Governance Theory: A Cross-Disciplinary Approach

307 Pages·2008·0.98 MB·English

by  Vasudha Chhotray

Governance Theory and
Practice
A Cross-Disciplinary Approach
Vasudha Chhotray and Gerry Stoker
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Governance Theory and Practice
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Also by Gerry Stoker
THE NEW POLITICS OF BRITISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT (editor)
MODELS OF LOCAL GOVERNANCE; Public Opinion and Political Theory (with
W. Miller and M. Dickson)
HOLISTIC GOVERNANCE (with Perri 6, D. Leat and K. Setzler)
THEORIES AND METHODS IN POLITICAL SCIENCE Second Edition (co-edited
with D. Marsh)
TRANSFORMING LOCAL GOVERNANCE
BRITISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT INTO THE 21stCENTURY (co-edited with
D. Wilson)
WHY POLITICS MATTERS; Making Democracy Work
RE-ENERGIZING CITIZENSHIP; Strategies for Civil Renewal (with T. Brannan
and P. John)
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Governance Theory and
Practice
A Cross-Disciplinary Approach
Vasudha Chhotray
Lecturer in Development Studies
University of East Anglia, UK
and
Gerry Stoker
Professor of Governance and Politics
University of Southampton, UK
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© Vasudha Chhotray and Gerry Stoker 2009
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this
publication may be made without written permission.
No portion of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted
save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence
permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency,
Saffron House, 6-10 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS.
Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication
may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
The authors have asserted their rights to be identified as the authors of this
work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published 2009 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN
Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limited,
registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke,
Hampshire RG21 6XS.
Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of St Martin’s Press LLC,
175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.
Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies
and has companies and representatives throughout the world.
Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States,
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ISBN-13: 978–0–230–54676–9 hardback
ISBN-10: 0–230–54676–5 hardback
This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully
managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing
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country of origin.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Chhotray, Vasudha, 1975–
Governance theory and practice : a cross-disciplinary approach /
Vasudha Chhotray and Gerry Stoker.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.
ISBN 978–0–230–54676–9 (alk. paper)
1. Group decision making. 2. Political science. 3. Economic policy.
4 Management. 5. Social policy. I. Stoker, Gerry. II. Title.
HM746.C48 2008
306.201–dc22
2008024574
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09
Printed and bound in Great Britain by
CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham and Eastbourne
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Contents
List of Tables viii
Acknowledgements ix
1 Introduction: Exploring Governance 1
Defining the scope of governance theory 3
Explaining the rise of governance theory 7
A cross-disciplinary tour of governance 10
2 Governance in Public Administration and Political 16
Science
Challenge to the discipline of politics and public 18
administration
Making governance work: five theoretical threads 26
Network management theory 27
Theories of delegation 32
Social interpretive theories 36
The bounded rationality school 37
Cultural institutional theory 41
Governance debates in political science and public 46
administration
Governance without government? 46
The nature of governance failure 48
The challenge of democracy and accountability 49
Concluding comment 51
3 Governance and the New Institutional Economics 53
The challenge of new institutional economics 54
Intellectual domain of the NIE and the study of 57
governance
Williamson and transaction cost economics: 58
firm-level governance
Principal-agent theory 60
A rules-based conception of governance: North 63
Ostrom: common-pool resources 67
The limits to NIE’s understanding of governance 69
Conclusions 72
v
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vi Contents
4 Governance and International Relations 76
A governance turn? 77
The institutions and structures of global governance 82
Understanding of power relationships 86
State power through global governance 86
Fairness of the global architecture of governance 90
The hegemony of neoliberalism 92
Main themes for debate: global democracy or anarchy? 93
Conceptual debates unresolved 93
Normative debates: world order and democracy 94
5 Governance in Development Studies 97
Context and meaning 98
Major epistemological developments 98
‘Good’ governance 102
Consensus or not? Major tensions within ‘good’ governance 108
Governance and aid 109
Governance and democratisation 111
Governance and the state 115
Governance and power 117
6 Governance in Socio-Legal Studies 120
Intellectual domain of socio-legal inquiry 122
What is the law? 122
Where is the law? 126
Is there any chronology to the emergence of the law? 129
The socio-legal response to ‘good governance’ 131
Law and power 134
Foucault’s key propositions on ‘governance’, power 135
and the law
The individual as subject: strategies of self-regulation 137
Analytical tools for governance 141
7 Corporate Governance (with Damian Tobin) 144
Economistic theories of corporate governance 145
Agency theory 147
Transaction costs theories 149
Recommendations for corporate governance: clear 149
principles, unclear results
Resource-based explanation of corporate governance 153
Comparative governance systems 156
The legal explanation 158
The political explanation 159
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Contents vii
A historical perspective 160
Convergence? 162
Conclusions 163
8 Participatory Governance 165
The meaning of participatory governance: diversity in 167
theory and practice
State or civil society: where does participatory 173
governance begin?
Citizenship versus community engagement 177
Janus-faced power: the normative and the empirical in 179
participatory governance
Participatory governance and effectiveness 184
9 Environmental Governance 191
Shifts in values and epistemological developments 192
The environmental governance discourse: 195
multi-disciplinary influences
Global environment, global politics: global 195
environmental governance
Institutional responses to the environment as a 200
collective action problem
A tense environment: whose governance is it? 206
Power and environmental governance 208
The effectiveness of environmental governance 211
10 Governance: From Theory to Practice 214
Advances stemming from a multi-disciplinary approach 216
Searching for a governance solution: some design principles 226
Governance solutions may be clumsy 226
The limits to mainstream approaches to governance 227
audit
The prospects for institutional design 229
Cognitive, social and motivational filters: towards a 231
heuristic
Combining realism and normative principles in 237
approaching governance
Governance and politics 237
Normative principles, democracy and governance 241
References 248
Index 270
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List of Tables
2.1 A typology of delegation 33
2.2 Four commonly occurring cultures in institutions 44
2.3 Governance responses: insights from cultural 45
institutional theory
2.4 Hierarchical governance responses: a classification 45
2.5 A simple typology of government and governance 47
10.1 Governance problems and solutions: insights from 224
different disciplines
10.2 Four rationalities-perspectives on environmental matters 234
10.3 New forms of citizen engagement 246
viii
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Acknowledgements
We are very grateful to Damian Tobin for his co-authorship of Chapter
7. We thank our family and colleagues for their support. Thanks should
particularly go to Andy Hindmoor and Tony Payne for their comments
on earlier drafts of parts of the book. The financial support of the
Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) provided us both with
the time and resources to write this book. It came in the form of pro-
fessorial fellowship from January 2004 (ref no: RES-051-27-0067) pro-
vided to Gerry Stoker. We thank the ESRC for their support and the time
and opportunity it has provided.
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