This article assesses the institutional prescriptions of adaptive (co-)management based on a literature review of the (water) governance literature. The adaptive (co-)management literature contains four institutional prescriptions: collaboration in a polycentric governance system, public participation, an experimental approach to resource management, and management at the bioregional scale. These prescriptions largely resonate with the theoretical and empirical insights embedded in the (water) governance literature. However, this literature also predicts various problems. In particular, attention is called to the complexities associated with participation and collaboration, the difficulty of experimenting in a real-world setting, and the politicized nature of discussion on governance at the bioregional scale. We conclude this article by outlining a common research agenda that invites the collaborative efforts of adaptive (co-)management and governance scholars.
ABSTRACT. This special feature aims to further our understanding of the way in which transitions occur in water management. We contend that if we want to understand such transitions, we need to understand policy change and its opposite, policy stability. These issues have attracted considerable academic attention. Our interest is, however, very specific and thereby unique: we review the role that (groups of) individuals play in the process of preparing, instigating, and implementing policy change. In this article, a review of the literature on policy change provides the basis from which we extract a set of strategies which are available to policy entrepreneurs. The questions for the rest of this special feature are first, can we detect the influence of policy entrepreneurs in actual cases of major policy change, and second, which strategies have they actually used to affect policy change?
This paper discusses sixteen instances of radical water policy change across the globe. The key question we seek to answer is about the role of individuals in such transitions. 'We call these individuals 'policy entrepreneurs' and we suggest that they can affect transitions through a set of strategies, such as idea development, coalition building, the detection and exploitation of v^^indows of opportunity, network management, and venue shopping. Our empirical analysis shows that individuals do contribute to transitions. They do so in collectives, dividing tasks over various members. The way in which they manage to affect transitions depends, at least partly, on the institutional setting they operate in. Some national policy systems offer better opportunities for centralized direction (and thus top-down pattern of transitions) whilst other systems offer better chances for bottom-up change. In either case, change has to be prepared for before windows of opportunity open. One way to prepare change is to instigate pilot projects, showing the feasibility of other approaches to water management. Policy change is a political game: networks must he built, issues need to be framed strategically, forums manipulated or hy-passed, and strategies adjusted to the peculiarities of the institutional system the entrepreneur is working in.
Adaptation to climate change raises important governance issues. Notwithstanding the increasing attention on climate adaptation at the global and European level, the variety of local conditions and climate impacts points towards a prime role for regional actors in climate change adaptation. They face the challenge of developing and implementing adaptation options and increasing the adaptive capacity of regions so that expected or unexpected impacts of future climate change can be addressed. This paper presents a conceptual framework to analyse the regional governance of climate adaptation. It addresses the following key questions: (1) What are the distinct challenges for the regional governance of climate adaptation? (2) Which concepts can guide the design of new governance arrangements and strategies? (3) What challenges to legal principles are posed by the climate? (4) What research methods are suitable for developing and testing governance arrangements and strategies? We present a framework designed to address each of these questions; it has analytical, design, normative, and methodological components. In the paper, examples from the Dutch regional governance of climate adaptation serve as illustrations of the conceptual argumentation.
Abstract. The European Union (EU) has sought to lead the world in the adoption of ambitious climate change mitigation targets and policies. In an attempt to characterize and broadly explain the resulting pattern of EU climate governance, scholars have advanced the term "multi-level reinforcement." This helps to account for the paradoxical situation whereby the EU seeks to lead by example but is itself a relatively leaderless system of governance.Drawing on a much fuller empirical account of the evolution of EU climate governance, this article finds that the term captures some but not all aspects of the EU"s approach. It identifies four other paradoxical features of the EU"s approach and assesses the extent to which they exhibit "multi-level reinforcement." It concludes by looking forwards and examining the extent to which all five features are expected to enable and/or constrain the EU"s ability to maintain a leading position.
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