The public purchasing profession revisited

This article revisits two vital questions largely ignored in the scholarly literature devoted to professionalism in government. First, is the public purchaser a professional? And second, is public purchasing a profession? Our reexamination of the first question led us to conclude that a public purchaser that meets certain requirements in government purchasing practices distinct from traits reserved for recognized traditional professions such as law, medicine and clergy can be a professional. Furthermore, when we analyzed the basic criteria that characterized a profession such as the existence of esoteric knowledge, rigorous formal training, codes of ethics, representative association, autonomy in practice, and criteria for admission into the occupation, we concluded that public purchasing is a profession.