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Literature Notes for Tutorials and Classes
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Tutorial 1
Guiding questions:
1) What are the main differences between ‘government’ and ‘governance’?
Stoker 1998 – see below on 5 propositions (what gov is doing going beyond government)
there is also governance within multi-stakeholders – but it can also be multi-stakeholders
Governance of governance is possible when authority over other authorities can steer power –
so multiple layers of governance over each other – fair trade agreement – meta government
Steering is about process of governance
2) How are the key steering types for governance different from each other?
Steuer 2013
Model mirrors 3 types of steering in governance (based on Max Weber sociologists – 3 ways
to exert power)
> hierarchies (coercion via laws and rules) – governments have soft and hard regulation
capacities - policy instruments can be legal, economic or informational
> markets about bargaining or financial incentives - business self-regulation implies that
businesses self-specify rules, self-monitor their conduct and self-enforce compliance without
direct and explicit interference from the state or from civil society actors – either at firm or
industry level - usually business self-regulation at any level is usually not isolated from but
driven by other types of regulation.
> networks about convincing with good arguments to do what I want via for ex covenants or
agreements - Standard-setting means that CSOs aim to steer businesses by demanding
compliance with formalised standards they have developed – and How does civil regulation
work through informal pressuring? For decades, CSOs aimed to steer businesses by
demanding legislation from governments. Since this ‘‘civil lobbying strategy’’ oftentimes
failed, civil society actors now aim to regulate businesses by addressing them directly in
confrontational ways
Regulatory mechanisms they have created over time – steering via them
Circles may differ on a sectoral or country level (china and US would have differently sized
circles) how things are structured in society so empirically but also maybe in normative
way? – check the diagram on page 8 of syllabus
3) How do the roles and responsibilities of different societal actors change within the context
of governance for sustainable development?
,4) What are key governance challenges? Please discuss the challenges of implementing the
sustainable development goals in your answer.
>> Bowen et al 2017 - Implementing the “Sustainable Development Goals”: towards
addressing three key governance challenges— collective action, trade-offs, and
accountability
>> from the lecture:
• fundamental societal changes and transformations
• dealing with complex and intertwined nature of social, economic, and environmental
issues
• coping with conflicting goals and uncertainty
• worldwide diversity of political systems and cultures
• global/international perspective (vs. national/local focus)
• long-term perspective (vs. short-term election cycles)
• knowledge and resources distributed among many actors
• no traditional governing with states/governments as institutions with hierarchical
power
• not a process of classic policy implementation
• plurality of values, beliefs, needs and interests to be merged into collective action for
the common good
• experimenting and learning are important
Lecture 1
• Understand the classical models of governing through government mirroring the classical
image of the manageable society
• Understand the key concepts and definitions of governance theory
• Explain the differences between ‘government’ and ‘governance’
This lecture will offer an introductory view on the supposed shift from governing-as-
government to governing-as-governance. It starts with a conceptual clarification of these
terms and the distinctions implied, sketches the historical context of the governance debate
and introduces theoretical perspectives on the study of governance. According to Stoker
(1998, p. 17), “government is understood to refer to the formal and institutional processes
which operate at the level of the nation state to maintain public order and facilitate collective
action.” Different models of governing by government can be distinguished, particularly the
regular control model (use of the law) and the economic control model (use of economic
incentives and sanctions, e.g. taxes or levies). In the last decades, scholars observe a shift
from governing as being equivalent to government, to governing as ‘governance’. While
there is no commonly accepted definition of ‘governance’, it is usually taken to refer to the
involvement of private and nongovernmental actors in the governing process through non-
hierarchical mechanisms. The involvement of actors from outside the state is sometimes
considered as substitute for, yet more frequently as complement to, traditional state
institutions.
Reading Notes
Stoker, 1998 - Governance as theory: five propositions
,- Anglo-American political theory uses the term ‘government’ to refer to the formal
institutions of the state and their monopoly of legitimate coercive power. Government is
characterized by its ability to make decisions and its capacity to enforce them. In particular
government is understood to refer to the formal and insti- tutional processes which operate at
the level of the nation state to maintain public order and facilitate collective action.
- Governance is ultimately concerned with creating the conditions for ordered rule and col-
lective action. The outputs of governance are not therefore different from those of govern-
ment. It is rather a matter of a difference in processes.
