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You are here: Agriculture » About Agriculture » Publications and Resources » Policy and Strategy » Institutions in Network Design

Institutions in Network Design

Discussion paper for ORL 5.1

MARCH 2007

Published by:
Catchment and Agriculture Services, Practice Change, Tatura, March 2007

ISBN 978-1-74199-191-8

Author:

Peter Howden

Acknowledgments:

This paper is part of a larger project Linking Policy and Practice funded by the Victorian Government’s Our Rural Landscape Initiative.

Introduction

Institutions play an important part in how networks are organised, evolve, are enabled or constrained. As Dovers (2001) observes though, institutions ‘as an area of analysis and as a reality of modern life are monstrously complex.’ In any context there will be multiple institutions operating which merge, clash and interact in multiple ways. Nevertheless their influence on the function of networks makes it important that we develop some strategies to ensure institutional change is congruent with the goals of any collaborative action for policy outcomes in the Department of Primary Industries (DPI), or at the very least that we are aware of their influence on network processes.

This work is part of a body of research on the role of networks in complex resource management processes for Our Rural Landscape (ORL) program 5.1. In this report I will briefly overview some of the (small amount of) literature on institutional design in collaborative networks and on institutional design in general, particularly as it relates to complex policy issues.

It is intended that the insights from this research will inform a guide for network managers currently under development (Howden 2007b).

Background

Networks (in this context) are defined as a social system of multiple participants (including individuals, agencies and organisations), with multiple formal and informal linkages, involved in achieving Government goals and aspirations. Networks constitute a new form of governance that is emerging to challenge the dominance of existing ways of doing the business of government (see Petris 2005). It recognises the increasing complexity of the natural resource management (NRM) issues Government is facing, the increasing diversity of stakeholders with an interest in NRM governance, and that Government is frequently not in charge – that is, the skills, resources and knowledge to address complex NRM issues are often held across multiple agencies, and public and private organisations.

Through research on governance networks for ORL5.1 we have developed several tools to assist public managers involved in complex programs, projects and other policy development and implementation settings. These include, a Network Management Workbook (see Hulme 2006b) and a Rapid Assessment Tool (Hulme 2006a) for measuring the effectiveness of established networks.

Ongoing research has also revealed several theoretical and/or practical issues requiring considerable further attention. These include: the importance of trust in complex governance systems (this is currently the subject to a small research project in ORL 5.1); the requirement for a better evaluation model that is more suited to complex multi-stakeholder, processes; and (the subject of this report) the influence of multiple interacting institutions on the effectiveness of network governance.

What is an Institution?

An institution is a persistent, reasonably predictable arrangement, law, process, custom or organisation structuring aspects of the political, social, cultural or economic transactions and relationships in society. Institutions allow organised and collective effort toward common concerns and the achievement of social goals. Although by definition persistent, institutions constantly evolve (Dovers 2001 p. 5).

Institutions have an important organising role, like the grammatical rules that make human verbal communication possible (Klijn and Teisman 1997). As well as the formal and informal rule system that guides, organises, coordinates and regulates social activities in a particular social domain (eg. an organisation, club, religious group etc), institutions define the social order, relationships, positions of authority and power, and legitimate or appropriate participants in a domain, as well as rights and obligation in relation to one another, and right of access to resources in a domain. Institutions also provide the basis (lens) for interpretation, understanding and sense-making in a domain, as well as key values, norms and beliefs (Machado and Burns 1998).

Formal organisations are also regarded as institutions. Importantly though, ‘persistence’ is an important defining element of an institution. As Dovers (2001) notes, an organisation would need a good deal of longevity and social acceptance to be thought of as an ‘institution’. Similarly, new rules can be imposed on any social system, but they do not become ‘institutionalised’ until they are widely accepted and acted on – they ‘persist’.

A ‘two-edged sword’

Institutions enable social interactions, provide stability and certainty and form the basis on which trust can be built (Klijn and Koppenjan 2006). Without the ‘infrastructure’ of institutions, virtually every form of collective behaviour and collective action would be impossible. However, institutions also serve to ‘codify’ previous (unequal) power relations (Klijn and Koppenjan 2006) and reinforce biases in favour of some interactions, to the detriment of others.

