Management for stakeholder approach for a socially sustainable governance of megaprojects

The purpose of this paper is to provide a brief overview from a multidisciplinary literature (organizational, political, sociological) on how to manage megaprojects in contemporary societies, focusing on the role of stakeholders engagement. Starting from the main points of weakness stated in literature on megaprojects failure, the paper analyzes these points from a sociological and political perspective in order to understand how to overcome these limits and increase the probability of megaprojects to succeed. Among these points the multi-stakeholder nature of megaprojects, the kind of actors involved and the difficulty to engage all of them to assure an inclusive participation along with a socially responsible model of governance, are emphasized. This conceptual paper refers to both social network and stakeholder theories to integrate the current theoretical body of literature in the field of project management. In particular, the approach of management-for-stakeholders is presented to complement the more traditional management-of-stakeholders. It allows to emphasize megaproject social responsibility and to promote a more comprehensive understanding of megaproject governance in a context of sustainable development.