Managing socio‐economic development according to highly detailed pre‐implementation plans rigidly applied has not had a high degree of success in generating sustained progress in the world's poorer nations. At the other end of the spectrum is the process approach that avoids specifying targets in advance, and concentrates upon building problem‐solving capacity among the people involved. Many international donor and developing country agencies favour the blueprint model, despite its performance weaknesses, for its control and specificity. The process approach is limited by its lack of fit with agency procedures and incentives. This article discusses a structured flexibility approach to development management that integrates the blueprint model's planned structuring of action with the process model's flexibility and iterative learning orientation. This blend provides the basis for the programmatic and financial accountability required to obtain support from donor and developing country bureaucracies, and facilitates adaptive management to deal with uncertain and changing task environments. Case examples from the Caribbean, Portugal, and Pakistan illustrate the application of the structured flexibility approach.

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The article presents the challenges of introducing a ‘shared‐power’ community‐based management approach in the socialist society of Vietnam. The Portland State University (PSU)'s Oregon Environmental Management Alliance partnered with Vietnamese organisations in a shared‐power pilot project aimed at strengthening stakeholder participation in environmental improvements in two communities along the Tan Hoa‐Lo Gom (THLG) canal in Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC). The Oregon Solutions model, a community‐based environmental management (CBEM) approach, was adapted for the shared‐power project. This article analyses three core ingredients of the shared‐power CBEM approach: multiple stakeholder structure, dispersed authority arrangements and diverse policy instruments. Critical reflections are offered on the meaning and appropriateness of these shared‐power ingredients when they are reinvented in Vietnam's politically guided governance system. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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