Managing stakeholder networks for a social license to build

Abstract

When construction projects are halted or slowed by conflicts with stakeholders, they have lost their social license. Social licenses are granted by stakeholder networks, which include community groups, among others. Project managers would benefit from approaches that can predict which groups or coalitions within the stakeholder network have sufficient influence and motivation to delay progress and that can suggest interventions to reduce that risk. We present an integration of theories and methods that has been successfully used in the extractive industries to maintain a high level of social license. We define the social license concept, noting its embeddedness in stakeholder theory and the resource dependence view of the firm, and how it has been elaborated enough to become measurable. Then we integrate it with social network analysis and methods for quantifying stakeholders’ issues and concerns. Key benefits are the ability to identify minority clusters that have sufficient influence to dominate the majority and the specification of network interventions to raise the level of social license. We use an example of a proposed housing project to illustrate how the proposed approach produces practical stakeholder relations strategies for gaining and maintaining a social license to build.