After all, institutions are in essence just ossified past practices and the power imbalances and bargaining asymmetries embodied in them. (Goodin 1996 p. 10)

Institutions are thus a two-edged sword (Klijn and Koppenjan 2006). They are valuable precisely because they provide stability and predictability, but they hinder to the extent that organisations and policy processes shaped by institutions reflect past rather than present (let alone future) understandings and imperatives (Dovers 2003).

Institutions and complexity

Virtually every discussion on sustainability, notes Dovers (2001), concludes that our existing governance institutions are inadequate and require considerable reform, or that they are lagging behind the technological innovations (Brown 2004) that can influence wide scale implementation of sustainable practices. We are ‘prisoners of history’ claims Dovers (2003), ‘caught within an institutional system that is outmoded.’ Sustainability requires a long-term vision and action across sectors, issues and political boundaries, something not compatible with dominant institutional arrangements.

Sustainability is a complex (if not wicked) problem. The work in ORL 5.1 (see Howden 2006; Hulme 2006b) builds on recognition of the increasing complexity of resource management issues in Australia. We have explored network governance as an appropriate response to these challenges. Networks, it is argued, are the only organisational form designed to work in such complexity (Agranoff and McGuire 1999). However, the widespread acceptance and adoption of network responses to NRM challenges will require significant institutional change at all levels of Government.

How do institutions change?

Goodin (1996 pp. 24-25) suggest that (‘roughly speaking’) there are three ways institutions (or human societies in general) may change:

• By ‘accident’ - There are no forces of natural or social necessity at work, or no larger causal mechanisms driving things. What happens just happens as purely a matter of contingency.
• By ‘evolution’- The initial variation might have occurred utterly at random, as a matter of pure accident and happenstance. But some ‘selection mechanism’ at work, usually competitive in nature, picks out some (‘better fitted’) variants for survival.
• By ‘intentional intervention’ - The change might be the product of the deliberate interventions of purposive, goals-seeking agents. Those agents might be either isolated individuals or organised groups.

Any actual instance of social or institutional change suggests Goodin (1996) is almost certain to involve a combination of all three of these elements.

It is important not to underestimate the impact of accident and evolution on any intentional, institutional design, nor to consider any intervention to be the sole domain of one ‘designer.’ Intentional interventions are not ‘rational designs’ note Kljin and Koppenjan (2006), they are the result of ‘the process of pushing and pulling between the parties involved’. Institutions then might be the product of ‘intentional activities gone wrong – unintended by-products, the products of various intentional actions cutting across one another, misdirected intentions, or just plain mistakes’ (Goodin 1996). Efforts at comprehensive institutional (re)design are common, and largely over-optimistic. New institutional rules are often actively or passively resisted by individuals who have a vested interest in the existing rules (or the incorporation of new ones), resulting in rejection, modification or partial adoption. Unexpected or undesired effects can result from institutional design efforts. Even when the new rules are accepted, their effective implementation requires a long learning process (Klijn and Koppenjan 2006).

Given the depth and complexity of institutional systems, rapid institutional change is unlikely warns Dovers (2003).  Institutions change, but they do so slowly.

‘Institutional time’ is more similar to ‘ecological time’ – slow evolution and strong path dependency, punctuated by thresholds and reformations – than it is to economic or political time (Dovers 2001 pp. 25-26).

All-in-all, the above projects a rather gloomy prospect for creating the adaptive institutional systems that are needed to address the complex NRM problems we are faced with. However, Goodin (1996) suggests that while direct design is not possible, indirect design is often feasible. Accidents happen, he suggests, but the frequency and direction of accidents can be significantly shaped by the intentional interventions of social planners (Perrow, in Goodin 1996). Dovers (2001) also advocates for purposeful incrementalism, which he suggest can produce profound changes.

Perhaps it would be better to speak of institutional intervention, argues Pettit (1996) rather than institutional design, or to consider any intervention as the start of a trajectory of institutional change (Klijn and Koppenjan 2006) rather than a definitive blueprint.

