Between Government and Governance: Opening the Black Box of the Transformation Thesis

ABSTRACT

The notion of going from government to governance, known as the transformation thesis, as depicted in early Governance Theory has been subjected to substantive critique. This paper explores two different stances of such critique. The first critical stance is represented by Jonathan S. Davies’ 2011 book “Challenging Governance Theory: From networks to hegemony” and entails a radical rejection of the transformation thesis. The second stance offers a more moderate reconfiguration of the transformation thesis and is represented by the recently co-authored work of several prominent governance theorists titled “Interactive Governance: Advancing the paradigm”. While both aspire to set new agendas for governance research, this paper argues that the latter reconfiguration carries a problematic preposition towards overemphasizing the separation between government and governance practices.

KEYWORDS:

• Governance and government
• network governance theory
• public administration theory
• reflexive modernity
• transformation thesis

Introduction

Within political science and public administration theory, it has over the last two decades become increasingly fashionable to understand collaborative efforts in the production of public policy within the conceptual framework that can be labeled Network Governance Theory (Kersbergen & Waarden, 2004; Osborne, 2010; Rhodes, 1997; Sørensen and Torfing ed., 2007). Central to Network Governance Theory is the notion of a transition from government to governance, claiming that within public management in the western world networked forms of governance are increasingly replacing traditional hierarchical modes of government (see particularly Milward & Provan, 2000, Rhodes, 1997).

While the content and application of the governance term vary in the literature (see Kersbergen & Waarden, 2004), this article generally refers to the concept of network governance as pluricentric forms of governance contrasted to multicentric forms (i.e. the market) and hierarchical forms (e.g. the state). The conceptualizations applied thus comply with Sørensen and Torfing’s assertion that:

In a nutshell, the argument prompting the rise of governance network research is that policy, defined as the attempt to achieve a desired outcome, is a result of governing processes that are no longer fully controlled by the government, but subject to negotiations between a wide range of public, semi-public and private actors, whose interactions give rise to a relatively stable pattern of policy making that constitutes a specific form of regulation, or mode of coordination (Maynts 1993a, 1993b). It is this pluricentric mode of coordination that in the literature is dubbed governance networks.

(Sørensen & Torfing, 2007, pp. 3–4, original emphasis)

Known as the transformation thesis, the notion of a transition from government to governance is debated and has been subjected to substantial critique in recent literature. This article explores how the tension between governance and government is treated in two recent publications—both aspiring to set new trends for governance research, but based on two different critical stances toward the transformation thesis.

The first critical stance is represented by Jonathan S. Davies—Challenging Governance Theory: From networks to hegemony (2011)—and entails a radical rejection of the transformation thesis. The second stance does however offer a more moderate reconuration of the transformation thesis, and is represented by the recent coauthored work of several prominent governance theorists titled Interactive Governance: Advancing the Paradigm (Torfing, Peters, Pierre, & Sørensen, 2012).

While the authors of both publications acknowledge that the notion of transformation carries problematic normative attachments, their different stances on the core issue of societal change toward a post-traditional condition result in a radically different interpretation of governance practices. Further, this article argues that that while Torfing et al. develop a substantial advancement of governance theory based on their critique of the transformation thesis (and its attached normative biases), their insistence on the key idea of societal and governmental transformation leads to a problematic and possible biased preposition toward overemphasizing the separation between hierarchical government and networked governance. In turns, this preposition may obstruct the development of a more combined perspective on how different governing practices interact, and how networked practices of governing exist in a continuum between the archetypical descriptions of government and governance.

From traditional government to post-traditional governance

The transformation thesis, describing the shift from hierarchal government toward nonhierarchical network governance within public management in the Western world, is both a central and highly debated concept in the network governance literature. In sociological terms, the understanding of a transformation can generally be related to Anthony Giddens’s and Ulrich Beck’s theories of post-traditional society and reflexive modernity, and particularly to Giddens (1994) descriptions of the diminishing role of the state and Becks’ (1992) rise of the risk-based society—that can both be understood as preconditions of public decision makers surrendering hierarchical government in favor of inclusive network governance as steering tools.

Simplified, it can be argued that in the post-traditional society, where individualization and common notions of risk have caused a breakdown of old traditions and cleavages, reflexive modes of steering have not only become possible but also necessary in steering a state undermined by individualization from below and globalization from above. Flexible modes of steering through trust-based networks, and working with the grains of market forces, have therefore become governments response to steering a public sector (that has also been further fragmented throughout the 1980s’ and 1990s’ doctrines of New Public Management) deemed ungovernable through traditional means. The emergence of network governance thus becomes expressions of a post-traditional and reflexive condition, free from the ossified hierarchical structures associated with traditional government. Within the early governance theory, the ideas of the diminishing state and emergent network steering have been particularly echoed in the influential notions of the “hollow state” (Milward and Provan, 2000) and the emergent condition of “governing without government” (Rhodes, 1997).