- agreement that governance refers to the development of governing styles in which
boundaries between and within public and private sectors have become blurred. + focus on
governing mechanisms which do not rest on recourse to the authority and sanctions of
government + ‘The governance concept points to the creation of a structure or an order which
cannot be externally imposed but is the result of the interaction of a multiplicity of governing
and each other influencing actors’ governance is about a reinvented form of government
which is better managed
- The Osborne and Gaebler work is about how a government might make sensible and
effective use of a wider range of tools beyond the direct provision of services. Governance
for them is about the potential for contracting, franchising and new forms of regulation. In
short, it is about what others refer to as the new public management
in this article, 5 propositions around Governance. Each proposition has associated with
it a certain dilemma or critical issue
1. Governance refers to a set of institutions and actors that are drawn from but also
beyond government. There is a divorce between the complex reality of decision-
making associated with governance and the normative codes used to explain and justify
government.
> The first message of governance is to challenge constitutional/formal understandings of
systems of government
> Westminster model of government were image is of a unitary state directed and legitimated
by the doctrine of ministerial responsibility are suggested to be limited and misleading.
Indeed, structures of gov are fragmented, there is no one centre of power but many, with
many links across agencies of gov this complex architecture to systems of gov is
emphasised by governance
> The governance perspective also draws attention to the increased involvement of the
private and voluntary sectors in service delivery and strategic decision-making.
Responsibilities that were previously the near exclusive responsibility of government have
been shared. Contracting-out and public-private partnerships are now part of the reality of
public services and decision-making in many countries.
> Broadly the governance perspective challenges conventional assumptions which focus on
government as if it were a ‘stand-alone’ institution divorced from wider societal forces.
> It is the confusion and uncertainty created by a system that is now so far divorced from our
formal constitutional understanding that reveals the first dilemma of governance. Research
shows that the emerging system in which responsibilities are shared between local authorities
and a range of other public and private providers lacks strong normative underpinning in
public opinion A legitimation deficit undermines public support and commitment to
programmes of change and ultimately undermines the ability of power-holders to mobilize
resources and promote co-operation and partnership.
> a system can be designed and operated in a way that either decreases or increases its
legitimacy. Governance lacks the simplifying legitimizing ‘myths’ of traditional perspectives,
, such as the British Westminster model. The issue to be considered is whether or how
governance can obtain enhanced legitimacy
2. Governance identifies the blurring of boundaries and responsibilities for tackling
social and economic issues.
The blurring of responsibilities can lead to blame avoidance or scapegoating which
are not new political phenomena but can be extended due to governance
> The governance perspective not only recognizes increased complexity in our systems of
govern- ment, it also draws to our attention a shift in responsibility, a stepping back of the
state and a concern to push responsibilities onto the private and voluntary sectors and, more
broadly, the citizen.
> citizenship now is about rights and responsibilities = right to welfare support is
complemented by a duty on those who are offered help to take it and respond
> active citizenship which also connected to rise of voluntary groups, non-for-profits, NGOs
etc all operating within the ‘social economy’ emerged btw market econ and public sector
> The governance perspective demands that these voluntary sector third-force organizations
be recognized for the scale and scope of their contribution to tackling collective concerns
without reliance on the formal resources of government.
> Responsibilities have also been taken up by the private sector as well as not-for-profit
organizations. There are here the well-known examples of former public enterprises sold off
by governments: airlines, utilities
3. Governance identifies the power dependence involved in the relationships between
institutions involved in collective action.
Power dependence exacerbates the problem of unintended consequences for
government.
> Power dependence implies that: (a) Organizations committed to collective action are
dependent on other organizations; (b) In order to achieve goals organizations have to
exchange resources and negotiate com- mon purposes; (c) The outcome of exchange is
determined not only by the resources of the participants but also by the rules of the game and
the con- text of the exchange.
> In a governance relationship no one organization can easily command, although one
organization may dominate a particular process of exchange. National-level government or
another institution may seek to impose control, but there is a persistent tension between the
wish for authoritative action and dependence on the compliance and action of others (Rhodes,
1996). Governing from the governance perspec- tive is always an interactive process because
no single actor, public or private, has the knowl- edge and resource capacity to tackle
problems unilaterally
> Governance as an interactive process involves various forms of partnership. It is poss- ible
to distinguish between: principal–agent relations, inter-organizational negotiation (involving
orgs in negotiating joint projects in which by blending capacities they are better able to meet
own objectives) and systemic co-ordination (this establishes a level of mutual understanding
and embeddedness so as to develop a shared visions that leads orgs to the establishment of a
self-governing network – games under rules here become games about rules, with systemic
co-ordination results in designed, intentionally chosen and adopted governance orders or
structures)
> Recognizing the power dependence in col- lective action means accepting intentions do not
always match outcomes in both principal-agent and negotiated relationships BUT not all
unintended effects are necessarily perverse of undesirable Governance implies a greater
willingness to cope with uncertainty and open-endedness on the part of policy-framers (see
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