Institutional design

Instead of aiming at designing institutions directly, argues Goodin (1996), we should be endeavouring to ‘designing schemes for designing institutions - schemes which pay due regard to the multiplicity of designers and to the inevitable cross-cutting nature of their intentional interventions in the design process.’ I argue that such a ‘scheme’ is inherent in the notion of ‘network governance’.

Network governance requires the influencing of shared understanding and/or collective action between a range of disparate, but interdependent actors to achieve outcomes in an arena in which there might be conflicting goals, understanding of causes and/or potential approaches to their solution (Howden 2006). The approach to network management advocated in the research program for ORL 5.1, and supported by the network guide, informs a holistic governance approach that can influence positive institutional change.

How might institutions better fit networks?

Heikkila and Gerlak (2005) observe that there is a large body of empirical research that identifies the characteristics of the resource and those of the resource users (the network context) that are likely to support the emergence of appropriate institutions for collective action (see also Ostrom 2000). These include small-scale settings with easily defined boundaries, stable resources, and homogenous, trusting resource users. Clearly many complex NRM issues with don’t conform to these characteristics. Thus the context within which networks are most effective is also not amenable to the easy emergence of effective institutions.

Network governance of complex NRM issues throws up many challenges to intervening in institutions. Four main issues are addressed here:

• Collective action concerns:  Negative institutional arrangements (eg. sanctions) – to guard against anticipated self-interested behaviour – may ultimately produce counterintuitive outcomes.
• Designing dynamism – ‘Goodness of fit’ of institutions may not necessarily be sufficient to drive innovation in complex contested governance environments – it may be better that they do not ‘fit’.  
• Democracy and accountability – Although notionally more egalitarian, networks may undermine democracy if they are not appropriately accountable and inclusive.
• Conflicting institutions – Political inequalities can result from one group’s world-views and imperatives dominating other’s. 

Collective action concerns

Conventional economic and political wisdom says that individuals in collaborative activities will always act in their own self-interest, and without selective benefits no one will act to achieve group interests.  However, a large body of research has demonstrated that (many) people will act according to principles of trust and reciprocity and forgo some individual benefits for the collective good, if there is a means to monitor the behaviour of others and ensure they contribute (Ostrom 2000).

However, much public policy-making is still based on that single model of human behaviour which presumes only the short-term, egocentric pursuit of material outcomes. It underpins the widely accepted need for incentive systems (Ostrom 2000).  In what Pettit (1996) calls a deviant centred approach, such models seek to increase motivation to comply by rigging ‘payoffs’ in favour of compliance.

Providing external inducements to contribute to collective benefits, however, may actually produce counter-intentional consequences. Ostrom (2000) argues that incentives can ‘crowd out citizenship.’

Pettit outlines a number of ways in which incentives (positive and negative) can produce undesirable outcomes.

• The introduction of deviant centred sanctions can switch individuals from a non-egocentric to an egocentric mode of deliberation.
• The introduction of high rewards or harsh penalties might make egocentric considerations more salient than they were. It can serve to legitimate the egocentric management of behaviour, by representing it as the statistical normal (Thus the expectation of egocentric behaviour becomes self-fulfilling).
• Incentives also have a ‘signalling effect’ - others not aware of non-compliance behaviour, suddenly become aware that it exists.
• Incentives may also reduce the idealistic profile of the activity (Why do it for free if my neighbour is getting paid for it?).
• Someone hemmed in by rules and labelled (albeit implicitly) as untrustworthy, might begin to live up to that image-position just to ‘win one’.

It would also be wise to not ignore the fact that collective action problems and free riders are almost impossible to overcome in some contested governance environments. Pettit (1996), though, suggest that institutional arrangements should first support the compliant and then deal with the deviants.

Pettit (1996 pp. 78-86) recommends a three step arrangement:

1. First screen out those who appear motivated by self-interest. Although it would not be appropriate to exclude others who have a right to participate (Howden 2006). 
2. Then offer compliant-centred incentives to reinforce deliberative habits. 
3. Then put in place structured sanctions to guard against ‘the occasional knave’ (Pettit 1996). Braithwaite (in Pettit 1996) argues that they should be staged in an escalating hierarchy up to the ‘big stick’.