What transformation?

The question of whether the notion of network governance represents a qualitatively new approach to public management is met with ambiguity in the governance literature. For example, while Sørensen and Torfing explicitly state that “the construction of, or reliance upon, governance networks is by no means a new phenomenon” (2007, p. 4), and further argue that what is new is rather a tendency toward legitimizing governance networks, the same volume also contains numerous references implicating a qualitative transformation in public governance. For example:

As such, the idea of sovereign state governing society top-down through comprehensive planning, programmed action and detailed regulations is losing its grip, and is being replaced by new ideas about pluricentric governance based on interdependence, negotiation, and trust.

(Sørensen & Torfing, 2007, p. 3)

This ambiguity toward the question of transformation is visible in large parts of the governance literature, where writers have frequently been referring to the transformation thesis through idiomatic phrases like “the advancement of new arrangements of governance” (Kersbergen & Waarden, 2004, p. 143), “emergent phenomena” (Agranoff & McGuire, 2001, p. 296), and “suggested shift” (Røiseland, 2011, p. 879). While such phrasing implies different stands toward the idea of transformation, and to some extent acknowledges the contested reality of the transformation thesis, the exact understanding of transformation and the relationship between government and governance are seldom elaborated.

Most theorists do however agree that there has been a change in how networked forms of governance are perceived and understood. While particularly the hand of private interests in public policy decisions has previously been viewed with great suspicion, networked modes of policy making involving both private and public actors are now perceived as both legitimate and effective ways of governing—endorsed by both central decision makers and academics (Torfing et al., 2012).

In his critical analysis of governance literature, Jonathan Davies (2011) argues against the conceptualization of governance networks as a new phenomenon. To Davies, network governance is nothing but “governing as usual”, as networking has always been a power strategy among political and economic elites. Furthermore, Davies asserts, the interdependence between governmental and nongovernmental actors is axiomatic to any governing system, and according to him the governance institutions claimed transformative today have been “woven into the fabric of state-citizen relations at least since the rise of universal suffrage” (Davies, 2011, p. 55). Drawing on Gramscian notions of cultural hegemony, Davies argues that what is new is rather the ideological celebration of networks that he interprets as an integral part of a neoliberal hegemonic project. In his analysis, Davies attributes network theorists themselves a significant role in the emerging emphasis on network governance, arguing that the celebration of networks has become orthodoxy in a dialectic relationship between academic and political discourses.

In his critique Davies implies that governance theorists have, at least implicitly, accepted the premises of the transformation thesis and its post-traditional normative attachments—celebrating the novelty of the present by distorting the past. Applying concepts from the sociology of science, rather than the Gramscian concepts applied by Davies, it could be argued that the transformation thesis has undergone a process of blackboxing.¹ By accepting the premises of the transformation thesis as axiomatic, governance theorists have become preoccupied with improving the performance of governance networks so that they can deliver the promised governing solution for the post-traditional society. Rather than scrutinizing what is actually going on, Davies argues that:

The literature is “thoroughly functionalist”, concerned with finding “practical solutions to practical problems”, underpinned by the normative bias towards networks. Instead of asking whether “trust” really holds networks together and if so whether this is necessarily a good thing, orthodox governance theory proceeds from the question of how to cultivate trust-based networks (…).

(Davies, 2011, pp. 2–3)

By accepting the premises of the transformation thesis, without exploring its empirical relevance, governance theorists do, according to Davies, conform not only to a bias toward networks, but also to a bias in how networked interactions are interpreted. Particularly, Davies points to how the general understanding of governance networks as egalitarian game-like interactions, rooted in trust and enacted by reflexive partakers, seldom seems to comply with empirical realities. Rather, networks can function as vehicles of hegemonic power, reproducing and concealing the hierarchical structures they are presumed to replace (Davies, 2011).

A new perspective on an emergent reality?

Davies’s (2011) claim of a “thoroughly functionalistic” governance theory is particularly fitting for what is often labeled as the “second generation” of governance literature, where avoiding the question of the transformation thesis is an implicit mission statement. For example, Sørensen and Torfing (2007, pp. 14–15) argue that while the first generation of governance theory “set out to convince us that something new was going on”, the research agenda has moved on as “Governance networks no longer represent something new and exotic; they are something we must live with and make the best of”. Sørensen and Torfing (2007, pp. 14–15) therefore declare a research agenda for a “second generation” of governance research consisting of four central questions related to the function and performances of governance networks, rather than the question of transformation.

