3.1 Partnerships in (global) environmental governance

Literature dealing with partnerships from the institutional perspective focuses on the (national or global) society at large and on the institutional arrangements existing in past, current and/or future societies. Partnerships are primarily understood as new institutional arrangements, contributing to and shaping the governance of environmental and related issues. The major issue authors are concerned with is the role partnerships (could) play and the functions they (could) fulfil in a presumed new (global) environmental governance regime. Aspects often included in these analyses are the driving forces behind the partnership trend and the institutional implication of this trend.

As for the methodologies used in these studies, these are mainly literature studies and (single) case studies. Studies on the appropriateness, adequacy and effectiveness of partnerships as governance arrangements are mostly theoretical exercises, complemented with practical examples and literature comparison. It has to be noted, however, that the research methods quite often remain unspecified.

A good example of a scholar taking an institutional perspective is Pattberg (2004). He addresses the role of private governance institutions in environmental politics. The goal of this publication is to ‘draw a preliminary picture of private rule-making and its functions in the field of environmental politics’ (p. 53). He does so by means of a study of literature and a case study of the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). This exercise results in a description of the various functions private governance institutions can fulfil in global environmental governance.

Another example is Arts' study on Green Alliances of Business and NGOs (Arts 2002), in which he examines their contribution to environmental policy making and regulation. The author's aim is to ‘theorize about the history, strengths and weaknesses of green alliances’ (p. 1). The author builds upon the policy arrangements approach (Van Tatenhove et al. 2000; Arts & Leroy 2006), resulting in an assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of Green Alliances as policy arrangements, followed by recommendations to overcome these weaknesses.

3.2 The context in which partnerships arise: Driving forces behind the partnership trend

From an institutional perspective, the key issue is the actual and possible role and function of partnerships in a (global) environmental governance regime. Authors typically start tackling the issue by painting the societal context in which the partnership phenomenon could emerge. Jessop (1998), Merrien (1998), Arts (2002), Van Tulder and Van der Zwart (2003) and other scholars turn to processes of globalization, liberalization and privatization to explain the rise of partnerships. These trends are believed to have led to the emergence of new organizational forms, through a process best known as ‘sector blurring’ (Bozeman 1987). Authors essentially argue that the increasing globalization of economic activities brought about the globalization of their negative effects as well, for example pollution, unhealthy and unsafe labour circumstances and loss of biodiversity. These large-scale, complex or messy problems (Ackhoff 1975, cited in Van Herel 2005) exceed by far the solution capacities of single actors. This calls for shared efforts of actors throughout all sectors of society in the form of new configurations of state bodies, market agents and civic parties, from the local to the global level. Intersectoral partnerships with a sustainable development aim can be interpreted as one such new configuration.

While also linking sustainability to partnerships, some authors look for a more discursive explanation for the rise of partnerships. Glasbergen and Groenenberg (2001), and Arts (2002), for example point at the rise of the concept of sustainable development itself. This concept, these authors argue, combines the need for economic development with the need for social development and environmental quality. Thus, the concept combines needs for which responsibilities were traditionally separated: Business for economic development, government for the protection of public goods (of which social and natural capital are important aspects), and civil society for the enhancement of civility and social cohesion (of which social and environmental quality are important aspects as well).

Other scholars observe these same societal changes, but take a more critical and political stance. They use the term ‘political modernization’ to refer, among other phenomena, to the privatization of hitherto publicly managed domains, their delegation to non-elected quasi-autonomous agencies and institutions, and processes of rapid Europeanization and globalization, and signal a decline in democracy, caused by this wave of rapid political changes (e.g. Blowers 1998; Arts & Leroy 2006). From this perspective, partnerships might appear as convenient mechanisms, both to mask and to counterbalance this democratic deficit by reflecting a paradigm of collaboration, consensus building and cooperation (cf. Glasbergen 2007). On the other hand, partnerships can be said to create a new elitist management (Dubbink 2003). In other words, these scholars rather point at worldwide governance innovations in response to worldwide problems, particularly including democratic deficits. The organizational, the discursive and the political rationale and interpretation do not contradict, but rather complement each other.

3.3 The (potential) role of partnerships

As partnerships are considered a response to the limited problem-solving capacity of governments, the functions attributed to them tend to respond to this deficit. The list below does not pretend to be exhaustive, yet it enumerates the partly overlapping roles and functions ascribed to partnerships within the literature from an institutional perspective:

• Agenda setting (Streck 2002b; Visseren-Hamakers & Glasbergen 2007).