Consistent with Ostrom’s (2000) observations, the complete absence of sanctions could make compliant individuals worry about what safeguards there were against deviants, so some sanctions are a necessary evil.

Designing dynamic systems

‘Goodness of fit’ or ‘optimal design’ (Goodin 1996; Dovers 2001; Dovers 2003) are often criteria for effective institutions. But for network responses to complex policy issues, institutions may be better not ‘fitting’ too well. Sometimes, suggests Goodin (1996), ‘disharmony is far from disadvantageous’.  Unfortunately other imperatives, such as vertical and horizontal integration drive institutional design, rather than democratic needs or sound problem definition (Skelcher et al. 2005).

Innovative institutional reforms, argues Dovers (2001; 2003) should be ‘radical’ enough to drive sustainability but ‘mild’ enough to be tolerated by the wider system.

We are often well advised to design institutions in such a way that they allow us take one step backward so we may take two steps forward (Goodin 1996 p. 39).

Democracy and accountability

Sørensen and Torfing (2003) argue that interactive decision-making can be good for democracy in that it allows more affected individuals to participate in governance processes around things that affect their lives (than representative democratic processes otherwise permit). However, a number of reservations feature in much commentary on network processes, particularly around how they are accountable to the wider political system and whether they are truly more democratic, or just represent a shift in power or governance mechanism.

Three criticisms of network processes, related to democracy and accountability, are outlined here, as well as their implications for institutional design: reproduction of tradition, policy elitism, and lack of transparency (Sørensen and Torfing 2003).

Reproduction of tradition: Network mechanisms might simply represent a different mechanism by which traditional means of governance are replicated. More marginal world views may well be included, but suppressed through network processes that support the status quo. Institutional arrangements may favour conservative, ‘sub-optimal solutions when non-conforming proposals are ignored’ (Sørensen and Torfing 2003).

Policy elitism: There may be a restricted view on who is a ‘legitimate’ participant in networks (see discussion on ‘discourse’, below), limiting both who is invited to join, and the power those in the network have in the decision making process. This can lead to the domination of network processes by the policy elite (Sørensen and Torfing 2003; Gooey and Howden 2004; Skelcher et al. 2005).

Lack of transparency: An important criticism of networks is the absence of conventional structures of accountability, because in networks there is no obvious principal steering agent (Howden 2006).

Everyone is somewhat in charge and, therefore, everyone is somewhat responsible. As a result, all network participants appear to be accountable, but none appear to be absolutely accountable  (Agranoff and McGuire 1999 p. 33).

It becomes difficult, note Sørensen and Torfing (2003) to find out who is making the crucial decision, when it is made, why it was made, which seriously limits transparency.  Collaborative governance processes, they warn, can weaken democracy if we don’t design them for both their positive and negative sides. This means resisting the reproduction of old institutional models, ensuring ‘real’ participation, and that network processes are transparent.

Conflicting institutions

An administrative organization characterized by hierarchy, fixed rules, standardization and detailed predictability is incongruent with social networks governed by norms stressing mutuality, flexibility and openness  (Machado and Burns 1998 p. 364).

Not only can there be institutional incompatibilities between network processes and the governance hierarchy, often there are conflicts between the missions and regulatory standards of agency stakeholders (Heikkila and Gerlak 2005), and the norms and traditions of other stakeholders within networks.

To better illustrate how conflicting institutions impact on the workings of network, it is useful to introduce the concept of discourse. Discourses, argues Dryzek (1996) must be treated as institutional software. No institution, he says, can operate without an associated and supportive discourse (or discourses). The rules, rights, operating procedures, customs and principles (outlined in my definition of institutions above), then, constitute the institutional hardware (Dryzek 1996).