In a more recent work, Torfing et al. (2012) do however return to a discussion of the transformation thesis and its problematic connotations. Here, Torfing et al. (2012) argue that a simplistic narrative of a transition from government to governance carries three implicit dangers. First, it creates an oversimplified picture of a linear development where the government has gone from a state of omnipotence to suddenly being stripped of all its powers. Second, the narrative builds on the problematic assumption that governance can only expand at the cost of hierarchical government. Finally, related to the two arguments above, it seems to deny, or at least obfuscate, the government’s role in public governance.

In an effort to avoid these pitfalls, Torfing et al. (2012, p. 10. original emphasis) propose that governance should be perceived as a “new perspective on an emerging reality”, thereby emphasizing the transformation of perspective—although still suggesting that an empirical transformation is taking place as “an emerging reality”. Replacing the network governance term with their concept of “interactive governance”, they argue that within this emerging reality interactive forms of governance are proliferating as:

(..,) a result of ad hoc decisions on the part of public decision-makers who realize that the scope of unilateral action is shrinking and demanding private actors who want to take an active part in public decision making (Warren 2002, 2009). It is a daily experience among public decision-makers at various levels that the governing of society and the economy through top-down steering is becoming increasingly difficult because of growing complexity of policy problems, the functional differentiation of society, the increasing interdependence among social and political actors, and the strategic uncertainties caused by globalization and conflicting rising public demands (..,).

(Torfing et al., 2012, p. 31)

In essence, interactive governance is interpreted as public decision makers’ response to steering a society deemed ungovernable by hierarchical methods. Further, they argue that this rise of interactive governance has produced several irreversible changes to the governing of society and economy. Broadly, these changes include: that stakeholders now have expectations to become actively involved in policy processes; that public agencies have become relatively “open organizations” involved in collaborative efforts; and that the legitimization of interactive governance has made governance a more reflexive enterprise (Torfing et al., 2012, p. 31).

While conforming to the idea of a change in public management, their main critique against the transformation thesis is the idea that governance is replacing government. Rather, Torfing et al. (2012) argue that the introduction of interactive governance is a supplement to hierarchical government, representing a third layer of government alongside hierarchical government and the New Public Management (NPM)-introduced market regulation.

Post-traditional society?

Torfing’s et al. (2012) critique of the idea of governance replacing government is both well founded and important. The assertion that the increased emphasis on network governance has led to certain transformation in how society and economy is governed is also not unreasonable.

Furthermore, following Davies assertion of a dialectic relationship between network theory and public decision makers, the question of transformation itself becomes a discussion of whether the dialectics between theory and practice dismisses the theory (Davies, 2011)—a discussion prone to soon descent into a discussion of the hen and the egg. However, the important question imposed by Davies is rather how the normative implications of the transformation thesis shape not only our understanding of such an alleged transformation, but also the practices associated with it.

While the notion of an “emerging reality” in Torfing et al. (2012) could be claimed to be only a slight reconuration of the transformation thesis, the volume does acknowledge and annul several of the biases within governance theory pinpointed by Davies (2011). For example, Torfing et al. (2012, p. 51) acknowledge a neglect of power relations within studies of network governance, causing a tendency toward a depoliticized view of networked policy processes. The neglect is largely attributed to what they label a “broader post-political vision in contemporary society”, which tends to perceive political conflict and power struggles as antiquated. As in Davies’s analysis (2011), Torfing et al. (2012) further affiliate the depoliticization of network governance to Anthony Giddens’s and Ulrich Beck’s concepts of post-traditional society and reflexive modernization. Additionally, Torfing et al. also trace the lack of perspectives on power to the roots of governance theory in the perspective of New Institutionalism, which tends to overemphasize normative integration in networked institutions, thereby downplaying the role and impact of power (Torfing et al., 2012). The lack of perspectives on power and political struggle in governance theory is met by Torfing et al. (2012) through the development of a comprehensive theoretical framework for analyzing power and politics in networked policy processes.

Torfing et al. (2012, p. 9) also acknowledge that network governance often fails to provide the “[c]ompetent and knowledge-based decision-making, innovative policy solutions, flexible and coordinated policy implementation and democratic ideals” promised by its most eager protagonists. As in Davies’s analysis, they also link the exaggerated celebration of network governance to the transformation thesis, and argue that “[t]he promises ascribed to governance are a simple inversion of the problems associated with traditional forms of hierarchical government” (Torfing et al., 2012, p. 9).

