Abstract:is a political scientist and senior researcher and at the Norwegian Institute for Urban and Regional Research (NIBR). His research concentrates on political and administrative processes in Russian and East European countries. He is currently the leader of a three-year international project on welfare reforms and political mobilisation in Russia. Vadim Kononenko currently works at the European Parliament's directorate general for external policies. His previous employment was with the Finnish Institute of Inter… Show more
“…Russian NGOs in the child welfare sphere thus tend to avoid open confrontation with their state counterparts. Indeed, as Davies et al (, p. 143) argue, for members of Russian governance networks “…willingness to work constructively with the state is the condition of being kept inside the network.” This non confrontational approach was highlighted by one of our respondents:We try to work within the logic of the government, so if it's a question of making decisions and putting pressure on the government we don't take a confrontational approach and say “you must do this and you must do it this way and this way!” We try to understand the logic of their position …”
Section: Russian Child Welfare Ngos As An Expert Communitymentioning
This article explores the issue of the major reform of the child welfare sector that has been carried out in Russia in recent years. Focusing on deinstitutionalization and a child's right to a family, this reform moves Russia in the direction of international trends in this area and represents a break with previous state‐ and institution‐dominated approach to “problem families.” The article explores how and why this process has come about in a traditionally top‐down hybrid regime and applies the Multiple Streams Framework first developed by Kingdon to argue that Russian child welfare nongovernmental organizations have acted in concert with government officials to act as policy entrepreneurs in framing the policy problem and presenting solutions to it in a way that has influenced national priorities in this area. At the same time, the article acknowledges that major challenges remain in terms of implementing the reform at the regional level of government in Russia.
“…Russian NGOs in the child welfare sphere thus tend to avoid open confrontation with their state counterparts. Indeed, as Davies et al (, p. 143) argue, for members of Russian governance networks “…willingness to work constructively with the state is the condition of being kept inside the network.” This non confrontational approach was highlighted by one of our respondents:We try to work within the logic of the government, so if it's a question of making decisions and putting pressure on the government we don't take a confrontational approach and say “you must do this and you must do it this way and this way!” We try to understand the logic of their position …”
Section: Russian Child Welfare Ngos As An Expert Communitymentioning
This article explores the issue of the major reform of the child welfare sector that has been carried out in Russia in recent years. Focusing on deinstitutionalization and a child's right to a family, this reform moves Russia in the direction of international trends in this area and represents a break with previous state‐ and institution‐dominated approach to “problem families.” The article explores how and why this process has come about in a traditionally top‐down hybrid regime and applies the Multiple Streams Framework first developed by Kingdon to argue that Russian child welfare nongovernmental organizations have acted in concert with government officials to act as policy entrepreneurs in framing the policy problem and presenting solutions to it in a way that has influenced national priorities in this area. At the same time, the article acknowledges that major challenges remain in terms of implementing the reform at the regional level of government in Russia.
“…In order to improve its policy output, the Russian regime practices a combination of hard and soft tools of governance. 'Vertical' modes such as hierarchy, coercion, and repression -'hard' tools deemed typical of non-democratic regimesare combined not only with attempts to initiate market-driven competition among actors and regions (in order to promote 'best' solutions and to test the competence and loyalty of political elites) but also with collaborative, 'softer' modes of governance (Berg-Nordlie et al 2018;Davies et al 2016;. At first glance, it appears somewhat counterintuitive to discover such complex 'patterns of the mix' (Davies 2011: 57) in non-democratic regimes, as they tend to attenuate the power of 'vertically' organized institutions.…”
mentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Whereas many contributions to governance networks are '…imbued with strong normativity regarding the phenomenon [they] describe[]…' (Berg-Nordlie et al 2018: 15), our approach is anchored in a more functionalist approach and applies the notion of resource exchange as an analytical framework. Early research on governance networks employed the argument that network-like collaborations between state and non-state actors emerge because both sides mutually depend on their respective resources (Rhodes 1997;Davies et al 2016). In fact, state actors often lack information, expertise, personnel, coordinative and implementation capacities, and access to hard-to-reach groups that non-state actors exclusively provide.…”
Due to weak state and administrative capacity, the Russian government has involved resource-rich non-state actors into policymaking since about 2005 and established numerous institutionalized platforms, networks, and forums. These networks mainly emerge on regional and local levels and are designed to generate policy advice, implement decisions, and contribute to output legitimacy. A crucial question is how the authorities govern and regulate these bodies under the terms of a hybrid regime. The paper sheds light on why and how state authorities interact with non-state actors and unravels functions and flavors of governance networks in Russia. Drawing on the empirical results of case studies on anti-drug policy conducted in the regions Samara and St Petersburg, the paper reveals that state dominance within networks is a significant characteristic, although authorities rarely apply explicit 'hard' tools of government onto collaborations with non-state actors. The paper also allows for theorizing on the role of governance networks in a hybrid regime.
“…But even when opposition parties get a considerable share of seats in the national assembly, the hybrid or competitive regime does not take the risk of letting the freely elected representative organ play an independent role. Instead, for the representative organs they "substitute" (Petrov, Lipman and Hale 2014) various types of consultative bodies composed of nonelected, individual members who are given the task of representing opinion, sector-specific insight and to a certain degree material interests (Davies et al 2016). Thus, the role of political parties is minimized.…”
Section: Recent Research On Political Party Supportmentioning
This review was commissioned by the Danish Institute for Parties and Democracy and carried out by the Norwegian Institute for Urban and Regional Research. Dr. Jørn Holm-Hansen was project leader and Dr. Marit Haug team member.The evaluation has been designed to allow for active participation of DIPD as well as the political parties and multi-party platforms taking part in DIPD projects. Fieldwork was carried out in Palestine and Kenya and Skype interviews made with partners in Egypt and Myanmar. The Norwegian Institute for Urban and Regional Research would like to thank all those having shared their time, information and insights with the evaluators. Special thanks to Ali Khilleh (Palestine) and Range Mwita (Kenya) for practical assistance and insightful input during fieldwork.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
