Hybrid Modes Of Governance Research Articles

Vertical integration for climate change adaptation in the water sector: lessons from decentralisation in Africa and India

Vertical integration, which creates strategic linkages between national and sub-national levels, is being promoted as important for climate change adaptation. Decentralisation, which transfers authority and responsibility to lower levels of organisation, serves a similar purpose and has been in place for a number of decades. Based on four case studies in semi-arid regions in Africa and India, this paper argues that vertical integration for climate change adaptation should reflect on lessons from decentralisation related to governing natural resources, particularly in the water sector. The paper focuses on participation and flexibility, two central components of climate change adaptation, and considers how decentralisation has enhanced or undermined these. The findings suggest that vertical integration for adaptation will be strengthened if a number of lessons are considered, namely (i) actively seek equitable representation from marginal and diverse local groups drawing on both formal and informal participation structures, (ii) assess and address capacity deficits that undermine flexibility and adaptive responses, especially within lower levels of government, and (iii) use hybrid modes of governance that include government, intermediaries and diverse local actors through both formal and informal institutions to improve bottom-up engagement.

Unpacking Spatial Planning as the Governance of Place

Since the 1990s, the concept of governance has become an integral element of spatial planning research. In this article, we revisit some of the key contributions to the literature to discuss how and to what extent governance theory has informed planning theory so far and what the implications are for our understanding of how to construe planning practices. Next, we examine the current governance literature in order to identify promising elements that can further inform planning theory and practice. More specifically, we discuss relations between hybrid modes of governance in regard to cross-sectoral coordination of actors and institutions, and the implications of various forms of learning within governance networks. Finally, we suggest entry points for planning research such as studying the combination and interplay of various modes of governance to understand the inherent functioning of spatial planning assemblages, or investigating the learning capacity of actors and institutions in order to anticipate their adaptive capacity to respond to changing contexts in spatial planning practice. However, we also point out a few, yet troublesome implications. One of them is that planning understood as the governance of place might imply that the term “planning” as such becomes meaningless and that planning theory might turn into a subsection of (institutional) political theory. The article serves as a framing text for this special issue as it addresses a number of key elements and underlying concepts of the governance literature that are relevant for understanding the procedural dimension of spatial planning and which underpin some of the issues that are addressed in the more case study-based contributions by the other authors.

Hybride stadsregionaal bestuur belicht: effectiviteit en legitimiteit in vier grootstedelijke gebieden

This article reports on an analysis of the effectiveness and legitimacy of modes of governance in four European regions that clearly show signs of hybridity, that is, they have private as well as public characteristics. Berlin, Eindhoven, Copenhagen-Malmo and Zurich thus aim to increase the problem-solving capacity of their regional governance and to govern ‘smartly’ in a complex and multi-level context. The individual cities search for effective links with private and societal actors, each in its own way. Legitimacy is an issue that is hardly reflected upon, though. Hybrid modes of governance may have negative impacts on both effectiveness and legitimacy, but also offer new opportunities for good governance. ‘Hybrid’ and ‘smart’ do not always go hand in hand, but they are not mutually exclusive either.

Efficiency of Agrarian Governance in Bulgaria

Empirical studies on efficiency of the governance system in agriculture are very rare. That is a consequence of both theoretical and practical challenges. The criteria and approach for assessing social efficiency are still debated while appropriate statistical, accountancy, etc. data for evaluation diverse mechanisms and modes of governance are not readily available. This is a first attempt for a comprehensive empirical study on the efficiency of the system of agrarian governance in Bulgaria. Since there is a social “contract” about sustainable agrarian development in EU and Bulgaria, the impact to sustainability is taken as a criterion for assessing the social efficiency of the governance system. The interdisciplinary New Institutional Economics framework is incorporated, and the impact of institutional environment and diverse market, private, collective, public and hybrid modes of governance on agrarian sustainability at the current stage of development in Bulgaria assessed. First, the methodological framework of the study is outlined. After that impact of major components of institutional environment of agrarian sustainability evaluated. Following, dominating governing modes in Bulgarian farms of different juridical type, size, specialisation, ecological and geographical location are identified, and their impacts on agrarian sustainability assessed. In conclusion implications for further research, public policy improvement, and private managerial strategy formation are presented.

