Collaborative governance

Last updated

Governance is a broader concept than government and also includes the roles played by the community sector and the private sector in managing and planning countries, regions and cities. [1] Collaborative governance involves the government, community and private sectors communicating with each other and working together to achieve more than any one sector could achieve on its own. Ansell and Gash (2008) have explored the conditions required for effective collaborative governance. They say "The ultimate goal is to develop a contingency approach of collaboration that can highlight conditions under which collaborative governance will be more or less effective as an approach to policy making and public management" [2] Collaborative governance covers both the informal and formal relationships in problem solving and decision-making. Conventional government policy processes can be embedded in wider policy processes by facilitating collaboration between the public, private and community sectors. [3] Collaborative Governance requires three things, namely: support; leadership; and a forum. The support identifies the policy problem to be fixed. The leadership gathers the sectors into a forum. Then, the members of the forum collaborate to develop policies, solutions and answers. [4]

Contents

There are many different forms of collaborative governance as such as Consensus Building and a Collaborative Network:

History

Over the past two decades new collaborative approaches to governing and managing have developed in a range of fields, including: urban and regional planning; public administration and law; natural resource management; and environmental management. Collaborative governance has emerged as a response to the failures of government policy implementation and to the high cost and politicization of regulation and as an alternative to managerialism and adversarial approaches. [5] The field of public administration has changed its focus from bureaucracy to that of collaboration in the context of the network society. Public administrators have blurred the lines between the people, the private sector and the government. Although bureaucracies still remain, public administrators have begun to recognize that more can potentially be achieved by collaboration and networking. [6] Collaboration and partnerships are nothing new in the political realm, however the wider use of this leadership style has gained momentum in recent years. In part, this is a response to neoliberalism with its focus on the primacy of the free-market economy and the private sector.

Definitions

Ansell and Gash (2008) define collaborative governance as follows: [7]

'A governing arrangement where one or more public agencies directly engage non-state stakeholders in a collective decision-making process that is formal, consensus-oriented, and deliberative and that aims to make or implement public policy or manage public programs or assets'.

This definition involves six criteria: (1) the forum is initiated by public agencies; (2) participants in the forum include non-state actors; (3) participants engage in decision making and are not merely consulted; (4) the forum is formally organized; (5) the forum aims to make decisions by consensus; and (6) the focus of collaboration is on public policy or public management. Emerson, Nabatchi and Balogh (2012) have developed a less normative and less restrictive definition, as follows: [8]

'The processes and structures of public policy decision making and management that engage people constructively across the boundaries of public agencies, levels of government, and/or the public, private and civic spheres in order to carry out a public purpose that could not otherwise be accomplished.'.

This framework definition is a broader analytic concept and does not limit collaborative governance to state-initiated arrangements and to engagement between government and non-government sectors. For example, the definition encompasses collaboration between governments at different levels and hybrid partnerships initiated by the private or community sectors.

Advantages of Collaborative Governance

The intent of collaborative governance is to improve the overall practice and effectiveness of public administration. The advantages of effective collaborative governance are that it enables a better and shared understanding of complex problems involving many stakeholders and allows these stakeholders to work together and agree on solutions. It can help policy makers identify and target problems and deliver action more effectively. Stakeholders that are involved in developing a solution are more inclined to accept directions given or decisions made. It can thus serve as a way to identify policy solutions that have greater traction in the community. Additionally, it can contribute new perspectives on issues and policy solutions and thus offer new ways to implement strategies for change. For public officials who work in administration and management, collaborative governance can serve as a way of genuinely allowing a wider array of ideas and suggestions in the policy process. It may also be used to test ideas and analyze responses before implementation. For those who are not involved in formal government, it allows them to better understand the inner workings of government and carry more influence in the decision making process. It also enables them to see beyond government institutions being merely a vehicle for service delivery. They are able to feel ownership and a closer relationship to the system, further empowering them to be agents within institutional decision making. [9] For both public and private sectors, a commitment to collaboration is likely to drive organizational change and affect resource reallocation. Other advantages include combining relevant skills and capacities, as well as allowing specialization. Overall, collaborative governance can lead to mutual learning and shared experiences, while also providing direction for institutional capacity building inside and outside agencies and organizations. [10]