Discourse as institutional ‘software’

Discourse, in social theory, refers to different ways of structuring areas of knowledge and social practice, manifest in particular ways of using language and other symbolic forms, such as visual images (Fairclough 1992). Through discourse, individuals put together diverse bits of sensory information into coherent wholes. Discourses represent, but also construct, social entities in different ways (eg. a ‘freedom fighter’ or a ‘terrorist’; a ‘greenie’ or a ‘conservationist’). ‘Adherents’ to a discourse, notes Dryzek (1996) ‘share assumptions and capabilities, which they will typically take from granted, often unaware even of the possibility of alternatives to them.’

Any ‘politically interesting’ discourse, suggests Dryzek (1996 p. 109) contains:

1. An ontology, or set of entities whose existence is recognised.
2. Ascription of agency to some entities: these entities, be they individuals, groups, institutions, ‘wood nymphs’, or social classes, can act; other entities can only be acted upon.
3. For agents, some ascription of motive, and concomitant denial of other motives.
4. Taken for granted relationships (especially hierarchies) across agents and other entities.

To illustrate how understanding these components can provide an insight into how an institutional form is constituted, Dryzek (1996 pp. 110-112) give examples of two governance discourses; one surrounding incentive systems, and the other around regulatory instruments. I have tabularised them here (Table 1) for ease of comparison.

Table 1: Comparison of discourses on incentives systems and regulatory systems (after Dryzek 1996 pp. 110-122)

	Incentive system	Regulatory instrument
Ontology	governments, firms, environments, and individuals	governments and government officials, firms, environments, and individuals
Ascription of agency	governments and firms	only governments and their officials
Ascription of motive	government - efficiency considerations & perhaps level of acceptable pollution; firms - material self interest	public spirited (if unclear how the public interest is defined)
Taken for granted relationships	firms are competitive, government hierarchical and know better than citizens (design of markets is a technical matter)	Clear hierarchy with government above the others
*Dryzek warns that it is important to remember that these represent discourses, not the actual relationships

Networks are conceived of as horizontal domains where organisations must work together in order to achieve outcomes that they could not achieve alone. Yet the language of partnership is often constructed markedly differently by the parties involved and may conceal significant power differentials between, for example, public authorities and citizens’ groups (Skelcher et al. 2005).

Skelcher et al. (2005) argue that those interested in institutional analysis and design have frequently ignored the significance of this ‘taken for granted’ institutional software, and therefore there can be a mismatch between what happens at the formal and ‘ritual’ level (Sørensen and Torfing 2003), and what happens on the ground.

For example, research by Sørensen and Torfing (2003) into political decision-making processes in a town in Denmark showed that democratic norms and procedures were laid down in laws, articles, and standing orders in collaborative groups, and the institutional frameworks were still democratic, but, in general, there was not much democracy in practice. One possible explanation they suggest lies in a ‘striking’ observation from their organisational analysis, that the leadership of the organisations, with few exceptions, did not conceive the members as ‘democratically competent actors with political rights and potential influence’ (Sørensen and Torfing 2003, my emphasis). These research findings are consistent with discourses of the policy elite outlined by Gooey and Howden (2004).

The influence of competing discourses on institutional design is illustrated by Skelcher et al. (2005) who identified three competing discourses that structure governance institutions in their analysis of the literature on contemporary public governance.

Skelcher et al. (2005 pp. 578-580) argue that three ‘discursive patterns’ are apparent in the overall partnership meta-discourse:

Managerial: Influenced by the new public management (NPM) movement in the public sector (see Petris 2005), it places great value on managerial action and increased discretion for managers with respect to the political process. Managers have the mandate to make and implement decisions that realise the intentions of their political superiors. Public participation and accountability are constructed in terms of consultation and contribution to implementation processes, rather than as matters of citizenship rights or good public governance. The public is also conceived of as potentially disruptive to managerial practice by introducing new elements into the policy debate.

Consociationalism: Is built on coalitions between social groups in a population in an elite decision-making structure. Two ‘particularly pertinent’  features of this discourse are outlined (Skelcher et al. 2005).