Impact of Governing Modes on Agrarian Sustainability in Bulgaria

The specific system of governance in different countries, regions, subsectors, etc., eventually determines the speed and type of socio-economic development. Despite its big academic and practical importance, in Bulgaria and other countries in East Europe, there are very few empirical studies on dominating governing structures in agriculture, and their impact(s) on agrarian sustainability. In this paper the interdisciplinary New Institutional Economics framework is incorporated, and the impact of diverse market, private, collective, public and hybrid modes of governance on agrarian sustainability at the current stage of development in Bulgaria assessed. First, the methodological framework of the study is outlined. After that dominating governing modes in Bulgarian farms of different juridical type, size, specialization, ecological and geographical location are identified, and their impacts on agrarian sustainability and its economic, social, and environmental pillars evaluated. In conclusion implications for further research, public policy improvement, and private managerial strategy formation are presented. Agricultural producers of different use quite unlike mixture of effective market, private, collective and hybrid modes for governance of their activities and relations. Individual factors and modes most contributing to improvement of agrarian sustainability at the current stage of development are: manager’s personal convictions and initiatives, farms resources and innovation potential, near future profit and benefits strategies, market prices levels and dynamics, area-based EU subsidies, and informal agreements. Research on relations between the governing structure and agrarian sustainability is to continue though increasing representation, and the spectrum of specific governing modes used by farms of different type as well as assessments of the impact of institutions on agrarian sustainability and the impact of the governance at different hierarchical levels. The latter however, requires a new kind of micro and macro data, and a close cooperation between all interested parties.

AN EMPIRICAL STUDY ON RELATIONS BETWEEN GOVERNANCE AND SUSTAINABILITY IN BULGARIAN AGRICULTURE

This paper applies the interdisciplinary New Institutional Economics framework, identifies diverse market, private, collective, public and hybrid modes of governance and assesses their impact on agrarian sustainability in Bulgaria. First, the methodological framework of the study is outlined. After that dominating governing modes in Bulgarian farms of different juridical type, size, specialization, ecological and geographical location are identified, and their impacts on agrarian sustainability and its economic, social, and environmental pillars evaluated. In conclusion implications for further research, public policy improvement, and private managerial strategy formation are presented. Agricultural producers of different type use quite unlike mixture of effective market, private, collective and hybrid modes for governance of their activities and relations. Individual factors and modes most contributing to improvement of agrarian sustainability at the current stage of development are: manager’s personal convictions and initiatives, farms resources and innovation potential, near future profit and benefits strategies, market prices levels and dynamics, area-based EU subsidies, and informal agreements.

Un cadre d’analyse pour la gouvernance des ressources naturelles. Le cas des eaux souterraines

La gestion des eaux souterraines interroge le cadre dans lequel s’est élaboré le concept de « bonne gouvernance » depuis les années 1990. Nous montrerons que dans des contextes marqués par une pluralité d’instances de pouvoir, l’exploitation des ressources naturelles nécessite des modes de gouvernance hybrides, qui associent la coordination des actions individuelles, imposée ou impulsée par l’État, et les formes de l’action collective d’intérêt public ou d’intérêt communautaire. Des articulations originales entre ces différents modes d’action restent souvent à imaginer. Elles sont rendues nécessaires par le constat, sur le terrain, de l’échec conjugué d’arrangements institutionnels purement marchands ou purement publics. En partant de l’exemple de la nappe souterraine d’Azraq en Jordanie, nous montrerons en quoi une gestion locale et des règles négociées, de type « communs », permettent de renforcer mutuellement action collective et action publique par une reconnaissance réciproque de leurs légitimités et de leurs échecs ou difficultés.

Towards market- or command-based governance? The evolution of payments for environmental service schemes in Andean and Mesoamerican countries

Payments for environmental services (PES) are a hybrid mode of governance, situated between markets and hierarchies. However, market structure has been used as a theoretical model to inform PES design. Based on 16 cases from Andean and Mesoamerican countries, we analyze whether PES schemes have, since their implementation, gradually incorporated more market characteristics or whether and to what extent these schemes have changed towards more reliance on command-based mechanisms. The schemes analyzed cover a range of governance mechanisms, from small markets to almost complete hierarchical organization. Our results suggest that over time an increasing number of the schemes have incorporated characteristics of a hierarchy to organize ecosystem service users. Mostly through the use of taxes/tariffs and by governments acting directly on users’ behalf. Contractual agreements, with payment levels either bilaterally negotiated or set by intermediaries, and providers being mainly individual and communal landholders, remain at the core of most schemes studied. Intermediaries are important actors in almost all schemes analyzed. They organize and/or represent users, and are usually national or local governments. The evolution of the schemes analyzed suggests that there is no convergence towards a market for ecosystem services, but an increasing complexity in the schemes' design.