Disadvantages of Collaborative Governance

The disadvantages of collaborative governance in relation to complex problems are that the process is time consuming, it may not reach agreement on solutions, and the relevant government agencies may not implement the agreed solutions. In a complex structure with many entities working together, individual roles can become unclear and confusing. Some individuals act largely in a personal capacity, while others may act on behalf of agencies or organizations. Powerful stakeholder groups may seek to manipulate the process. Stakeholders can also begin to feel 'stakeholder fatigue', a feeling they get when they are repeatedly consulted by different agencies on similar issues. This kind of dynamic can be burdensome and time consuming. [9] Structural issues also affect agendas and outcomes. Open structures with loose leadership and membership allow multiple participants to gain access to a fast expanding agenda. Achieving goals in such a wide agenda becomes more difficult as an increasing number of players struggle to resolve differences and coordinate actions. Furthermore, challenges arise for implementation when representatives are allowed to come and go with no real obligations to other collaborators. Accountability of participating members, unequal or hidden agendas, trust between members, power imbalances, and language and cultural barriers are all issues that can arise in collaborative government regimes. Critics argue that collaborative governance does not provide the institutional stability and consistency required, and therefore deters progress. [11] The work of Ansell and Gash (2008) and Emerson, Nabatchi and Balogh (2012) seeks to understand these issues and challenges and identify the social and process conditions required for effective collaborative governance.

Social Applications

Collaborative governance has been used to address many complex social, environmental and urban planning issues, including: flood crisis management and urban growth management in Australia; community visioning and planning in New Zealand; and public participation in the redesign of the Ground Zero site in New York. [12]

In the UK, the USA and countries across much of Western Europe, governments have attempted to shift the focus towards various forms of co-production with other agencies and sectors and with citizens themselves in order to increase civic participation. [13] The classic forms of hierarchical governance and representative democracy are seen as inefficient when it comes to engaging citizens and making them a part of the decision making process. Large projects and initiatives require involvement and communication with not only citizens but partnerships with other government and non-government agencies and, in some instances, international cooperation with foreign governments and organizations. For example, managing the growing number of official and non-official crossings of the US-Mexico border has required input from all levels of US and Mexican governments, multiple government agencies (like U.S. Forest Services and U.S. Border Patrol), land management, and other non-federal agencies for social affairs. All of these parties had to communicate and collaborate to address issues of border security and protecting natural resources. As a result, the U.S. Border Patrol and Forest Services successfully enacted the terms of the 2006 memorandum of understanding, creating inter-agency forums, increasing field coordination and joint operations, and constructing fences and other tactical infrastructure. [14]

Governing and managing large and growing metropolitan urban areas, covering numerous local governments and various levels of State and National governments, provides many governance challenges and opportunities. [15] Abbott has reviewed metropolitan planning in South East Queensland (SEQ), Australia where collaborative governance arrangements, between State and local governments and the regional community, have evolved over a 20-year period leading to positive outputs and outcomes. [16]

The positive outputs and outcomes of collaborative governance and metropolitan planning in SEQ have been extensive and broad and extend well beyond statutory regional land use planning.

These include: three endorsed non-statutory regional plans; two endorsed statutory regional plans; an infrastructure program linked to the State budget; regional sectoral plans for transport, water supply, natural resource management, etc.; new legislation and institutional arrangements for metropolitan governance; and capital works such as the SEQ busway network.

