Surprising cooperation despite apparently irreconcilable differences: Agricultural water use efficiency and CALFED

Much has been said about the need and benefits of consensus building for resolving disagreements about water and environmental management. Less has been said about how to better convene and facilitate those processes. This paper focuses on the latter, examining the challenges and breakthroughs encountered when decision-makers convene consensus building processes that seek an agreement among stakeholders who believe they have “apparently irreconcilable differences.” The research described here analyzes two multi-stakeholder, collaborative processes convened by the CALFED Bay-Delta Program (CALFED) on the issue of agricultural water use efficiency in the Sacramento and San Joaquin river watersheds of California. The first process made very little progress; however, stakeholder representatives in the second were able to forge an agreement that included significant innovation and surprising risk taking by all sides. Analyzing the two processes, this paper shows that the stakeholders, conveners, and facilitators in these processes had to do much more than make the discrete trades across interests envisioned in consensus building theory or reframing as described in theories about conflict and frames. Looking at the data, this paper shows how several concepts from outside consensus building—including boundary objects and interlanguage—along with less well-known concepts and issues within the consensus building literature—bricolage and representation—can provide insights into how the Steering Committee accomplished what it did. This paper introduces these additional concepts, how they mattered in this CALFED process, and suggests a complex set of interrelated insights into how future collaborative and integrative environmental programs can approach the most difficult environmental policy and management conflicts.     

CALFED and the quest for optimal institutional fragmentation

Environmental problems are typically addressed by fragmented governance institutions. Fragmentation can present serious barriers to resolving environmental conflicts, but can also offer benefits. The CALFED experience should not be seen as demonstrating that unified governance is necessarily superior. Rather, it is a reminder that a fragmented governance strategy is not likely to succeed without strong leadership and tools for resolving inter-agency conflicts.     

Creating resilient water governance for irrigated producers in Mendoza,Argentina

This research explores the institutional water governance system of irrigated agricultural producers in Mendoza, Argentina in the context of a changing climate (predominantly increasing events of drought and water scarcity). An assessment is made of the impact of water governance instruments on producers using the methodology of vulnerability and adaptive capacity. Analysis focuses on the impact of the institutional water governance system on the adaptive capacity of producers’ resources, or capitals (human, social, economic, technological, and natural). Conclusions and suggestions for improving the resiliency of agricultural producers and increasing the adaptive dimensions of Mendoza’s water governance system are made based on this analysis.     

Integrating scientific knowledge into large-scale restoration programs: the CALFED Bay-Delta Program experience

Integrating science into resource management activities is a goal of the CALFED Bay-Delta Program, a multi-agency effort to address water supply reliability, ecological condition, drinking water quality, and levees in the Sacramento–San Joaquin Delta of northern California. Under CALFED, many different strategies were used to integrate science, including interaction between the research and management communities, public dialogues about scientific work, and peer review. This paper explores ways science was (and was not) integrated into CALFED's management actions and decision systems through three narratives describing different patterns of scientific integration and application in CALFED. Though a collaborative process and certain organizational conditions may be necessary for developing new understandings of the system of interest, we find that those factors are not sufficient for translating that knowledge into management actions and decision systems. We suggest that the application of knowledge may be facilitated or hindered by (1) differences in the objectives, approaches, and cultures of scientists operating in the research community and those operating in the management community and (2) other factors external to the collaborative process and organization.     

Institutional networks and adaptive water governance in the Klamath River Basin,USA

Polycentric networks of formal organizations and informal stakeholder groups, as opposed to centralized institutional hierarchies, can be critically important for strengthening the capacity of governance systems to adapt to unexpected social and biophysical change. Adaptive governance is one type of environmental governance characterized by the emergence of networks that stimulate adaptive capacity through increases in social-learning, communication, trust, public participation and adaptive management. However, detecting and analyzing adaptive governance networks remains elusive, especially given contexts of highly contested resource governance such as large-scale negotiations over water use. Research methods such as social network analysis (SNA) are often infeasible as they necessitate collecting in-depth and politically sensitive personal data from a near-complete set of actors or organizations in a network. Here we present a method for resolving this problem by describing the results of an institutional SNA aimed at characterizing the changing governance network in the Klamath River Basin, USA during a period of contested negotiations over water. Through this research, we forward a method of institutional SNA useful when an individual or egocentric approach to SNA is problematic for political, logistical or financial reasons. We focus our analysis on publically available data signaling changes in formal relationships (statutory, regulatory, contractual) between organizations and stakeholder groups. We find that employing this type of SNA is useful for describing potential and actual transitions in governance that yield increases in adaptive capacity to respond to social and biophysical surprises such as increasing water scarcity and changes in water distribution.     