First, the elite groups tend to be closed, with limited accountability to their constituency. ‘This facilitates negotiation and agreement-seeking behaviour amongst leaders while retaining a public face of independent action and opposition to others’

Second, ideological issues are redefined into technical means-ends relationships in order to reduce the value conflicts facing the elite group in making collective decisions and enabling solutions to be structured and evaluated by professionals in an expert environment (Townley, in Skelcher et al. 2005).

In this discourse, complex problems may be represented as simple because dissenting views may not be seen as legitimate, reducing the apparent contestation of a governance issue.

Participatory democracy: Is seen as a more democratic and sustainable alternative to the dominant representative democratic system. Society is seen in terms of ‘self-reliant communities of place and interest’ and the discourse is ‘couched in terms of the value of inclusivity, reinforced by a notion that partnership implies equality of standing and power between the actors involved’ (Skelcher et al. 2005).

Perhaps not surprisingly, research shows that institutional design for collaborative governance is significantly shaped by the managerialist discourse and its practices, although moderated by consociational and participatory elements (Skelcher et al. 2005).

This discursive ‘software’ is selectively drawn on (consciously and unconsciously) as individuals interact in the design of collaborative processes. The resultant democratic (institutional) forms reflect a mix of these three discourses. Skelcher et al. illustrate three partnership types that result from this interaction. They are: the club; the agency; and, polity forming. These types and their features are in table 2, below.

Table 2 – Institutional ‘hardware’: partnership types that emerge from competing ‘democratic’ discourses (from Skelcher et al. 2005 p. 592)

	Club	Agency	Polity-forming
Discursive orientation	Elite co-decision	Managerialism	Community participation
Focus	Mutual benefits for members	Implement central government policy	Authoritative decisions that allocate values
Legitimacy	Member organisations	Central government	Community
Consent	Member organisations	Member organizations / Central government	Member organizations / Community representatives / Higher tiers of government
Accountability	Member organizations / Higher tiers of government	Central government	Community / Higher tiers of government

What then can we draw from this to inform the management of effective governance networks?   Dryzek (1996) suggests that rather than choosing which is best, we should be aware of how any interventions 'reinforce, reshape, or undermine particular discourses.' Given the tenor of the discussion above, we have limited opportunity and means to significantly change institutions, but we do have scope, as network managers, to informally influence them in more positive directions. Dryzek (1996) invokes the image of a ‘conversation’ in which both established discourses and more novel ideas contribute. ‘A conversation where discourses are always being shaped or reshaped, strengthened or undermined in open-ended interplay.’ ‘The upshot’, he says ‘is the reconstitution of theories, discourses and even institutions’ (Dryzek 1996).

They key features of an ‘informal’ approach to institutional design, suggests Dryzek (1996 p. 106) are as follows:

1. It allows multiple dimensions of human ways of knowing – manifested in multiple discourses
2. It can tolerate extensive ambiguity in the interactions amongst persons and the rules that govern interactions.
3. ‘We seek the new world through criticisms of the old.’  Dovers (2001) would perhaps call this ‘purposeful incrementalism’ – as opposed to radical redesign.

Key attributes of (good) institutions

Perhaps it should first be said that representing institutions and discourse as nested components of a network is not always helpful. They are part of a dynamic system of social organisation and ways of acting and knowing. To that end it is not useful, in identifying insights for the network management guide, to differentiate between processes to influence institutions and processes to influence networks.

Dovers (2003 pp. 9-10) in his review of a substantial research project on institutional design in the context of sustainable development, suggests the following key attributes of adaptive policy, institutions and management:

• Persistence, allowing sufficient time for policy and institutional ‘experiments’ to be run and lessons accrued;
• Purposefulness, through a widely recognised set of core policy principles (eg. continually evolving principles of sustainable development);
• Information richness and sensitivity, especially over time, referring not only to information gathering but to its wide ownership and application;
• Inclusiveness, through clearly understood, sustained public participation in both higher level policy and on-ground management; and
• Flexibility to encourage adaptation and improvement, and so persistence and purposefulness do not develop into rigidity.