India

The Government of India launched the Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) program in 1975 to ensure appropriate growth and development of all children but this implementation was weak. To improve, in the city of Mumbai, they partnered up with a non-profit Society for Nutrition, Education and Health Action (SNEHA), to build a child nutrition program for care and prevention of acute malnutrition. This partnership also included the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) to team up with their Nutritional Rehabilitation and Research Centre (NRRC) at Lokmanya Tilak Municipal General Hospital. The collaboration between SNEHA, a non-state actor, and ICDS and MCGM, state actors, led to what is considered the only large-scale successful program that implemented community- based approaches to identify, treat, and prevent wasting in urban informal settlements of India. [17]

See also

Related Research Articles

Public policy is an institutionalized proposal or a decided set of elements like laws, regulations, guidelines, and actions to solve or address relevant and real-world problems, guided by a conception and often implemented by programs. Public policy can be considered to be the sum of a government's direct and indirect activities and has been conceptualized in a variety of ways.

Development communication refers to the use of communication to facilitate social development. Development communication engages stakeholders and policy makers, establishes conducive environments, assesses risks and opportunities and promotes information exchange to create positive social change via sustainable development. Development communication techniques include information dissemination and education, behavior change, social marketing, social mobilization, media advocacy, communication for social change, and community participation.

Policy analysis is a technique used in the public administration sub-field of political science to enable civil servants, nonprofit organizations, and others to examine and evaluate the available options to implement the goals of laws and elected officials. The process is also used in the administration of large organizations with complex policies. It has been defined as the process of "determining which of various policies will achieve a given set of goals in light of the relations between the policies and the goals."

Governance is the process of making and enforcing decisions within an organization or society. It is the process of interactions through the laws, social norms, power or language as structured in communication of an organized society over a social system. It is done by the government of a state, by a market, or by a network. It is the process of choosing the right course among the actors involved in a collective problem that leads to the creation, reinforcement, or reproduction of acceptable conduct and social order". In lay terms, it could be described as the political processes that exist in and between formal institutions.

In a corporation, a stakeholder is a member of "groups without whose support the organization would cease to exist", as defined in the first usage of the word in a 1963 internal memorandum at the Stanford Research Institute. The theory was later developed and championed by R. Edward Freeman in the 1980s. Since then it has gained wide acceptance in business practice and in theorizing relating to strategic management, corporate governance, business purpose and corporate social responsibility (CSR). The definition of corporate responsibilities through a classification of stakeholders to consider has been criticized as creating a false dichotomy between the "shareholder model" and the "stakeholders model" or a false analogy of the obligations towards shareholders and other interested parties.

Electronic participation (e-participation) is ICT-supported participation in processes involving government and citizens. Processes may concern administration, service delivery, decision making and policy making. E-participation is hence closely related to e-government and e-governance participation. The need for the term has emerged as citizen interests and interaction with political service providers have increasingly become digitized due to the rise of e-government.

Public participation, also known as citizen participation or patient and public involvement, is the inclusion of the public in the activities of any organization or project. Public participation is similar to but more inclusive than stakeholder engagement.

Watershed management is the study of the relevant characteristics of a watershed aimed at the sustainable distribution of its resources and the process of creating and implementing plans, programs and projects to sustain and enhance watershed functions that affect the plant, animal, and human communities within the watershed boundary. Features of a watershed that agencies seek to manage to include water supply, water quality, drainage, stormwater runoff, water rights and the overall planning and utilization of watersheds. Landowners, land use agencies, stormwater management experts, environmental specialists, water use surveyors and communities all play an integral part in watershed management.

Network governance is "interfirm coordination that is characterized by organic or informal social system, in contrast to bureaucratic structures within firms and formal relationships between them. The concepts of privatization, public private partnership, and contracting are defined in this context." Network governance constitutes a "distinct form of coordinating economic activity" which contrasts and competes with markets and hierarchies.

