Collaborative Governance in Theory and Practice
2007/11/13 by Christopher Ansell, Chris Ansell, Alison Gash · 155 citations
Health Professions · Social Sciences · #Community Health and Development #E-Government and Public Services #Public Policy and Administration Research
paper · doi:10.1093/jopart/mum032
openalex publication_date 2007/11/13 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
Abstract
Abstract Over the past few decades, a new form of governance has emerged to replace adversarial and managerial modes of policy making and implementation. Collaborative governance, as it has come to be known, brings public and private stakeholders together in collective forums with public agencies to engage in consensus-oriented decision making. In this article, we conduct a meta-analytical study of the existing literature on collaborative governance with the goal of elaborating a contingency model of collaborative governance. After reviewing 137 cases of collaborative governance across a range of policy sectors, we identify critical variables that will influence whether or not this mode of governance will produce successful collaboration. These variables include the prior history of conflict or cooperation, the incentives for stakeholders to participate, power and resources imbalances, leadership, and institutional design. We also identify a series of factors that are crucial within the collaborative process itself. These factors include face-to-face dialogue, trust building, and the development of commitment and shared understanding. We found that a virtuous cycle of collaboration tends to develop when collaborative forums focus on “small wins” that deepen trust, commitment, and shared understanding. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of our contingency model for practitioners and for future research on collaborative governance.
Citations
Cited by
- What Do We Know About Wicked Problems After Nearly 52 Years? Tracing the DNA of Wicked Problems through A Bibliometric Study
- Policy’s role in democratic conflict management
- Engaging European local communities in biodiversity genomics research: A five-step framework for scientists
- Pathways to Implementation: Evidence on How Participation in Environmental Governance Impacts on Environmental Outcomes
- Latent Hybridity in Administrative Crisis Management: The German Refugee Crisis of 2015/16
- Transitioning from planning to implementation: comparing collaborative governance and developmental dynamics in 4 watersheds
- Does stakeholder participation improve environmental governance? Evidence from a meta-analysis of 305 case studies
- Hang in there: capacity constraints and processes of sustaining collaboration over time
- An Integrative Framework for Collaborative Governance
- Collaborative Platforms as a Governance Strategy
- Nonprofit Sector Growth and Density: Testing Theories of Government Support
- Maybe It Is Time to Rediscover Technocracy? An Old Framework for a New Analysis of Administrative Reforms in the Governance Era
- Representation in Nonelected Participatory Processes: How Residents Understand the Role of Nonprofit Community-based Organizations
- Structure and Network Performance
- Crisis Preparation, Capacity Building, and Community Resilience: Lessons From Maui
- Policy Design and Governance Effectiveness: The Role of Non‐Linearities in Urban Water Management
- Barriers to environmental policy implementation: stakeholder perceptions in the context of Ireland
- Citizens are more willing to co‐produce when participants represent community demographics
- Exploring contextual influences in collaboration: A sensemaking perspective
- Harnessing artificial intelligence (AI) to increase wellbeing for all: The case for a new technology diplomacy
- Fixes That Fail in Collaborative Innovation: The dynamics of conflict, decision-making speed and time pressure
- Seeking conservation behaviour change: an intervention model to integrate environmental education and social network analysis in Sorkhrud Wetland (Iran)
- Co-Designing with Multiple Stakeholders and Datasets: A Community-Centered Process to Understand Youth Deviance in the Italian City of Turin
- Toward a Theory of Office: Authority, Separability, Ministry, Accountability
- Contemporary policy work in subnational governments and NGOs: Comparing evidence from Australia, Canada and the Czech Republic
- Data Management for Sustainable Development: Case Analyses of Small Island Developing States ( SIDS )
- Coproduction as a Causal Process
- Territorio y energías renovables no convencionales: Aprendizajes para la construcción de política pública a partir del caso de Rukatayo Alto, Región de Los Ríos, Chile
- How can governance support collaborative innovation in the public sector? A systematic review of the literature
- Accountability as a function of power relationships in public governance networks
- Placing Stakeholder Formation in Central Oregon’s Deschutes Basin
- Addressing (in)equity through public policy and local governance systems: A case study of Queensland, Australia
- Knowledge Conditions in the Co-creation of Social Innovation: A Theory-driven Review
- Balancing Stability and Flexibility in Climate Crises Governance: Lessons From Brazil's Water Sector
- Member duality and policy tourism: Learning in interlocal policy networks
- Compliance under distrust: do people comply less when they feel distrusted?