Measured on the key terms of effectiveness and democratic performance, both Davies and Torfing et al. agree that governance networks seldom perform as well as predicted by its most optimistic protagonists. However, on this point, the two analyses’ different stances on the transformation thesis lead to a larger division in perspective on the potential of network governance as steering tools.

In Davies’ view, the transformation thesis is essentially flawed due to its preconditions in theories of reflexive modernity and the post-traditional society—preconditions that he argues represent a “vague premonition of one possible post-capitalist condition mistaken for a emergent reality” (Davies, 2011, p. 152). While networks may function as powerful governing tools they are nothing new, and, perhaps more importantly, they do not operate in any context where traditional structures and conflicts have been superseded by any incipient post-traditional or reflexive modern condition—and thus does not have any special potential as advocated by the transformation thesis.

While Torfing et al. agree that the celebration of networks has been somewhat overenthusiastic, their main concern with the transformation thesis remains the widespread belief that governance is simply replacing government. Their notion of “an emergent reality” still entails a transformation of both society and governance structures deeming network governance a fitting tool with particular potential. While Torfing et al. trace the tendencies toward neglecting power relations in network governance theory back to the post-traditional concepts of Giddens and Beck, Torfing et al. do not discuss the concept of post-traditional society in relation to the basic idea of the transformation thesis itself. Rather, and in sharp contrast to Davies’s analysis, the concept of societal change prompting a change in government structures remains axiomatic.

While Davies argues that governance networks’ failure to fulfill its most optimistic promises is due to a case of the cure (networks) missing its disease (context of post-traditional condition), Torfing et al. (2012) offer two main alternative explanations. First, network governance is not assessed in appropriate terms, and second, networked governance is not managed in a manner that sufficiently enhances its potential. In tune with the mission statements for second-generation governance theory, Torfing et al. (2012) therefore provide a tailored toolbox for assessing and managing network governance to ensure their performance.

While Torfing et al. assert that governance networks are in themselves neither inherently effective or ineffective, nor democratic or undemocratic, the basic arguments behind the need for new measuring and managing tools strongly echo the post-traditional claim of the transformation thesis: traditional tools for assessing performance and traditional tools of management are no longer sufficient in the new “emerging reality”:

[I]n order to measure the effectivity of networks and partnerships, we must move beyond the traditional notions of cost efficiency, operational effectiveness, and allocative efficiency. Alternatively, we propose that the effectivity of network-types of governance is measured in relation to a set of criteria that aims to capture the specific promises in terms of effective governance that are identified in the burgeoning literature on networks and partnerships.

(Torfing et al., 2012, p. 167)

Likewise, Torfing et al. acknowledge that in accordance with traditional understandings of democracy, network governance can be highly problematic as they tend to undermine the formal institutions of representative democracy (2012). Still, Torfing et al. argue that network governance is not intrinsically undemocratic, as it might under some circumstances actually enhance democracy. Examples include: by bringing affected citizens in on arenas of decision making, providing a new platform for political mobilization (alongside or replacing traditional areas such as political parties), and by introducing a wider array of competing public service providers, giving citizens the option of choosing and affecting public services as consumers (Torfing et al., 2012).

For assessing the democratic performance of governance networks, Torfing et al. propose investigating how such arenas are anchored in relevant territorial or functional demarcated political constituencies, and norms of democratic conduct. Thus, network governance arenas can be considered democratic to the extent that they: (1) are monitored by democratically elected politicians, (2) represent the membership basis of the participating groups and organization, (3) are accountable to a territorially defined citizenry, (4) facilitate negotiated interaction in accordance with a commonly accepted democratic grammar of conduct (Torfing et al., 2012).

Through this model of democratic anchorage, Torfing et al. imply that traditional tools of assessing democratic performances are not sufficient, and that the emerging reality of governance requires a new (post-traditional) understanding of democracy (as well as effectivity). More importantly, they also require a new and post-traditional role of politicians to act as “metagovernors” of such processes.

The governing of governance: metagovernance

For network governance arenas to perform in accordance with the formulated and tailored criteria they are dependent on careful and complex management, “[h]ence, the attempts of governments at multiple levels to reap the fruits of interactive governance call for a reflexive and strategic metagovernance” (Torfing et al., 2012, p. 122). Metagovernance can be understood as the “governance of governance”, and involves the deliberate attempt to facilitate and manage more or less self-regulating processes of network governance (Torfing et al., 2012, p. 122).