Inclusive management is a pattern of practices by public managers that facilitate the inclusion of public employees, experts, the public, and politicians in collaboratively addressing public problems or concerns of public interest.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Strengthening Participatory Organization</span>

Strengthening Participatory Organization is the largest rights-based national support organization in Pakistan working since 1994 to strengthen and support community organizations and public interest institutions for promotion of democratic governance, social justice, peace and social harmony. SPO engages civil society networks, faith-based organisations and groups representing a wide range of stakeholders.

Stakeholder engagement is the process by which an organization involves people who may be affected by the decisions it makes or can influence the implementation of its decisions. They may support or oppose the decisions, be influential in the organization or within the community in which it operates, hold relevant official positions or be affected in the long term.

Environmental governance (EG) consist of a system of laws, norms, rules, policies and practices that dictate how the board members of an environment related regulatory body should manage and oversee the affairs of any environment related regulatory body which is responsible for ensuring sustainability (sustainable development) and manage all human activities—political, social and economic. Environmental governance includes government, business and civil society, and emphasizes whole system management. To capture this diverse range of elements, environmental governance often employs alternative systems of governance, for example watershed-based management.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Collaborative e-democracy</span> Political concept based on a collaborative policymaking process

Collaborative e-democracy is a democratic conception that combines key features of direct democracy, representative democracy, and e-democracy. The concept was first published at two international academic conferences in 2009.

Type II partnerships were developed at the Johannesburg World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002. Arising in opposition to the state-centred eco-governmentality of previous approaches to sustainable development policy, the partnerships facilitate the inclusion of private and civil actors into the management of sustainable development. The partnerships are employed alongside traditional intergovernmental mechanisms in order to effectively implement the United Nations' Agenda 21 and Millennium Development Goals, particularly at sub-national level. Although widely acknowledged as one of the most innovative and effective developments in global environmental governance in recent years, the partnerships have faced criticism due to fears of a lack of accountability, and the risk that they may exacerbate inequalities of power between Northern and Southern states. Despite these reservations, there is a general consensus among state and non-governmental actors that Type II partnerships are a significantly progressive step in global environmental governance in general, and sustainable development discourse in particular.

Ocean governance is the conduct of the policy, actions and affairs regarding the world's oceans. Within governance, it incorporates the influence of non-state actors, i.e. stakeholders, NGOs and so forth, therefore the state is not the only acting power in policy making. However, ocean governance is complex because much of the ocean is a commons that is not ‘owned’ by any single person or nation/state. There is a belief more strongly in the US than other countries that the “invisible hand” is the best method to determine ocean governance factors. These include factors such as what resources we consume, what price we should pay for them, and how we should use them. The underlying reasoning behind this is the market has to have the desire in order to promote environmental protection, however this is rarely the case. This term is referred to as a market failure. Market failures and government failures are the leading causes of ocean governance complications. As a result, humankind has tended to overexploit marine resources, by treating them as shared resources while not taking equal and collective responsibilities in caring for them.

Multistakeholder governance is a practice of governance that employs bringing multiple stakeholders together to participate in dialogue, decision making, and implementation of responses to jointly perceived problems. The principle behind such a structure is that if enough input is provided by multiple types of actors involved in a question, the eventual consensual decision gains more legitimacy, and can be more effectively implemented than a traditional state-based response. While the evolution of multistakeholder governance is occurring principally at the international level, public-private partnerships (PPPs) are domestic analogues.

Collaborative partnerships are agreements and actions made by consenting organizations to share resources to accomplish a mutual goal. Collaborative partnerships rely on participation by at least two parties who agree to share resources, such as finances, knowledge, and people. Organizations in a collaborative partnership share common goals. The essence of collaborative partnership is for all parties to mutually benefit from working together.

Communicative planning is an approach to urban planning that gathers stakeholders and engages them in a process to make decisions together in a manner that respects the positions of all involved. It is also sometimes called collaborative planning among planning practitioners or collaborative planning model.

Maritime anti-corruption initiatives have emerged in the last decade as a response to the growing threat of transnational corruption in the maritime domain, specifically the shipping industry. While historically, national authorities would handle corruption domestically, the increasingly international nature of shipping and corruption have led to private and public actors engaging in collective initiatives, typically manifesting through the work of the Maritime Anti-Corruption Network.

