatment of correlation between variables is necessary for deriving any theoretical distribution of the project cost of buildings. This paper highlights some often ignored theoretical requirements necessary for a rigorous treatment of correlations. The condition for a positive definite...

Applying the principles of sustainability to human activities ultimately must result in the scrutiny of all sectors of economic activity to assess the changes required to provide for a high quality of life for future generations. A high priority for evaluation, in the light of its impacts on...

In the construction industry demand drives the design process and as a result design is structured in order to respond to this demand. However, what happens when this demand breaks down, when traditional markets are saturated, and no feasible alternative arises? Will this sector be capable of...

This paper addresses the 'innovativeness' (the extent to which the design of the organization facilitates or inhibits innovation) of French and British project organizations. Following a review of the literature on organization design and innovativeness, data from a comparative organizational...

Client driven 'pushes' for ISO 9000 certification in Hong Kong are observed to have overtaken any spontaneous 'pull factors' (motivators) towards quality improvements 'for their own sake'. For example, the need for ISO 9000 certification as a prerequisite for even being considered for public...

Erecting a structure in a construction project involves the use of a number of complex, interacting processes. Systematic analysis of these processes is essential for ensuring that they are executed in the most efficient way possible. However, traditional tools like CPM and PERT and other...

The comparison of two or more risky projects is more of a challenge than the evaluation of one project in isolation. In the numerous decision models and methods suggested in the literature, often it is assumed that the criteria as well as the decision maker's preference or utility function can...