Ecological modernisation: new perspectives

“Ecological modernisation” – understood as systematic eco-innovation and its diffusion – has by far the largest potential to achieve environmental improvements. In general, the market logic of modernisation and competition for innovation combined with the market potential of global environmental needs serve as important driving forces behind “ecological modernisation”. In recent times, however, additional factors like rising energy prices or fears from climate change have favoured the rise of this innovation-based approach to environmental policy. The article deals with two special driving forces: first, there is growing evidence for the importance of “smart” environmental regulation. Secondly, the increasingly complex actor constellation of global environmental governance leads to mounting business risks for polluters and thereby exerts pressure for eco-innovation.Despite these favourable framework conditions, the strategy of “ecological modernisation” nonetheless faces a number of inherent limitations. These include the unavailability of marketable technological solutions for relevant environmental problems like the loss of species, the rebound effect neutralising the incremental environmental improvements through economic growth (the dilemma of the “N-curve”) as well as resistance by “modernisation losers”. Against this background, structural solutions seem indispensable. Here, eco-innovations should be supported by transition management or ecological structural policy.     

Marginalization by collaboration: Environmental justice as a third party in and beyond CALFED

Governance and planning of ecosystem and water management within the California Bay-Delta, a critical component of California's water economy, have been characterized by a range of innovations in collaboration and conflict resolution. Despite legal mandates to incorporate environmental justice, the California Bay-Delta Authority's (CBDA) policy-development process and the subsequent Delta Vision process have systematically marginalized the role of environmental justice in California's water policy. We suggest that environmental justice in Bay-Delta planning can be understood as a “third party” with a tenuous seat at the CALFED water management table. As such environmental justice is a useful lens through which to assess the state's broader commitments and capacities relative to equity as a planning principal and outcome. We interpret the fate of environmental justice within Bay-Delta planning as indicative of the inherent tensions between systems based on increasing market dominance and state legitimation and the values of environmental justice based on distributive, procedural, and cognitive justice. We construct a model of marginalization and environmental injustice in collaborative planning to illustrate these tensions. We draw upon experiences of members of the Environmental Justice Sub-Committee of CBDA's Bay Delta Public Advisory Committee, as well as interviews with other key environmental justice interests, and a comprehensive review of internal and public CBDA documents relating to the environmental justice program including budgets and program plans, and ethnographic field work. We conclude that by learning from the mistakes of Bay-Delta planning, a positive model of collaborative, environmental justice-based planning for water and ecosystem management is possible.     

Collectively engaging complex socio-ecological systems: re-envisioning science, governance, and the California Delta

We address the future of science and governance for the California Delta, focusing on the CALFED Bay-Delta Program, an interagency, multi-stakeholder effort to understand and manage the Delta for multiple purposes. We portray a Delta history as a coevolutionary process between science, governance and ecosystems. Global integrated environmental assessments (IEA) provide insights into understanding complex, dynamic socio-ecological systems. Many of the discursive stakeholder and scientific activities that have arisen under CALFED are similar to IEA and remain essential to the shared learning needed to effectively interact with a dynamic Delta. More deliberately enmeshing environmental monitoring, analysis, and collective learning into Delta governance will improve outcomes.     

基于节能环保视域下的企业技术创新

以建设资源节约型企业为出发点,就企业如何在节能环保的视野下实施技术创新,分析企业实施技术创新的影响因素以及应采取的对策,从而实现企业的可持续发展,达到企业与社会的双赢。     

沈阳市生态文明体制改革规划研究

以制度体制推进环境管理的有效性,是改善环境质量、解决环境问题及实现绿色发展最为直接且经济有效的手段。通过规划,对现有生态环境制度体系存在问题进行分析,提出沈阳市制度体制改革内容,明确改革方向。设计以空间管控、生态补偿、环境监管、治理市场、绩效追责、公众参与为核心,以绿色环保产业为承接的沈阳市"6+1"生态文明制度体系,明晰政府部门责任,建立联动机制,将单项制度孤岛联系起来,以制度创新及制度体系构建推动环境管理制度改革及沈阳市生态文明建设。     

National laws and policies can enable or confound adaptive governance: Examples from South African national parks

