E-procurement and Arctic infrastructural geography: challenges of e-governance in the Russian Arctic

Abstract

ABSTRACT Everyday life in the Arctic has become increasingly digitalized. The academic discussion around it focuses on three aspects: digital infrastructures and access; digital promises; and digitalization risks and challenges to human security. The existing critical research on e-governance in the Arctic has been done in the North American and European Arctic, while digital governance in the Russian Arctic has mostly remained beyond the scope of research. In this article, we aim to fill the gap by demonstrating how Russian Arctic infrastructural geography affects digital governance in the region. To achieve this goal, we used a mixed methods approach. First, to grasp the structural differences between Arctic and non-Arctic Russia, we analyzed open data from the Russian e-procurement system concerning the share of contracts with local suppliers, the percentage of terminated contracts, and indicators of contract time sensitivity. Second, to explore the mechanics of e-procurement in the Arctic, we gathered interviews with procurers working in state organizations in three remote settlements in different parts of the Russian Arctic: The Republic of Sakha (Yakutia), Krasnoyarsk Krai, and Arkhangelsk region. By combining these data, we produce a detailed picture of e-procurement across the differentiated Russian Arctic infrastructural geography.