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Policy‐Making in Fragmented Systems: How to Explain Success

Hubert Heinelt, Tanja Kopp‐Malek, Jochen Lang, and Bernd Reissert

in Linking EU and National Governance

Over the last decades, the European structural funds have undergone a series of wide-ranging reforms. The history of the funds, thus, does not confirm the ‘joint decision trap’ hypothesis that is ... More

Over the last decades, the European structural funds have undergone a series of wide-ranging reforms. The history of the funds, thus, does not confirm the ‘joint decision trap’ hypothesis that is often associated with policy-making in the EU multi-level system. Instead, the reforms of the structural funds can be evaluated as a success story, which calls for explanation. In contrast to some of the previous literature, empirical evidence and theoretical reasoning presented in chapter 7 show that it is difficult for the capacity for reform to be related to the existence of a closely-knit network of relevant actors in a single policy community. It is rather the ‘loose coupling’ of elements in a fragmented decision-making structure that keeps the system manageable and explains continuous reform.Less

Societal Effects: From Vacuum to Tropical Jungle

Arndt Sorge

in The Global and the Local: Understanding the Dialectics of Business Systems

Institutions can be considered as softer or harder typifications of reciprocally understood meanings attached to social patterns. Their origin is explained by the sociology of knowledge and the ... More

Institutions can be considered as softer or harder typifications of reciprocally understood meanings attached to social patterns. Their origin is explained by the sociology of knowledge and the interactionist school of sociology. They extend to more macro institutions or structures via the duality of social action. Societal space does two things: it divides action into institutionally and functionally differentiated action systems, and it breeds coherence across action systems with segmented meanings; societal effects make any action reverberate through the differentiated texture of action systems. Action systems are thus tightly coupled although institutional domains are loosely coupled (i.e., relatively autonomous). Society invariably has many layers that may be differentiated or conflated. Internationalization blends into and is interdependent with the layered architecture of society. It implies related processes of expansion and provincialization of social horizons.Less

Compounded Representation in EU Multi‐Level Governance

Arthur Benz

in Linking EU and National Governance

Chapter 5 applies the concept of compounded representation to analyse democracy in EU multi-level governance. From this analytical perspective it describes how different modes of democratic ... More

Chapter 5 applies the concept of compounded representation to analyse democracy in EU multi-level governance. From this analytical perspective it describes how different modes of democratic governance entrenched in national and European institutions, i.e. the European Parliament, the European Council and national parliaments, interfere. Based on a case study on the reform of the European structural funds, the author shows how actors tackle the problems caused by incompatible decision rules and evaluates the consequences for democracy in terms of efficiency, authentic interest representation and accountability. In this way, the chapter sheds new light on the often criticized ‘democratic deficit’ of the EU and presents proposals for its solution which lie in functional differentiation and ‘loose coupling’ of the above-mentioned representative institutions.Less

The Making of a European Public Space: The Case of Justice and Home Affair s

Klaus Eder and Hans‐Jörg Trenz

in Linking EU and National Governance

Chapter 6 sets out to explain the dynamics of multi-level governance as regards the evolution of forms of public communication and the making of a European public sphere. The central theoretical ... More

Chapter 6 sets out to explain the dynamics of multi-level governance as regards the evolution of forms of public communication and the making of a European public sphere. The central theoretical concern is discussed with empirical reference to core areas of governance in the fields of justice and home affairs. So far, research has mainly taken an intergovernmentalist perspective, which fails to explain the institutional dynamics of intensifying cooperation in these fields which is slowly integrating the ‘European security community’ into an encom-passing ‘area of justice, freedom and rights’. The intergovernmentalist account neglects two significant factors: first, that governments act within an expanding transnational field made up of norms, discourses and institutions that increasingly constrain their action. Second, competitive actors within the field are more and more linked to public monitoring of their activities. Consequently, the transnational field is transformed into a public space attended by different audiences with shifting attention and expectations. The term ‘transnational resonance structures’ is introduced to account for the integration and legitimation of forms of ‘loose coupling’ between international, European and domestic politics as the organizing principle of governance in Europe.Less

Purpose and Profit: Strategies for Balancing Cultural and Financial Imperatives

Mukti Khaire

in Culture and Commerce: The Value of Entrepreneurship in Creative Industries

This chapter explores the strategies adopted by producers, who must balance financial and cultural imperatives to maintain viability and standing in both the artistic and the business worlds, each of ... More

This chapter explores the strategies adopted by producers, who must balance financial and cultural imperatives to maintain viability and standing in both the artistic and the business worlds, each of which has a different, sometimes contradictory institutional logic. Mirroring the strategies used by individual creators, producers attempt to balance both worlds by maintaining varying degrees of separation between the two worlds—blending (no separation), loose coupling or portfolio (some separation, maintained through the production of multiple product lines), and decoupling (complete separation through production of unrelated products or by adopting a not-for-profit business model). Each of these strategies is differentially appropriate for creator firms versus producer firms, and each has specific implications for pioneer producers and new producer ventures, all of which are explored.Less