- Comparing Beyond (Just) the State? Examining Patterns of Policy Advice Externalization Across Policy Domains
- Reassessing the cluster approach to knowledge-Based Urban Development
- Developing an evidence‐based model to implement co‐governance
- Reshaping disaster management: An integrated community‐led approach
- Sustaining collaborations after a crisis: Australian disability and health policy and practice
- Who takes care of Hawaiʻi? Understanding the roles and capacities of civic organizations in environmental stewardship
- Mapping the use of knowledge in policymaking: barriers and facilitators from a subjectivist perspective (1990–2020)
- Lived experience as evidence in anti-poverty policy making: a governance-driven perspective
- Decentralization and resource contributions within local governance networks: Evidence from health sector reform in Honduras
- Homelessness and nature across landscapes and disciplines: A literature review
- The discourses of Ba’al Shem Tov (Besht) Street in Jaffa: From displacement to placement
- Emergency management through enduring collaborative networks: Lessons on phases and levels
- Policy Innovation for Public Value Creation: Insights from Dynamic Performance Governance in Addressing Rural Depopulation
- Blocked and “Unblocked” Learning: Structural Factors That Impede and Enable Evidence‐Informed Policymaking
- Who Holds the Strings? Hybrid Governance in Small States
- Blueprints or sketches? State laws for collaborative governance
- Collaboration as a Tool for Equity? Reducing Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Healthcare Access
- Street-level partnership: making collaborative service delivery work against the odds
- Post‐NPM approaches to personnel management: Employee roles, motivation, and challenges in contemporary public administration
- Turf Protection or Policy Expansion? How European Agencies Shape Their Reputation Through Social Media Communication
- Supporting Sustainable Island Tourism Through Infrastructuring Co-Design: A Case Study From Mayu Island
- Managing inclusive co-creation processes in a superdiverse neighborhood: drivers of inclusion in the case of Rotterdam
- Implementing Nature‐Based Solutions in Cities: Testing and Refining the Integrative Framework for Collaborative Governance
- Non‐State Regulators? Civil Society as Extension of the State in a Context of a Regularization Scheme for Undocumented Migrants
- Manifesting symbolic representation through collaborative policymaking
- The CAPS framework for governance capacity building for local climate action
- In the shadow of bureaucratic governance: A framework for internal governance in government organisations
- The situatedness of dilemmas in boundary spaces: uncovering paradoxical conditions for increasing effectiveness through transdisciplinary research approaches
- Fostering innovation through collaboration: a comparison of collaborative approaches to policy design
- The evolution of mandated coordination in policy implementation: Evidence from China's central government agencies
- Integration of Indonesia's government research and development institutions into single agency: Neo‐Weberian State or not?
- The negative relationships between employee resilience and ambiguity, complexity, and inter‐agency collaboration
- Responsible mission governance: An integrative framework and research agenda
- Mapping Institutional Hybridity and State Capacity in Polycentric Governance: Modes of Coordination and Performance in Polycentric Governance: Disentangling Complexity. By AndreasThiel, ElizabethBaldwin, MarkStephan, and SergioVillamayor‐Tomas (eds.), Oxford University Press, 2025. 206 pp
- Accountability and Multi-level Governance: More Accountability, Less Democracy?
- How do policymakers involve citizens in advancing health? A mixed-method qualitative study in municipalities in the Netherlands
- Populist Governance in Sweden and Its Impact on State‐Civil Society Relations From CSOs' Perspective
- Addressing global health equity through Global Collaborative Evidence Networks: a narrative literature review of governance models, power and participation
- Understanding the influence of power dynamics in intersectoral collaboration: A realist evaluation in Assam, India
- The Environmental Performance of Participatory and Collaborative Governance: A Framework of Causal Mechanisms
- Updating the Institutional Collective Action Framework
- Unpacking the Collaborative Toolbox: Why and When Do Public Managers Choose Collaborative Governance Strategies?
- Hidden conflicts? Revealing power mechanisms in collaborative governance for redeveloping heritage districts: The case of Dashilar, Beijing, China
- Governing Institutional Complexity: The Ecology of Games Framework
- Understanding the dynamics of Civil Society Organization responses in the cross‐sector collaboration process with a government partner: A typology from a grounded theory approach
- SCOR: A Framework for Responsible AI Innovation in Digital Ecosystems
- Collaborative governance in practice: power, networks and inclusion in a biocultural landscape
- From Planning to Implementation: Top‐Down and Bottom‐Up Approaches for Collaborative Watershed Management
- A theoretical framework for studying the co-creation of innovative solutions and public value
- How public leaders can promote public value through co-creation
- Collaborative Governance and the Challenges of Network-Based Research
- Marine spatial planning in ocean governance: Fijian perspectives
- Estrangement, embodiment and entanglement: Putting agonistic planning into practice through Urban Drama Labs
- What Drives the Centralization or Decentralization of Network Governance? A Configurational Analysis in Different Health and Social Care Networks
- The role of values in the interorganizational network response to wicked problems
- Leading intra-organizational collaboration among public employees: a mixed methods study
- Health inequalities tackled through intersectoral collaboration: longitudinal process issues and insights
- The role of universities in regional development strategies: A comparison across actors and policy stages
- Community garden coproduction under collectivism
- Policy issue interdependency and the formation of collaborative networks
- Unlocking citizen participation: Network characteristics, sense of power, and place attachment as key factors in regional settings
- Determined to succeed: Can goal commitment sustain interagency collaboration?