References

  1. ↑ Phares, Donald (ed) (2004) Metropolitan Governance without Metropolitan Government? Ashgate Publishing, Aldershot UK.
  2. ↑ Ansell, Chris &, Alison Gash (2008). "'Collaborative Governance in Theory and Practice' Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, 18(4): 543-571" (PDF).
  3. 1 2 3 Bradley, Quintin. "A 'Performative' Social Movement: The Emergence of Collective Contentions within Collaborative Governance" Space and Polity. 16.2. (2012): 215-232. EBSCO. Web. 14 Oct. 2015.
  4. ↑ "What is Collaborative Governance?". NPCC. Policy Consensus Initiative. Archived from the original on 2015-04-20. Retrieved 2015-05-05.
  5. ↑ Ansell, C., & Gash, A. (2008). Collaborative Governance in Theory and Practice. Retrieved October 16, 2015, from http://sites.duke.edu/niou/files/2011/05/Ansell-and-Gash
  6. ↑ Morse, Ricardo; Stephens, John (Summer 2012). "Teaching Collaborative Governance: Phases, Competencies, and Case-Based Learning". Journal of Public Affairs Education. 18 (3): 565. doi:10.1080/15236803.2012.12001700. S2CID   169341744.
  7. ↑ Ansell, Chris &, Alison Gash (2008). "Collaborative Governance in Theory and Practice". Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory. 18 (4): 544.
  8. ↑ Emerson, Kirk, Tina Nabatchi, Stephen Balogh (2012). "An Integrative Framework for Collaborative Governance". Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory. 22 (1): 1–29. doi: 10.1093/jopart/mur011 .{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  9. 1 2 Murray, Jessica, et al. "Enhancing Participatory Governance and Fostering Active Citizenship: An Overview of Local and International Best Practices." Politikon, vol. 37, no. 1, Jan. 2010, pp. 45–66.
  10. ↑ Wanna, John (2008-01-01). Collaborative Governance: A New Era of Public Policy in Australia?. ANU E Press. ISBN   9781921536410.
  11. ↑ Huxham, C., Vangen, S., Huxham, C., & Eden, C. (2000). The Challenge of Collaborative Governance. Public Management: An International Journal of Research and Theory, 2:3, 337-358
  12. ↑ Twyfords (2012). The Power of Co: The Smart Leader's Guide to Collaborative Governance. Twyfords, Wollongong, Australia.
  13. ↑ Newman, Janet; Barnes, Marian; Sullivan, Helen and Knops, Andrew (2004). Public participation and collaborative governance. Journal of Social Policy, 33(2), pp. 203–223.
  14. ↑ Emerson, Kirk; and Nabatchi, Tina (2015). "Evaluating the Productivity of Collaborative Governance Regimes: A Performance Matrix". Public Performance & Management Review. 38 (4): 717–747. doi:10.1080/15309576.2015.1031016. ISSN   1530-9576. S2CID   53642688.
  15. ↑ Phares, Donald (2004). Metropolitan Governance without Metropolitan Government?. Ashgate Publishing, Aldershot, UK.
  16. ↑ Abbott, John (2012). Collaborative Governance and Metropolitan Planning in South East Queensland - 1990 to 2010: From a voluntary to a Statutory Model. Australian Centre of Excellence for Local Government (ACELG), Sydney.
  17. ↑ Chanani, Sheila; Waingankar, Anagha; More, Neena Shah; Pantvaidya, Shanti; Fernandez, Armida; Jayaraman, Anuja (2019). "Effectiveness of NGO-government partnership to prevent and treat child wasting in urban India". Maternal & Child Nutrition. 15 (S1): e12706. doi: 10.1111/mcn.12706 . ISSN   1740-8709. PMC   7198940 . PMID   30748121.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.