Dovers (2001) suggests that these principles are general and not at all strict and that judging that such principles have not been fulfilled might be easier than ensuring that they are. An important caveat, though, comes from Goodin (1996).  He warns that there is a danger in borrowing the ‘best' from other jurisdictions, in that there may be a 'race to the bottom' as we borrow the worst. The form of a governance network (its participants, its structure, its institutional arrangements etc.) is defined largely by the complexity of the problem it is formed around. Networks then are all different and we cannot assume that a process or rules that work well in one network will be appropriate in another.

Information richness appears a particularly salient factor as is articulated in much work on institutions. For example Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith (1993), Ostrom (2000), and Heikkila and Gerlak (2005) all emphasise the role scientific and technical information can play in acting as a bridge between belief systems and in increasing capacity to solve collective-action problems. A disclaimer here is that the scientific discourse in not represented as sacrosanct and immutable, but as information that must be interpreted and negotiated across multiple discourses.

To Dovers’ attributes I could add these general observations:

• Go easy on the incentives: Deviant centred incentives (or overuse of positive incentives) might crowd out norms of trust and reciprocity. However, some disincentives must be available to deter ‘knaves’, but also to reassure the civic minded that any deviants are being monitored.
• Disharmony can be a positive: Institutions may need to be sufficiently radical to inspire innovative interaction and to deter the fall-back position of business-as-usual.
• Ensure network processes are transparent: Seek to make widespread communication within a network, and to key stakeholders outside the network, ‘normal’ practice.
• Create a ‘history’ for the network: Develop a process to capture all the milestones (big and small) in the network from the perspective of all participants: note, for example, why decisions were made and how, as well as the course of the discussion around the decision. Record any dissent; we are not after total agreement, only a democratic and equitable process.
• Listen to the ebb and flow of network discourse: Listen and reflect on the discourses that underpin the different positions of network participants on an issue. Respect difference and seek points of convergence. Encourage processes that explore different world-views and challenges dominant discourses.

These processes might be underpinned by what Goodin (1996) suggests are ‘...the twin and connected facts that humans are fallible and that societies change.’

Lessons for the network guide

In the Network Guide (Howden 2007b) there are three ways you can influence change in networks: (1) processes that influence the structure of the network (the relationships between individuals); (2) those that affect cognitive processes (including the word-view of individuals and groups); and (3) those that influence institutional arrangements. These themes, of course, are interrelated. Partitioning them oversimplies the complexity of these processes, but is an important device to assist in understanding the range of influences on complex networks. Similarly, the ideas above don’t fit exclusively under institutional change. They may equally be, for example, related to perceptions (cognitive factors) or the connectivity (structural factors) of the network. Many are already incorporated into the guide. For example; flexibility, information richness, and the value of some disharmony (constructive controversy) are key themes that have emerged from the literature on complex networks.

However, this review has identified some important themes which should be used to strengthen the network guide.

First; the power of discourse in influencing the institutional arrangements of networks is significant, and processes that expose and negotiate between these discourses should be strengthened. 

Second; a lack of transparency and accountability has been identified as a significant challenge for network governance processes. Creating and maintaining a history for the network that records and communicates the decision processes should partly address this concern.

Third; resisting the urge to use (overuse) incentives, both positive and negative, to influence network processes is important. Incentives should be scaled in as deviant behaviour becomes apparent, not in anticipation of its existence. Equally, some deterrent against free riding or other negative behaviours might be desirable to reassure those concerned about its affect on collaborative processes.

Finally; the idea of ‘persistence’ is prominent in the literature: both in terms of the need for time for institutions (networks) to accrue lessons and evolve in response to complex governance issues; and, as a significant moderator of wholesale institutional reform.

Conclusion

The very nature of governance networks should allow the meaningful interaction of multiple world-views, multiple discourses and multiple institutional frameworks. However, it is the dominance of some discourses and/or rigidity of some institutions that often hinders the development of potentially more innovative and democratic collaborative processes that could have a greater impact on some of the more complex and contested resource management issues that the Department of Primary Industries faces today.

This review has identified a number of influences on institutional performance and design in networks and potential approaches to ameliorating them. These ideas will be incorporated into the network guide, with the aim of raising the awareness of network managers of the influence of institutions and improving their ability to reflectively shape or reshape network governance processes.

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