Reassessing marketing boards as hybrid arrangements: evidence from Canadian experiences

AbstractIn this article, we reassess the role of marketing boards and similar arrangements that have played an important role in numerous agro‐food sectors of developed countries over almost a century. Referring to transaction cost economics and to more recent contributions on the allocation of decision and property rights, we interpret these arrangements as hybrid modes of governance. We hypothesize that uncertainty is the leading force pushing toward these organizational solutions and we explore forms of uncertainty at stake and their impact in shaping various types of hybrids. We also explore the role of institutional embeddedness in providing marketing boards and the like their legitimacy. Using numerous examples from Canadian marketing boards, we discuss the benefits and point out flaws of these arrangements. We conclude on the need to assess comparatively the role of these solutions with respect to, for example, a system of bilateral contracts.

About Management and Efficiency of Agri-Business Organisations

Unprecedented development in theory of economic organisations in past decades has brought about to significant evolution in understanding of essence and efficiency of agri-business organizations. Nevertheless traditional approach for assessing management and efficiency of economic organisationsis (“black-box” approach, through “technical or financial efficiency” of production factors, “productivity of employed resources”) is widly used. Concequently it cannot be excplained: why there are so many organizations performing with great variation in efficiency for long period of time. This paper incorporates achievements of interdisciplinary New Institutional Economics and suggests a framework for assessing management and efficiency of organizations for agri-biusiness and innovation. According to this new approach we have to study firm and farm as a governing rather than as production structure; assess comparative efficiency of alternative market, contract, internal, and hybrid modes of governance; take into account transaction costs and institutional, behavioral, dimensional, technological and natural factors; enrich (reformulate) criteria of economic efficiency of business organization; and better determine effective horizontal and vertical boundaries of business organisations. Specificity in the area of agri-business research and innovations is also clarified. Effective boundaries of different governing modes are assessed, and needs and forms for public intervention in agrarian research and innovation are clarified.

Urban Governance Beyond the State: Practices of Informal Urban Regulation in the City of Goma, Eastern D.R. Congo

The city of Goma, situated in the Eastern Congolese borderland, evolved and expanded at the heart of a protracted violent conflict that afflicts the Kivu Region since the early 1990s. In a general context of state decline and profound informalisation, Goma developed itself largely outside the direct scope of the central state, along informal ways of regulation, hybrid modes of governance and fragmented paths of urbanisation. This situation promoted the emergence of parallel power- and regulatory networks and new alliances among urban elites. In urban regulatory practices, the Congolese state is increasingly challenged by other alternative sites of power such as armed groups, a powerful business elite and an increasing presence of international non-governmental organisations. Justice, security, land allocation, water provision, etc. are all ‘arranged’ by these hybrid institutions. Goma’s current reality corresponds to what has been described in recent political scientists’ literature as ‘hybrid governance’ or a situation where local power and authority are negotiated between multiple stakeholders. The main argument of this paper is, however, that these alternative modes of urban governance, in which the urban political and socioeconomic space is no longer dominated by a coordinating state structure, are often translated in the form of a strongly contested governance rather than a mere ‘negotiated’ governance. This paper demonstrates that the transformation of urban governance in a context of state failure and violent conflict has turned the city of Goma into a highly fragmented urban space, where power and authority over political, economic and sociospatial resources are being contested between different conflicting forces.

Framework for Analising and Improvement of the Governance of Agrarian Dynamics

In this paper we incorporate interdisciplinary New Institutional and Transaction Costs Economics (combining Economics, Organization, Law, Sociology, Behavioral and Political Sciences), and suggest a framework for analyzing and improvement of governance of socio-economics dynamic of agriculture. This new approach take into account: the role of specific institutional environment (formal and informal “rules of the game”, distribution of various rights between individuals, and systems of enforcement of rights and rules; behavioral characteristics of agents (preferences, bounded rationality, tendency for opportunism, risk aversion, trust); costs of governance and critical factors of transactions (uncertainty, frequency, asset specificity, and appropriability); comparative efficiency of market, private, public and hybrid modes of governance; efficiency of alternative modes for public intervention; complementarities between different modes; needs for multilateral and multilevel governance; technological and ecological factors.

