Call for Papers for Panel on Long-term evolution and institutional change in sustainable polycentric governance: connecting theory and normative conditions with empirical analysis

Co-Chairs: Elizabeth Baldwin¹, Michael McGinnis², Mark Stephan³, and Andreas Thiel⁴¹University of Arizona, USA, ²Indiana University, USA, ³Washington State University, USA, ⁴University of Kassel, Germany

Scholarship on polycentric governance has developed dynamically in recent years. The theorized core virtues of polycentric governance, such as resilience and adaptiveness, highlight its features in dynamic contexts. For example, polycentric governance is held to be adaptive because while it changes its form, it maintains its function. But few empirical studies examine institutional change over time in polycentric systems. This observation begs several crucial questions concerning the underlying determinants of sustainable polycentric governance: under what constitutional and social-ecological conditions does polycentric governance adapt well and prove resilient? What drives polycentric governance to change its form? Further, what feedbacks signal the need to adapt in polycentric governance and how do they function? To what extent is adaptation and change of governance the outcome of deliberate bottom-up or top down agency, or is change an emergent property of polycentric governance? What may be early warning signs that polycentric governance does not prove resilient and adaptive in the long term? What role do legitimacy and modes of contesting existing orders and the political economy of governance play? In this panel, we invite submissions that address these questions. Further, researchers ideally discuss several methodological challenges and constraints of such long-term studies and ways to overcome them. In order to contribute to coherence, organizers will circulate materials in advance that frames research on sustainable polycentric governance. The panel invites contributions to above-named questions by authors willing to engage into the kind of cross-cutting discussion outlined here.

Please, submit your abstracts by 12 December 2022

Link for Submission: https://2023.iasc-commons.org/paper-abstract-submission/

For More details on the XIX Biennial IASC Conference visit: https://2023.iasc-commons.org/