• Policy development (Reinicke & Deng 2000; Streck 2002b; Pattberg 2004; Visseren-Hamakers & Glasbergen 2007).

• Implementation (Reinicke & Deng 2000; Streck 2002b). Note that this is the formal role attributed to partnerships – Type II agreements – within the WSSD 2002 context (Hens & Nath 2003; Norris 2005).

• Generation and dissemination of knowledge (Reinicke 1999; Reinicke & Deng 2000; Streck 2002b; Waddell 2002; Pattberg 2004).

• Bolstering institutional effectiveness (Streck 2002b).

• Facilitating a solution (Pattberg 2004).

• Learning in networks (Reinicke 1999; Waddell 2002; Pattberg 2004).

• Broadening participation: Giving voice to unheard groups (Reinicke 1999; Reinicke & Deng 2000).

• Making and deepening markets (Reinicke & Deng 2000).

These partnership roles and functions that authors point to reflect different roles and functions that one observes in policy making in general or in specific stages of the so-called policy cycle. Howlett and Ramesh (2003) provide a comprehensive overview and elaboration on these functions. Two other functions that are attributed to partnerships are less familiar: Metagovernance and ensuring good governance (Visseren-Hamakers & Glasbergen 2007). The authors define metagovernance as ‘strategic steering and co-ordination in the governance system’, while ‘ensuring good governance is ensuring that the basic elements needed for a governance system to function are functioning, for example combating corruption’ (Visseren-Hamakers & Glasbergen 2007, p. 2).

The idea that partnerships have a role to play in global environmental governance is hardly contested, it is rather assumed to be self-evident. However, most authors argue that the potentially large contribution of partnerships only materializes under certain conditions. Streck (2002a,b) emphasizes the role that supranational organizations should play in creating a constructive institutional environment for what she refers to as ‘global public policy networks’. Bäckstrand (2006) argues Johannesburg partnerships can benefit from clearer linkage to existing institutions and multilateral agreements, measurable targets and timetables, more effective leadership, improved accountability, systematic review, reporting and monitoring mechanisms. Arts (2002) stresses the importance of ‘embeddedness’ of NGO – business partnerships within the core business of companies and in formal public policy making on the environment. In short, the general stance is that partnerships could contribute a great deal, but only under certain conditions.

3.4 Institutional implications of the partnership trend

When questioning the role of partnerships, many authors also discuss the possible or probable institutional implications of this new mode of governance.

In a recent paper, Visseren-Hamakers and Glasbergen (2007) address the more practical political implications of the emergence of new governance arrangements. In line with other scholars (Kooiman 1993; Cashore et al. 2004), they argue that next to the familiar traditional, top-down steering role, governments should take a meta-governance role. As stated above, Visseren-Hamakers and Glasbergen define the concept of metagovernance by referring to the management of the governance system as a whole, ensuring fair play and linkages between different partnership initiatives. Visseren-Hamakers and Glasbergen also point to a group of authors with a differing opinion. These scholars, like Jessop (1998) and Stoker (1998), disregard the traditional role of governments altogether, because of their loss of steering capacity. They see a solely mediating role for governments. This debate essentially comes down to a disagreement on the role of partnerships in relation to traditional governmental steering: Could or should the former (eventually) substitute the latter, or complement it? Or, on the contrary, is at least a minimum of ‘government’ a precondition for partnerships to be successful at all?

Here we touch upon a series of studies reflecting on partnerships and related arrangements from a mainly politico-philosophical and ethical perspective, assessing these new phenomena using criteria from western political and democratic traditions. Key issues then are the degree of inclusiveness or democracy, and the legitimacy of partnerships. Blowers (1998), Meadowcroft (1998), Dubbink (2003) and Pattberg (2004) are amongst the authors who wonder how multi-actor governance arrangements relate to the principles of representative democracy and the constitutional state. Pattberg phrases the issue adequately when he asks ‘how the valuable contribution of partnerships can be integrated into a democratic and legitimate governance of global environmental affairs’ (Pattberg 2004, p. 64).