There is growing appreciation that protected areas, like all social-ecological systems (SES), are inherently complex and face an unpredictable future under the influence of global environmental change. Adaptive management is the accepted approach for managing complex SES to ensure their resilience, but unless it is supported by a governance system that is itself adaptive it has little chance of success. Scholars have identified certain principles conducive to adaptive governance. Environmental legislation, an important component of the governance system, is often misaligned with these principles. In this paper we assess adaptive governance principles with regard to legislation governing South Africa’s national parks. This assessment indicates that, to enable adaptive governance and adaptive management, legislation should (1) be co-produced by policy-makers, policy implementers and users of protected area ecosystem services; (2) commit and empower management agencies to apply the principles of adaptive governance and adaptive management, particularly in the collaborative development of management plans; (3) commit agencies to review management plans and allow flexibility to adapt plans; (4) ensure that the temporal and spatial scales of the governance system match those of the SES being managed; (5) anticipate change and avoid assumptions of system stability and predictability; and (6) provide for flexible financing mechanisms, so that funds can be prioritised and timed to meet the unpredictable demands of complex systems.     

Collaborative governance versus constitutional politics: decision rules for sustainability from Australia’s South East Queensland forest agreement

Australia’s Regional Forest Agreements (RFAs) (1995–2000) involved a national program of bioregional assessment for native forest conservation and timber resource management. Eleven assessments covering 46 million ha or 6% of Australia, resulted in nine agreements (RFAs) between federal and state governments. While groundbreaking in some respects, however, the program had significant governance problems. Its main outcomes—intergovernmental agreements—were intended to overcome rather than resolve competing bodies of public opinion, and hence always risked entrenching rather than addressing underlying policy conflicts.This article reviews the problems inherent in the official approach, by contrasting it with the outcome reached in the major forest assessment not translated into an RFA. In September 1999, the South East Queensland assessment resulted in an agreement between lead timber production interests, key environmental NGOs and the state government, although rejected by the national government. Unique in Australia and rare in the world, this state-stakeholder agreement suggests the emergence of new decision rules for long-term resolution of biodiversity and natural resource conflicts. Consistently with other case studies, these centre on a fresh approach to integration of conflicting values, and the need for governments to accept more collaborative roles in environmental governance.     

跨区域环境协同治理对企业全要素生产率的影响

以2017年“2+26”城市大气污染协同治理为准自然实验,选取2014~2019年沪深两市制造业上市公司数据,利用三重差分法考察跨区域环境协同治理对于企业全要素生产率的影响.研究发现,“2+26”城市环境治理能够有效提高企业全要素生产率,其作用机制来自于企业提高绿色创新能力､环保投资以及研发投入.异质性分析表明,在环保严格执法的地区以及绿色创新能力更强､融资约束较低和国有企业样本中,企业全要素生产率提升作用更加明显.本文的发现为中国进一步推进跨区域环境协同治理具有一定的政策启示.     

The means do not justify the ends: A comment on CALFED

The state-federal CALFED process was more successful in transforming the means of thinking about decisions regarding California Bay-Delta resource management than in achieving the desired policy ends. Case studies in this special issue document how CALFED helped change the dynamics between stakeholders and agency managers; between scientists and implementers; and between endangered species managers and water project operators. In most cases, however, the new relationships and agreements failed to achieve the desired policy outcomes. The new tools and approaches that CALFED fostered can complement and support – but not substitute for – the obligation of policy makers to honestly confront and resolve fundamental oppositions of interest over resource management issues.     

自然资源适应性管理研究综述

自然资源适应性管理是随着对自然资源开发、利用与保护认识的不断深化,在自然资源管理研究不断推进的背景下,产生的一种新的资源管理模式。适应性管理在充分认识自然资源管理系统复杂性和不确定性的前提下,强调在资源管理的实践中不断增进人们对自然资源系统规律的认识,进而提升自然资源管理水平。研究系统论述了自然资源适应性管理的内涵,要素与组织形式,认为目前自然资源适应性管理中存在的主要问题包括尺度效应、自然资源管理的模拟与监测、制度欠缺灵活性、协调困难、研究与管理机构的利己主义、传统资源管理思维的局限、成本和管理风险以及生态价值之间的取舍等。通过分析,总结出自然资源适应性管理研究的发展趋势,包括适应性规划、适应性结果监测、协同适应性管理、适应性风险管理等。建议国内研究应进一步提升对适应性管理的认识,推进适应性管理的理论与实践研究。     

Building institutions based on information disclosure: lessons from GRI's sustainability reporting

Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) is the best-known framework for voluntary reporting of environmental and social performance by business worldwide. Using extensive empirical data, including interviews and documentary analysis, we examine GRI's organizational field and conclude that since its modest beginnings in 1999 GRI has been by several measures a successful institutionalization project. But the institutional logic of this new entity, as an instrument for corporate sustainability management, leaves out one of the central elements of the initial vision for GRI: as a mobilizing agent for many societal actors. This emergent logic reflects GRI's dominant constituency – large global companies and financial institutions and international business management consultancies – and not the less active civil society organizations and organized labor. We attribute these developments to factors such as building GRI within the existing institutional structures; the highly inclusive multistakeholder process; and the underdeveloped base of information users. From the institutional theory perspective, this case shows how the process of institutionalization is deeply affected by initial strategies of the founders, and how it reproduces existing power relations. From the governance perspective, this case leads us to question the power of commodified information to mobilize civil society and to strengthen governance based on partnerships.     

Conflicts and security in integrated water resources management

Water sector reforms based on the concept of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) are criticized for not considering context, local realities or legitimacy during the implementation of water sector reforms. Universal remedies of IWRM can thus lead to resistance, conflicts and ultimately failures of interventions. This paper examines how conflicts and disharmony can be addressed by IWRM's instruments. It conceptualizes institutional security as a highly relevant issue to be addressed during water management interventions. Further, the paper advocates a reform of the holistic concept of IWRM to incorporate ‘peace and security’ as a new pillar of water management based on a broad understanding of societal goals that are embedded in the principles of good governance and sustainable development. It also reviews recent criticism of and debates in IWRM and explains the advantages of expanding the normative idea behind it.     

滏阳河流域的水资源问题

根据对华北地区水资源短缺最严重的滏阳河流域的实证研究表明,随着部门和上下游用水者之间用水竞争程度的加剧,流域从开放向闭合的转变,地下水位的逐年下降及引致的环境问题,节水的空间也变得十分有限。解决未来水资源短缺的问题很大程度上将依赖于如何运用政策、制度和经济措施实现水资源的优化配置和综合管理,提高灌区的运行绩效和实现有效的产权制度创新。     

长江经济带生态环境保护的若干战略问题

长江经济带发展是国家区域协调发展的重大战略之一,要保护长江生态环境,走生态优先、绿色发展之路.当前,长江经济带经济增速放缓,产业结构持续优化,城镇化处于快速发展阶段后期;主要污染物排放强度下降,水环境质量改善,但水生态状况堪忧,生态环境质量持续稳定改善进入攻坚期.通过对社会经济和生态环境形势的研判,阐述了长江经济带生态环境保护的战略需求和目标,并提出了四项战略.结果表明:①长江经济带生态环境保护的战略需求从单一要素、单一指标、部分区域转向水生态环境的系统保护和综合修复.②生态环境保护的战略目标由水环境质量改善转向水生态环境安全提升,未来将逐步转向生态环境健康改善.③空间管控战略需要整合多项区域规划,研究构建流域与区域协同、水陆统筹、山海一体的统一的长江经济带生态环境空间单元划分体系.④产业绿色发展战略的核心是在影响水生态环境安全的相关产业领域加强防控.⑤科技创新战略要突出科技平台的作用,推进数据、人才、技术、成果的汇集和创新,实现生态环境保护由投资驱动向科技创新驱动转型.⑥现代治理能力提升战略要求长江经济带建成生态文明先行示范带,率先完善生态文明制度体系,构建生态环境治理体系和提升生态环境治理能力.研究显示,把握长江经济带生态环境保护的战略需求和目标,推行空间管控、产业绿色发展、科技创新和现代治理能力提升战略,能更加有效地支撑长江经济带和长江三角洲一体化的发展.      

电子废弃物回收产业链协同治理影响因素分析——基于社会网络分析方法

基于探索性多案例分析,使用扎根理论从协同治理层面析出电子废弃物回收产业链治理的影响因素;运用社会网络分析法进一步辨识影响电子废弃物回收产业链协同治理的的关键因素.研究发现：外部环境支撑和提升电子废弃物回收产业链中利益相关者的内外协同能力,进而影响协同治理的行为和效果;企业社会责任和环保责任意识、高层管理者能力及素质、借鉴国外技术与经验是企业内部协同治理的主要驱动力;环境和经济持续发展目标、政府鼓励生产商做拆解、与国内外同行企业沟通与合作则是企业外部协同的引擎.