- Governance network theory: past, present and future
- Religious Beliefs in Collaborative Environmental Governance: Evidence From Indonesia
- Collaborative governance in urban agriculture: Stakeholder roles, collaborative mechanisms, and power dynamics
- Communicative Capacity
- Public–Private Collaboration Led by Private Organizations in Combating Crises: Evidence From China’s Fighting Against COVID-19
- Direct Public Engagement in Local Government
- Examining the Impact of Local Collaborative Tools on Urban Sustainability Efforts: Does the Managerial Environment Matter?
- Insights into Participatory Policymaking
- Generating Democratic Legitimacy through Deliberative Innovations: The Role of Embeddedness and Disruptiveness
- Evaluating Conflict, Interest Advancement, and Representation in Collaborative Governance
- Facilitating citizen participation in marginalised neighbourhoods: selective empowerment in between vulnerability and active citizenship
- Gardening governance: CSO-government dynamics in Shanghai's urban renewal
- The Impact of Sustainable Nitrogen Management on the Health Risks of Unsafe Drinking Water and the Mediating Role of Food Production
- Between win–win and the manufacturing of consent: collaborative governance as a lightning rod in cannabis policy
- Collaborative governance in politicized times: the battle over asylum policies in Italian cities
- Integrating collaborative governance theory with the Advocacy Coalition Framework
- The CO‐City: Sharing, Collaborating, Cooperating, and Commoning in the City
- The Effect of Leadership and Teamwork on ISD Project Success
- Policy capacities and effective policy design: a review
- Reciprocal Engagement and NGO Policy Influence on the Local State in China
- Promoting public cooperation in government: key drivers, regulation, and barriers of the e-collaboration movement in Kazakhstan
- Assessing drivers of sustained engagement in collaborative governance arrangements
- Social Capital and Prospects for Collaborative Governance: An Ethnographic Case Study of Sama‐Bajaus' Post‐Disaster Experiences
- Evaluating the impact of Public Administration programs on governance competencies in Ethiopia
- Disaster Response in Turkey: Conditions Promoting Cross-Sectoral Collaboration and Implications for Effectiveness
- Growing Restorative Regulation
- Reaping the fruits of co-creation through design experiments
- One problem, two ontologies: How administrative coordination impacts policy coherence
- A typology of governance and its implications for tourism policy analysis
- How can collaboration deliver? A structurational approach to understanding collaboration process and effectiveness
- Collaborative Governance in a Developing Non-Democracy: Uganda's Organizational Success Fighting HIV/AIDS
- Organizational Adaptation Under Stress: Tracing Communication Processes in Four California County Health Departments During the H1N1 Threat, April 28, 2009, to March 11, 2011
- Representation in Collaborative Governance: A Case Study of a Food Policy Council
- An Analysis of Micro-scale Conflict in Collaborative Governance
- Mitigating conflict with collaboration: Reaching negotiated agreement amidst belief divergence in environmental governance
- Collaborative Decision-Making in Emergency and Disaster Management
- A systematic review of conflict within collaborative governance
- Global Digital Data Governance
- Transforming the Public Sector Into an Arena for Co-Creation: Barriers, Drivers, Benefits, and Ways Forward
- Collaborative Governance in Health and Technology Policy: The Use and Effects of Procedural Policy Instruments
- Enhancing Collaborative Innovation in the Public Sector
- ADMINISTRATIVE LEADERSHIP THEORY: A REASSESSMENT AFTER 10 YEARS
- Metagovernance of co‐creation in city–university partnerships: How to avoid being stuck in the middle?
- Mapping actor networks in global multi-stakeholder initiatives for food system transformation
- Deviating from the course: How presentational strategies and leadership investments affect leader credibility and collaborative engagement
- Do network management and trust matter for network outcomes? A meta-analysis and research agenda
- Can Leadership Improve Interorganizational Collaboration? Field-Experimental Evidence From a Team-Based Leadership Training Intervention
- Contextual Factors Affecting the Modes of Interaction in Governance: The Case of Dam Removal in Japan
- “Decision-Making by Surprise”: The Introduction of Tuition Fees for University Education in Barbados
- Organizing for “wicked problems” – analyzing coordination arrangements in two policy areas
- The Politics of Environmental Consensus: The Case of the World Commission on Dams
- Digital Governance and the Tragedy of the Commons
- Metagoverning Collaborative Innovation in Governance Networks
- Prosperous places: processes, policies, and practices
- Reconciling Conflict and Cooperation in Environmental Governance: A Social Network Perspective
- Learning and reform in the aftermath of COVID-19: The Swedish experience of learning from a creeping crisis
- Fostering Collaboration and Stakeholder Engagement for Sustainable Decent Work Policies in Africa: Lessons From Ghana
Related