Government Mapping of the Third Sector: A Government Innovation for Regulation and Coordination? Perspectives From the Third Sector

Abstract

This article examines the policy tool of a registry of civil society organizations in a regulatory transparency framework. A registry serves as a government ‘mapping’ tool by collecting data on civil society and nonprofit organizations. Do government efforts to map the third sector hinder or foster nonprofit organizations’ capacity and their coordination? The balance between regulation and the strengthening of nonprofit organizations’ capacity and the coordination of goods and services through government innovations like the registries—i.e., third sector mappings—might indeed have the potential to foster a more effective and efficient third sector.

Keywords:

• third-sector mapping
• government innovation
• registries of civil society organizations
• regulation transparency mechanisms

Notes

¹ Coproduction in policy studies means the degree to which there is the involvement of the target population—in this case, nonprofit organizations—in the formulation of the policy, in this case, the registry of civil society organizations (Schneider & Ingram, 1990).

² These include corporate financial disclosure; restaurant hygiene quality cards, mortgage lending reporting, nutritional labeling, toxics release reporting, workplace hazards disclosure, patient safety disclosure in health care, and workers notification of plant closing (Weil et al., 2006).