The Long Walk to Aleppo: Institutional Myths, Inhabited Institutions, and Ideals in the Real World

Mark de Rond and Tim Hallett

in Institutions and Organizations: A Process View

On December 26, 2016, several hundred people left a disused Berlin airport to walk some 2,100 miles to Aleppo as an expression of solidarity with civilians suffering in Syria while calling for an end ... More

On December 26, 2016, several hundred people left a disused Berlin airport to walk some 2,100 miles to Aleppo as an expression of solidarity with civilians suffering in Syria while calling for an end to the war. Some would stay the course for the nearly eight months it ultimately took, whereas others joined the Civil March for Aleppo for short periods. In this chapter, we explore what the march can tell us about the relation between processes and institutions by focusing on a contentious episode. When the marchers realized they might not be able to continue walking upon reaching Turkey, they had to confront a question that had never collectively been settled: Was this ultimately a march for or to Aleppo? Drawing from old, new, and inhabited institutionalism, we explore the causes and consequences of this episode and re-examine assumptions of loose and tight coupling in organizations.Less

When collaborative governance scales up: lessons from global public health about compound collaboration

Chris Ansell

Chris Ansell and Jacob Torfing (eds)

in How Does Collaborative Governance Scale?

Global diseases require collaboration at multiple scales – from local to global. This article examines the experience of three international global public health partnerships – UNAIDS, the Stop TB ... More

Global diseases require collaboration at multiple scales – from local to global. This article examines the experience of three international global public health partnerships – UNAIDS, the Stop TB Partnership and the Roll Back Malaria Partnership. These partnerships must be understood as compound collaborations. Such collaboration can often exhibit a marked tension between loose and tight coupling. Strategically designed to be loose or flexible in order to build initial support, loose institutional arrangements can also render these partnerships ineffective. Focal institutions, however, can help to align and facilitate the contributions of different partners operating on different scales.Less

Safe Schools

Calvin Morrill and Michael Musheno

in Navigating Conflict: How Youth Handle Trouble in a High-Poverty School

This chapter draws on ethnographic trouble cases and other observations, in-depth interviews, and youth sketch maps from New West High School (NWHS) to examine the unanticipated consequences ... More

This chapter draws on ethnographic trouble cases and other observations, in-depth interviews, and youth sketch maps from New West High School (NWHS) to examine the unanticipated consequences associated with the implementation of safe schools, a national-level social movement championing carceral-like school discipline in the 1990s and into first decade of the twenty-first century. The chapter documents how youth language and images of trouble at NWHS changed, increasing rates of police calls, and contestation and normalization of departures from official policy. The chapter analytic regards an unprecedented episode of collective youth violence – what came to be called the “October Fight” – as an “organizational accident” lens through which to unpack the initial collective trauma experienced when formal and informal control on campus dramatically change as result of the adoption of safe schools. The chapter also examines how safe schools was normalized on campus and the loose-coupling that occurred among students and school staff between official disciplinary policies and everyday practices.Less

Conclusion: Consulting and the “Managerial”

Florian Hoof

in Angels of Efficiency: A Media History of Consulting

The Conclusion sums up the key issues of the book. It characterizes media and business consulting as a historically emergent relation between loose and solid coupling. It shows how business ... More

The Conclusion sums up the key issues of the book. It characterizes media and business consulting as a historically emergent relation between loose and solid coupling. It shows how business consultants strategically use “new media” to create new services or rebrand existing offers. In the context of business consulting and management, media techniques and apparatuses function as discursive channels for factors that were until then incapable of being articulated or represented. The graphic media network translated the heterogeneous fields of management and consulting into a loose visual coupling: the basic prerequisite for the definition of generally valid concepts, and the formation of an accepted canon of managerial methods. This leads to a politics of consulting that shifts the power structures in society.Less

Explaining Success and Failure of Constitutional Policy

Arthur Benz

in Constitutional Policy in Multilevel Government: The Art of Keeping the Balance

Chapter 7 systematically compares the cases following the theoretical framework presented in Chapter 2. Moreover, alternative explanations focusing on policy problems, change in government, the party ... More

Chapter 7 systematically compares the cases following the theoretical framework presented in Chapter 2. Moreover, alternative explanations focusing on policy problems, change in government, the party system or time pressure are taken into consideration. While alternative theories should not be discarded, the research results support the theory presented in Chapter 2. Accordingly, the comparative study confirms that constitutional policy in multilevel government can lead to a stable and flexible balance of power between the constituent units. The research results also show that the design of constitutional policy can improve the probability for effective constitutional change. Negotiations in distinct, loosely coupled arenas and an appropriate sequencing of the process provide conditions for making a multilevel system robust.Less