How knowledge is used in collaborative environmental governance: water classification in New Brunswick,Canada

Collaboration is an increasingly important approach to dealing with complex environmental challenges. Participation of diverse actors in collaborative processes necessitates attention to the use of different forms of knowledge. We use a multi-case study of governance for water in New Brunswick, Canada, to explore knowledge-related concerns that are prominent in collaborative processes. As is common in other contexts, local or lay (experiential) forms of knowledge appeared to play complementary but ultimately subordinate roles to expert technical and scientific knowledge in the cases. Importantly, we found that the distinction between ‘expert’ and ‘local’ knowledge was not at all clear for the many participants. This study reinforces the importance of designing reflexive and flexible processes for encouraging the active engagement and use of knowledge in collaboration.     

乡镇政府环保政策规范化执行的影响路径研究——基于T市25个乡镇的定性比较分析

乡镇政府在落实国家政策方针、实现政策目标及推进基层治理等方面扮演着至关重要的角色。研究基于“动力－能力”的分析框架,采用定性比较分析方法深入探讨乡镇政府在执行环保政策过程中的行为逻辑。研究发现,政治任务、工作任务、公众诉求、领导参与、经济资源和技术水平六个因素共同影响着乡镇政府环保政策执行的规范性,并组合构成了双重任务驱动型、社会嵌入—技术赋能型和政治任务—上级关注型三种政策规范化执行的路径模式。为了进一步提升政策执行的质量,建议政府优化环境治理机制、多维度匹配政策资源、提升基层领导的参与度,并充分发挥社会力量与技术治理的作用,从而不断提高中国环境治理和生态文明建设的水平。     

Is Learning without teaching possible? The productive tension between network governance and reflexivity

ABSTRACT

Theories of reflexive governance are closely linked with the claim that more traditional modes of coordination have been replaced by networked structures, allowing reflexivity to emerge and reflexive learning to function as a steering mechanism in rapidly changing policy contexts. This paper explores this connection between reflexivity, governance, learning and networks in societal transitions, focusing particularly on the claim that networks will deliver reflexive learning. Using network theories from both policy networks and network governance and a case study of the Canadian agricultural biotechnology (agbiotech) policy network, it suggests that the kind of learning produced in networks will be a function of network structure. In particular, higher order reflexive learning will be compromised by the inevitability of the political struggle for nodality or central place in networks and the ensuing distribution of opportunities for bridging and bonding activities. Networks such as the Canadian agbiotech policy network that may promote learning but not necessarily reflexive learning are increasingly disadvantaged in contemporary policy settings.     

公众个体如何参与环境治理？——路径选择及优化策略

公众个体是环境治理的重要主体之一,但缺乏参与路径与信息、参与形式单一等是公众参与程度偏低的重要原因。因此,研究公众参与路径与模式选择对丰富治理理论及提升公众参与效果具有重要意义。本文基于治理理论的三种研究观点及社会治理主体视角,将公众参与路径划分为政府维度的行政力量主导型、社会维度的第三部门力量主导型、基层自治力量主导型、传播和宣传力量主导型,以及自身力量主导型等五种路径;并从环境治理体系和参与路径网络中各主体的角色定位出发,进一步优化路径选择,提出线上及线下结合的赋权型参与策略,以期提高公众个体参与的主动性和有效性,促进治理理论的本土化发展。     

EU policy on the move – mobility and domestic translation of the European Union’s renewable energy policy

We discuss how the EU’s Renewable Energy Directive was designed to be mobile, and how it was moved to and implemented in Finland by translating it to enhance wood-based energy production through specific subsidies. We study policy-making as a mobile process, which approach has its original roots in political science and more recent basis in political geography. The article aims to develop conceptual understanding of how the mobility of a supranational policy is generated and how a policy is translated into complex and contentious geographical contexts. We aim to show that mobility of a directive is enabled by an empty governance space which is aimed to be ‘filled in’ in each spatial context, and that the filling in process makes each translation a contentious and path-dependent process. In Finland, the selected policy tools and practices continued the path-dependent ways of favouring forestry industry’s traditional position as the primary utiliser of forest resources.     

海南\"美丽乡村\"环境协同治理状况调研:政策工具的视角

\"美丽乡村\"是\"美丽中国\"的重要载体和组成部分。实现\"美丽乡村\"的生态环境治理需要政府、社会、村民的多方协同治理,政策工具的选取、组合、使用,决定了协同模式的构建。本调研基于政策工具的视角考察海南\"美丽乡村\"环境协同治理状况,根据所得数据科学研究分析,科学合理地提出相应的建议对策,以期为海南\"美丽乡村\"环境协同治理提供实证借鉴。