The concept of metagovernance is a central concept within the second generation of governance literature. Concerned with improving the performance of networked arrangements, the general idea is that the new emerging reality of network governance requires new and distinct management tools as traditional (hierarchical) tools are obsolete and incapable of managing networks (Agranoff & McGuire, 2001; Sørensen & Torfing, 2009; Torfing et al., 2012). Representing a third layer of government, the tools of metagovernance include both “hands-on” methods (i.e. process management and direct participation) associated with traditional hierarchical steering and “hands-off methods” (i.e. institutional design, and goal and framework steering) associated with NPM reforms (Torfing et al., 2012, p. 135).

For Torfing et al., the notion of metagovernance is also essential to their critique of the transformation thesis suggesting transition from government to governance. Through exercising metagovernance the government still plays a crucial role in governance, creating a model of coexistence between the two. In turn, the exercise of network governance does however also affect government, but not by creating a hollow state. Rather, the exercise of governance is transforming the overall role and function of the state that is taking upon itself the role of metagovernor in recognition of the limits to unilateral state action (Torfing et al., 2011). Rather than a one-way movement from government to governance, the idea of transformation therefore becomes a dialectic process of coexistence and transformation between the two. However, they argue, the notion of metagovernance does not entail an insistence on the omnipotence of the state, reducing governance to a set of tools, strategies, and relationships used to govern:

Rather, the notion of metagovernance offers a way of balancing state-centered and society-centered views on how society and the economy are governed. It permits us to avoid erroneous ideas about the decline or death of the state and to appreciate the role of states and governments in influencing arenas of multilateral action, while insisting that traditional forms of control and command are rendered obsolete, or least reduced to “a shadow of hierarchy” (Scharpf, 1994), in areas where decentered forms of policy interaction are expanding.

(Torfing et al., 2012, p. 132)

The separation of government and governance

Through developing an alternative dialectic model of transformation, emphasizing the interaction between government and governance, Torfing et al. annul the problematic and simplified notion of governance replacing government from the transformation thesis. However, the idea of a societal and governmental transformation along with the underlying notion (as demonstrated by Davies, 2011) of a post-traditional condition remains central for Torfing et al. Through the insistence of governance as a post-traditional governing tool, the analysis of Torfing et al. emphasizes the separation between the concept of government and the concept of governance despite their attempt to conceptualize a dialectic transformation. This separation is further enforced through the development of tailor-made assessment and management tools replacing the “obsolete” tools of hierarchical government.

This tension between traditional government and post-traditional governance can be considered highly problematic. For example, Vabo and Røiseland (2012) have—through empirical enquires—demonstrated how classic and generic frameworks analyzing tools of government are still relevant in network context, and therefore argue for a bridge between the classical literature on policy instruments and the growing framework of metagovernance. Røiseland(2011) has also elsewhere, based on studies of collaborative arrangements in local government, demonstrated that the institutional forms of such arrangements do in reality exist in a continuum between the archetypical definitions of government and governance from the literature.

Conclusions

Exploring the reality of the transformation thesis and emergence of a post-traditional traditional literature lies well beyond the ambitions of this article. Regardless, opening the black box of the transformation thesis and understanding how its basic premises shape our understanding of governance networks is a task worth doing. The comparison between the critiques of Davies (2011) and Torfing et al. (2012) provides an interesting example of how variations to the basic idea of transformation shape the conceptualization of network governance practices.

While Davies’s critique sets out to challenge the governance theory at its very foundation by falsifying the transformation thesis through its roots in theories of reflexive modernity and the concept of a post-traditional condition, Torfing et al. take a different stance through utilizing their critique of the transformation thesis to advance governance theory. In tracing the problematic features of governance theory (such as simplified transformation and lack of power perspectives) back to normative attachments of the transformation thesis and reflexive theory, Torfing et al. manage to expand the theoretical framework of governance theory into annulling several of the problematic features pinpointed by Davies (2011). However, not confronting their own concept of an “emergent reality” with a similar analysis creates a problematic emphasis of the tension between government and governance, which may well hinder an elaborate understanding of how the totality of government practices may, or may not, be changing.

Notes

¹ Latour (1999, p. 304) defines blackboxing as “the way scientific and technical work is made invisible by its own success. When a machine runs efficiently, when a matter of fact is settled, one need focus only on its inputs and outputs and not on its internal complexity. Thus, paradoxically, the more science and technology succeed, the more opaque and obscure they become”.