Governing of Agro-Ecosystem Services

In this paper we incorporate interdisciplinary New Institutional and Transaction Costs Economics (combining Economics, Organization, Law, Sociology, Behavioral and Political Sciences), and suggest a framework for analysis of mechanisms of governance of agro-ecosystem services. Firstly, we present a new approach for analysis and improvement of governance of agro-ecosystem services. It takes into account the role of specific institutional environment (formal and informal rules, distribution of rights, systems of enforcement); and behavioral characteristics of individual agents (preferences, bounded rationality, opportunism, risk aversion, trust); and transactions costs associated with ecosystem services and their critical factors (uncertainty, frequency, asset specificity, appropriability); and comparative efficiency of market, private, public and hybrid modes of governance. Secondly, we identify spectrum of market and private forms of governance of agro-ecosystem services (voluntary initiatives; market trade with eco-products and services; special contractual arrangements; collective actions; vertical integration), and evaluate their efficiency and potential. Next, we identify needs for public involvement in the governance of agro-ecosystem services, and assess comparative efficiency of alternative modes of public interventions (assistance, regulations, funding, taxing, provision, partnership, property right modernization). Finally, we analyze structure and efficiency of governance of agro-ecosystems services in Zapadna Stara Planina – a mountainous region in North-West Bulgaria. Post-communist transition and EU integration has brought about significant changes in the state and governance of agro-ecosystems services. Newly evolved market, private and public governance has led to significant improvement of part of agro-ecosystems services introducing modern eco-standards and public support, enhancing environmental stewardship, desintensifying production, recovering landscape and traditional productions, diversifying quality, products, and services. At the same time, novel governance is associated with some new challenges such as unsustainable exploitation, lost biodiversity, land degradation, water and air contamination. What is more, implementation of EU common policies would have no desired impact on agro-ecosystem services unless special measures are taken to improve management of public programs, and extend public support to dominating small-scale and subsistence farms.

Private Operation with Public Supervision: Evidence of Hybrid Modes of Governance in Brazilian Prisons

Received theories suggest a possible cost-quality tradeoff when private outsourcing arrangements are used in public services. Using data from Brazilian prisons, our study provides evidence that contradicts this prediction: the prisons not only run at a lower cost, but also show similar or improved performance on a range of quality indicators. The attenuation of the cost-quality dilemma in our context is due to the hybrid management, which allocates control rights to a state-appointed public supervisor. We also discuss conditions in which the public supervisor may refrain from colluding with the private agent, therefore guaranteeing an effective monitoring of service quality.

Institutional and Transaction Costs Analysis of Evolution, Efficiency and Sustainability of Farm Structures in Bulgaria

This paper incorporates achievements of a new inter-disciplinary methodology of the New Institutional and Transaction Costs Economics (integrating Economics, Organization, Law, Sociology, Behavioral and Political Sciences) into analysis of Bulgarian agriculture, and assess impact of institutional modernization and EU integration on farm structures and sustainability. Firstly, the new institutional and transacting costs economics framework is briefly presented concentrating on: evolution of formal and informal institutions; structure of transacting costs and their institutional, behavioral, dimensional and technological factors; comparative efficiency of alternative market, contract, internal, and hybrid modes of governance; farm as a governance structure with a production and transaction optimization function. Secondly, an analysis is made on development of institutional environment for agrarian sector in Bulgaria, and its impact on newly evolving farming structure and on public readiness to implement EU CAP. Third, pace of evolution, and high efficiency and sustainability of dominating agro-firms, production cooperatives, subsistence farming, and small commercial farms are explained, and prospects of their development in conditions of EU integration and CAP implementation determined. Forth, specific modes for governing of land supply, and labor supply, and service supply, and inputs supply, and finance supply, and insurance supply, and marketing in different type and kind commercial farms are identified, and their comparative efficiency assessed. Fifth, feasible pace of CAP implementation and further EU integration is projected, and likely impact on economic, environmental, social and organizational sustainability of farms estimated. The study is based on various official report, census, and statistical etc. data. Besides, original data for modes of organization of different type transactions have been collected from the managers of 2.8% of the cooperatives, 1.2% of the agro-firms, and 0.3% of the unregistered commercial farms. Furthermore, interviews with the leading Bulgarian experts on farm structures have been organized to get assessment on likely impact of CAP implementation on sustainability of different farms.

Conceptual Issues in Inter-Agency Collaboration

Inter-agency collaboration – or partnership as it now commonly termed – is central to New Labour's agenda, but the general support for a partnership approach conceals disputes about definitions and approaches. This article begins by examining the shift to more complex and ambitious partnerships in health, social care and regeneration, which require new modes of governance. The three main modes – market, hierarchy and network – are briefly described and contrasted, and located within the recent history of public service development. It is argued that they are best seen as overlain and co-existing, resulting in a hybrid mode of governance which is characterised by tension and contradiction. The article goes on to discuss the issues this raises for real partnerships in trying to understand the collaborative imperative and the barriers to its effective achievement. Although the network mode has its attractions, there are complex issues of membership, management and culture which need to be addressed. It is concluded that hierarchy, markets and networks will co-exist better where each acknowledges its own limits and the strengths of others.