TY - JOUR

T1 - Clusters of water governance problems and their effects on policy delivery

AU - Kirschke, Sabrina

AU - Franke, Christian

AU - Newig, Jens

AU - Borchardt, Dietrich

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2019, © 2019 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

PY - 2019/4/3

Y1 - 2019/4/3

N2 - Public policy problems are increasingly being characterised as wicked or tame problems, assuming that this classification is also meaningful for attempts to effective problem-solving. But do distinct ‘wicked’ or ‘tame’ problems empirically exist? We investigate 37 water-related problems in Germany, based on interview-based data on problem wickedness and official data on policy delivery. Our analysis clearly reveals four clusters of water governance problems (system complexity, uncertainty, tame and wicked problems), based on variations of three factors of wickedness (goals, uncertainty and system complexity). These clusters of problems vary in their effects on different dimensions of policy delivery (goal formulation, stages and degrees of implementation of measures), with significant effects on goal formulation and the number of measures ‘in construction’. These empirical insights may contribute to a more systematic design of governance strategies for addressing water governance problems in practice.

AB - Public policy problems are increasingly being characterised as wicked or tame problems, assuming that this classification is also meaningful for attempts to effective problem-solving. But do distinct ‘wicked’ or ‘tame’ problems empirically exist? We investigate 37 water-related problems in Germany, based on interview-based data on problem wickedness and official data on policy delivery. Our analysis clearly reveals four clusters of water governance problems (system complexity, uncertainty, tame and wicked problems), based on variations of three factors of wickedness (goals, uncertainty and system complexity). These clusters of problems vary in their effects on different dimensions of policy delivery (goal formulation, stages and degrees of implementation of measures), with significant effects on goal formulation and the number of measures ‘in construction’. These empirical insights may contribute to a more systematic design of governance strategies for addressing water governance problems in practice.

KW - Politics

KW - Cluster analysis

KW - complex problems

KW - European Water Framework Directive

KW - water pollution

KW - water quality

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85062707780&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1080/14494035.2019.1586081

DO - 10.1080/14494035.2019.1586081

M3 - Journal articles

VL - 38

SP - 255

EP - 277

JO - Policy and Society

JF - Policy and Society

SN - 1449-4035

IS - 2

ER -