The authors dealing with these issues come to quite opposing conclusions. Meadowcroft (1998) perceives the involvement of private parties (e.g. businesses, civil society groups, citizens) in public policy making as an improved form of democracy. Hajer and Wagenaar (2003) even plea for a new form of democracy altogether – an expansive, deliberative democracy, instead of the representative democracies we currently know. On the contrary, Blowers (1998) and Ottaway (2001) emphasize that these new public – private governance arrangements indeed enable different partners to have a say in policy-making processes, but that these partners are not democratically chosen. Public – private governance arrangements tend to privilege some parties, while others are still left out. Richter (2003) goes one step further when she warns for neo-corporatism in disguise with regard to public – private partnerships, and she and others urge public interest organizations (UN, governments, NGOs) to keep away from them. The issues of democracy and legitimacy of partnerships are clearly quite fundamental. The debate is political and normative in character, and cannot be expected to come to an end soon.

4.1 Partnerships as strategic devices

From an actor perspective, society mainly forms the décor, while the object of study is the partnership itself. Authors look more into partnerships, than at partnerships and their functions among other forms of governance. In terms of volume, the partnership literature written from this perspective largely exceeds the one starting from an institutional perspective. In contrast to the latter, the actor perspective does not question the partnership phenomenon as such, nor does it look at it as a possible solution for general and fundamental societal problems. Instead, the actor perspective looks at partnerships as instruments for the advancement of actor-specific goals; for example, as a way for businesses to fill in their corporate social responsibility strategy and to make their production more sustainable.

Studies with an actor perspective try to understand and clarify partnership processes with the ultimate goal of improving these processes through recommendations based on their findings. A major function of these studies is thus to improve the design of partnerships as a strategic device for the agencies involved. Major issues dealt with within the actor perspective are the reasons to partner, the advantages and disadvantages of partnering and identification of critical success factors. Some studies serve a particular actor, like the work of Juniper and Moore (2002), while others are aimed at serving all partners. An example of the latter is the work of Stafford et al. (2000).

Virtually all this literature results in practical recommendations on when, how and with whom to partner and on how to arrange the process. Recommendations often take the form of checklists, do's and don'ts, and related types of advice. It is noticeable that a series of not-for-profit organizations, such as The World Conservation Union (IUCN), the Environment Council, the World Business Council for Sustainable Development, and a series of private consultancy organizations all provide their members and their clients with these kinds of checklists as well. We will not go into these.

In the next sections, often enumerated advantages and disadvantages of partnerships are reviewed and summarized (Table I), while frequently mentioned success factors are addressed and summarized as well (Table II).

Partnership literature from an actor perspective is closely related to collaboration theories, developed in the context of inter-organizational, although mostly intrasectoral collaboration. References to these types of collaboration studies, to the seminal work by Gray for instance (Gray & Wood 1991; Gray & Yan 1992), are frequently found. A central issue in collaboration literature is the building of trust among collaborating partners, and the importance of trust among partners is emphasized in partnership literature as well. This is not further elaborated upon in the remainder of this contribution, since some excellent work has been carried out on trust, for example by Vangen and Huxham (2003).

The research method most frequently used within the actor perspective is the in-depth case study. Most cases are studied in a traditional way – through interviews, document study and/or participatory observations. Other cases are studied through Action Research (e.g. Doherty & Tranchell 2005): Designing a real-life partnership process while observing and evaluating it. Next to that, a few other publications within this perspective are based on practical experience(s) of the author with real-life processes (e.g. McConney 2000).

Rondinelli and London (2003) offer a typical example of authors using an actor perspective. Their article deals with the conditions under which companies should engage in partnerships. The research goal is to review the experiences of different actors with corporate and non-profit organizations' collaboration. The authors aim to provide managers of business and non-profit organizations with strategic criteria that contribute to the effectiveness of partnerships and that help to assess the feasibility of intersectoral collaboration for the organization. The main data gathering and analysis methods are a study of archive data, a content analysis of corporate environmental performance reports, and in-depth interviews with organizations with experience in intersectoral (or cross-sectoral as Rondinelli and London call it) partnering. This results in a ‘decision tree’, with advice for organizations on when and how to start or to continue intersectoral collaboration.

4.2 Advantages of intersectoral partnering

In general, the literature is very optimistic about the possibilities and advantages of partnerships. The literature suggests that different actors can profit in different ways from partnering processes; the advantages (and risks) of partnerships are often divided into those important to governmental bodies, to companies and to societal organizations, respectively. Some apply to all, however. Access to means and resources is widely acknowledged as an important advantage for all partners in a partnership. Of the advantages mentioned (see Table I), most can be interpreted as enabling the partners to gain one or another resource.

