Towards Adaptive Management: Examining the Strategies of Policy Entrepreneurs in Dutch Water Management

Abstract

ABSTRACT. The growing awareness of the complexities and uncertainties in water management has put into question the existing paradigms in this field. Increasingly more flexible, integrated, and adaptive policies are promoted. In this context, the understanding of how to effect policy change is becoming more important. This article analyzes policy making at the micro level, focusing on the behavior of policy entrepreneurs, which we understand here as risk-taking bureaucrats who seek to change policy and are involved throughout the policy-change process. Policy entrepreneurs have received a certain level of attention in the adaptive co-management literature and the policy sciences in past decades. Yet, the understanding of the actions they can take to facilitate policy change remains limited. This study addresses this gap in focusing on the strategies that policy entrepreneurs employ in their efforts to effect policy change. The article draws on both theoretical exploration and in-depth field research on water management in the Netherlands, which included a series of semi-structured interviews and a focus group with policy entrepreneurs. We conclude that policy entrepreneurs employ four types of strategies: (1) attention and support-seeking strategies, to demonstrate the significance of a problem and to convince a wide range of participants about their preferred policy; (2) linking strategies, to link with other parties, projects, ideas, and policy games; (3) relational management strategies, to manage the relational factor in policy-change trajectories; and finally, (4) arena strategies, to influence the time and place wherein decisions are made. Our study suggests that by employing these strategies when the "time is right," the development of policy streams and consequently their coupling can, to some extent, be influenced and steered. In other words, policy entrepreneurs can, to a degree, prepare for a window of opportunity and hence direct policy change.

Assessing the Governance Capacity of Cities to Address Challenges of Water, Waste, and Climate Change

“…BAgents of change^refers to the intrinsic motivation of people, their willingness to take risks, and the support given to these efforts to change current approaches. The concept is therefore not limited to people in leading positions (Brouwer and Biermann 2011;Head and Alford 2015;Schultz and Fazey 2009). For this condition, three types of agents of change are distinguished: 6.1 entrepreneurial agents, who have the means and skills to gain access to resources, seek opportunities, and manage risks; 6.2 collaborative agents, who have the skills to build bridges and coalitions between actors; and 6.3 visionary agents, who envision long-term adaptive approaches and are able to steer current policy and actions (Brouwer and Huitema 2017;Termeer et al 2012;Gupta et al 2010;Ford and King 2015).…”

“…leaders, policy entrepreneurs, institutional entrepreneurs; Pahl-Wostl et al 2011;Ballard 2008;Brouwer and Biermann 2011). BAgents of change^refers to the intrinsic motivation of people, their willingness to take risks, and the support given to these efforts to change current approaches.…”

Niche entrepreneurs in urban systems integration: On the role of individuals in niche formation

“…To this end, we can draw on more recent work in policy studies about the managerial strategies employed by individual policy entrepreneurs to align streams. These managerial strategies can be characterized as follows (see Brouwer and Biermann, 2011;Koppenjan, 2004;Meijerink and Huitema, 2010;Mintrom and Norman, 2009;Williams, 2002):…”

Policy Entrepreneurship and Policy Transfer: Flood Risk Governance in Northern Sweden

“…In a seminal 2009 article, Mintrom and Norman 'provide both a clear definition of what a policy entrepreneur is and also a clear framework for describing the success or failure of a policy entrepreneur' (Hammond, 2013, p. 120), whereas in a recent review, Petridou (2014) shows the evolution of the policy entrepreneur(ship) as a comprehensive meso-level framework. Policy entrepreneurship has provided insights in such diverse sectors as Dutch water management (Brouwer & Biermann, 2011), local economic development and growth policies (Schneider, Teske, & Mintrom, 1995;Verdujn, 2015), educational policy (Mintrom, 2000), stem cell research regulation (Mintrom, 2013;, and international relations (Blavoukos & Bourantonis, 2011;David, 2015;Miles, 2015) among others.…”