cover image: Emerging private governance

Premium

20.500.12592/jx6js6

Emerging private governance

15 Nov 2012

Across sectors of the global economy, private governance has emerged as a new instrument for addressing pressing social and environmental problems. Although better suited for tackling the challenge of reaching agreements among states to address problems transcending national borders, these initiatives create new boundaries based on what problems they choose to focus on and which actors they choose to regulate - that is, the different policy foci of individual programs. Specialization is not inherently problematic. Private governance can focus attention on the problems of a single-issue area and build capacity among actors to resolve its problems, but equally a particular policy focus can create more problems than it fixes. Using certification systems, developed and run by non-state actors, from the forest, fisheries, and coffee sectors, this paper explores the reasons behind the different policy foci certification programs take on and how programs, alone and through coordinated efforts, seek to manage interactive and spillover effects arising from the issue-area boundaries that separate them. It closes with recommendations for future coordination strategies that draw from work in international relations and public administration.
government politics economics environmental governance governance environmental policy science and technology research strategy culture philosophy public-private sector cooperation science social policy social sciences standardization certification strategies institutional design attention cognitive science social responsibility of business international regimes private regulation regime complexity

Authors

Auld, Graeme

Pages
30
Published in
Canada

Related Topics

All