As for the first advantage mentioned, especially NGOs can partner to obtain financial means and to create markets for sustainable products. A partnership with a company can be of great help in ‘scaling up’ their activities (Cowe 2004). It has to be noted, however, that not all partnerships ‘transfer money’ from business to NGOs; some NGOs do not take money from businesses at all and there are partnerships with equal financial contribution from all parties. Furthermore, Hale and Mauzerall (2004, p. 220) state, on the WSSD partnerships, that they ‘were hoped to catalyze (…) additional funding of sustainable development projects around the world’, but they found that the funding of most of the WSSD partnership comes from governments and less than 1% from the private sector.

Second, the input of (local) expertise and knowledge of the partner(s) involved is mentioned as an advantage. Multinational corporations, for example, can be interested in the knowledge of NGOs on environmental management, or, when operating on an international scale, in the knowledge of local NGOs on habits and customs in a specific region (Heap 2000; Rondinelli & London 2003). NGOs, on the other hand, can be interested in the capabilities and resources that businesses have (Eweje 2007).

The third advantage, the emergence of creative, innovative solutions, can be seen as following up on the latter. It is meant to cover all the advantages that can be associated with the fact that through partnerships, parties can gain insight in the views of the others and learn from each other, so that knowledge is accumulated (Poncelet 2001; Hemmati 2002), creativity is stimulated, and a wider range of solutions can be generated (Davis 1999). One could say that ideally, in partnerships, one plus one could make ‘three’.

The fourth advantage, summarized in Table I as ‘eco-marketing reasons’, is framed as a very important motive for companies to partner. If done well, partnering with other societal parties can enhance the image of a company within the company itself (i.e. raise employee morale, Davis 1999), with NGOs (Murphy & Bendell 1997; Heap 2000) and with consumers (Tholke 2003). Thus, companies can gain a competitive advantage through partnering.

Finally, the gaining of legitimacy or credibility is brought forward as an important advantage, particularly for governments and for companies. Partnerships can contribute to their legitimacy, since they tend to take into account differing views in a constructive, non-hierarchical way (cf. Heap 2000; cf. Cowe 2004). This can create constituency support for the decisions that are taken (Holländer & Leroy 2001). In a way, partnerships here resemble the role that political participation classically plays. Both of them tend to further the acceptance and the implementation of (tough) decisions.

4.3 Risks of intersectoral partnering

Besides advantages, partnership literature within the actor perspective also lists many risks of intersectoral partnering that we have summarized in Table I. The first risk is a blurring of tasks and responsibilities. Partnering can bring about a lack of clarity on which actor is responsible for what, and thereby can lead to avoidance of responsibilities, as for instance Giguere (2001) points out.

A related risk is legitimacy loss. Whereas partnerships, on the one hand, may contribute to the legitimacy of the parties involved, these parties, on the other hand, risk losing legitimacy when they start working on topics that are traditionally not their field of expertise and/or responsibility, and with partners they did not previously work with. Companies for example risk being accused of seeking to gain influence over NGOs (Murphy & Bendell 1997), while NGOs in turn could be accused of co-operating with their traditional enemies instead of putting them under pressure (Hemmati 2002).

The third, cultural differences, is a container term for the fact that when different organizations partner, one will often face challenges related to differences in culture and language (Fiszbein & Lowden 1999) – sometimes even literally, when the partnership crosses national borders (Ansett 2005). Overcoming these differences takes time and effort. Although the benefits could be worth the workload, authors generally conclude that parties that form partnerships need to take cultural differences into account before and during the process (Hartman & Stafford 1997).

Lastly, partnership outcomes are insecure. As the other challenges mentioned above indicate, partnerships are in most cases not ‘business as usual’ for the participants and participants take a risk by engaging in them. Cowe (2004) for example warns that resources can be wasted if the desired outcomes are not achieved.

4.4 Factors for successful intersectoral partnering

As a result of the large amount of research carried out from the actor perspective, the list of partnership success factors that has been generated is rather impressive. Instead of presenting this long and partly redundant list of success factors, we have distilled the most important categories, and these are summarized in Table II. Because of the diversity in partnership forms, one should not regard success factors to be applicable to every single partnership in exactly the same way.

A first important aspect in the formation of partnerships is its very topic and the scoping thereof. Partnerships can be best formulated on a topic that fits well with the core business of the partners.

Scoping the issues also implies the choice for the right goals (Brinkerhoff 2002; Conrad et al. 2005). Authors mention being realistic in setting goals and investing adequate time in defining goals, management processes and evaluative metrics (Tholke 2003).

Besides the right goals, one should also gather the right partners (Caudron 1995; Tholke 2003). Authors advise to identify key stakeholders (Conrad et al. 2005) and to avoid assembling the same people for every new partnership initiative (Poncelet 2001). A mix of experienced and inexperienced actors is thought to be beneficial (Poncelet 2001).

Another essential success factor is a respectful, open way of working. Good communication, openness, listening to each other and building a shared understanding (Gray 1989, cited in Hartman et al. 1999; Hemmati 2002) are seen as important success factors.

Trust has already been mentioned as a central focus for literature on collaborative efforts in general and on partnerships in particular. As parties are often not used to working together and might even be former ‘enemies’, building trust and taking time to do so is considered to be very important (Heap 2000; Brinkerhoff 2002; Conrad et al. 2005; Hirsch & Meyer 2005).

Last of all, literature on partnerships from an actor perspective mentions some facilitating factors that are not easy to influence by the partners but that can further partnerships greatly. Examples are support or even participation of the media (Heap 2000), and from relevant political institutions (CSD Partnerships Fair Secretariat 2004).

5.1 Directions for further research

From the above, it might be clear that we regard a better, e.g. an empirically valid and reliable, understanding of the contribution of partnerships to sustainable development as a crucial task for partnership research. We indicate some strategic pathways that seem helpful in this quest.

Firstly, it is striking that partnerships are studied from a variety of disciplines, with quite different concepts, definitions, research methods, etc., and without too much contact, let alone too much accumulation of knowledge and insight between them. It is clear that partnership research could benefit from an integrated, at least a multidisciplinary, approach linking different perspectives into one research programme.

Secondly, studying the presumed link between partnerships and sustainable development requires a stronger operationalization and definition of the type of partnership, of the partnership effects and of the specific part of the sustainability challenge the partnership aims at solving. Typologies like the ones mentioned in section 2, some insights from the literature on power and influence – and how to measure them – and some insights from the literature and methods in policy evaluation could be helpful. The former could help to assess whether, to what extent and in what direction partnerships actually alter power relations between those involved and those not involved. These seem relevant questions, since sustainable development entails the quest for equal access to, and for participation in and transparency of decision making. The latter could help to get a more precise idea of the contribution of partnerships to policy-making qualities, either in terms of performance or legitimacy. Surprisingly, however, partnership literature until now rarely refers to these concepts, paradigms and methods.

Thirdly, as mentioned, a thorough evaluation of partnerships and their contribution to sustainability or even to a better environmental quality or decision making, requires clear criteria to measure ‘effectiveness’. Because of the multiple interpretations of what constitutes sustainable development, in most cases an effectiveness evaluation is likely to be beyond current capacities and is at least controversial, even though there has been some progress made in the development and application of sustainability indicators. Furthermore, in most cases a definite assessment of whether the actual policy outcome of a partnership is more sustainable than the one to be anticipated using a ‘traditional’ method of policy making is simply impossible, since there is no real basis nor opportunity for comparison. Therefore, an evaluation in terms of an increased concern, commitments made and followed, a better common understanding, increased learning capacities, the emergence of innovative ideas, etc., might be a next best evaluative approach. Such an evaluation could indicate whether and to what extent the expectations raised by the partnership paradigm are indeed met.

That would require a more longitudinal analyses of the partnership practices and strategies of governmental bodies, market parties and NGOs, an assessment of the changes therein and the reasons thereof, and an evaluation of the lasting, institutionalized changes in their way of handling environmental, sustainability and related issues. In other words, next to case studies, we need other research designs as well, as we are used to in comparable studies on the influence of political parties, trade unions and other actors and factors on policy making. Until now, the ‘newcomer’ partnership apparently led to rather fragmented and insulated ad hoc approaches. A combination of the actors' perspective and the institutional one could contribute to the designing of a more integrated and more longitudinal approach.

Fourthly and finally, our knowledge base and understanding would benefit from a more complete picture of the partnerships that currently exist. The development of partnership databases and quantitative analyses of their characteristics would lead to a more structural instead of anecdotal understanding of the partnership phenomenon, enabling us to generalize insights and findings. The studies on WSSD partnerships by Andonova and Levy (2003) and Hale and Mauzerall (2004) are examples of studies with such quantitative analyses that take a broad look at partnerships. Although the analyses in these studies are still relatively shallow due to the database characteristics, these are welcome and necessary contributions to the partnership literature.

All in all, we believe that research on the functioning of partnerships under specific political, economic and cultural conditions and dealing with issues from differing complexity seems an inevitable and promising, albeit tough, way forward.