Andrea Liese

Explaining Varying Degrees of Openness in the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)

One of the most widely held assumptions in the literature on global governance is that international organizations are increasingly turning to transnational actors (TNAs),2 that is, civil society organizations, business associations and multinational corporations, in standard-setting and implementation.3 Yet how can we explain varying degrees of openness toward these actors over time, with regard to specific TNAs and within organizations?

Transnationale öffentlich-private Partnerschaften — Bestimmungsfaktoren für die Effektivität ihrer Governance-Leistungen

Wenn von Governance in einer sich wandelnden Welt die Rede ist, so sind damit vor allem veranderte Akteursbeziehungen sowie die Enthierarchisierung von Politik angesprochen (vgl. Benz 2004; Schuppert 2005). Ein Paradebeispiel fur diese neuen Steuerungsformen sind Partnerschaften zwischen offentlichen und privaten Akteuren, die wir im Folgenden untersuchen. Im (idealtypischen) Modell moderner Staatlichkeit sind es Regierungen, also offentliche Akteure, die — vorwiegend hierarchisch — steuern und regulieren. Diesem Modell entsprechen jedoch weder das internationale System noch die Staaten auserhalb der OECD-Welt. Angesichts der mangelnden Effektivitat von internationaler und nationaler Steuerung stellen sich nicht nur Fragen nach der Exportfahigkeit dieses Modells eines demokratischen Rechts- und Interventionsstaates (Zurn/ Leibfried 2005; Risse 2007), sondern auch nach alternativen Formen politischer Steuerung, womit wir im Zentrum der Governance-Debatte und beim Gegenstand dieses Beitrags angelangt waren. Governance jenseits des Nationalstaates umfasst dabei in einer weiten Definition entweder die Gesamtheit kollektiver Formen der Regelung gesellschaftlicher Beziehungen (Mayntz 2004: 66) oder nach einer engeren Definition alle Formen horizontaler und moglicherweise auch informeller Steuerungsmodi, derer sich auch andere Akteure als Regierungen bedienen.

Introduction: Transnational Partnerships for Sustainable Development

Transnational public-private partnerships (PPPs) are a relatively new form of governance. By governance we mean ‘the various institutionalized modes of social coordination to produce and implement collectively binding rules or to provide collective goods’ (Risse, 2011b, p. 9). In PPPs, non-state actors (such as non-profit organizations and companies) work with state actors (such as intergovernmental organizations and public donor agencies) across multiple transnational, national, and local levels to provide collective goods. One could say that these diverse actors ‘co-govern’, thereby performing functions that until recently were generally regarded as the sole responsibility of sovereign states, at least in the ‘OECD world’ (Liese and Beisheim 2011, p. 115; OECD, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development).

The Authority of International Public Administrations

This chapter takes stock with the research on the authority of international organizations (IOs) and international public administrations (IPAs) in the fields of International Relations (IR) and Public Administration (PA). It combines arguments from conceptual and theoretical debates with empirical findings to explore under which conditions IPAs are likely to enjoy authority. Based on a review of the literature and on conceptual clarifications, we define authority as a social relationship between holders and granters of authority. We distinguish two types of authority, namely, political and expert authority, and two forms of recognition, namely, in practice (de facto) and by formal delegation (de jure). Given that the de facto expert authority of IPAs has received least attention in the literature, while the PA literature reminds us that knowledge lies at the heart of bureaucratic power, we develop propositions on how de facto expert authority could be measured and how the anticipated variation of expert authority among IPAs could be explained. We illustrate our argument with reference to empirical findings in the IR and PA literature. We conclude by highlighting the implications of our discussion for future research on the authority of national and IPAs.

Research Design: Measuring and Explaining the Effectiveness of PPPs

This volume analyzes the conditions that lead to different levels of effectiveness among transnational pub lie-priva te partnerships (PPPs) for sustainable development working in areas of limited statehood. Defining PPP effectiveness as furthering the attainment of international development goals such as the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), we use new empirical data obtained from expert interviews, documents, field research, and secondary literature to test a series of hypotheses about the relevance of various institutional design features for a partnership’s success. Our study focuses on 21 transnational PPPs (Chapters 3–5) and on 45 local-level projects carried out by four of these partnerships in Bangladesh, India, Kenya, and Uganda (Chapters 7 and 8). While we assume that institutional design matters, the question of which aspects of this design are the most significant depends on the type of partnership and the local context in which PPP projects are implemented. For the local-level projects, we adopt a comparative approach to analyze them in order to systematically assess the relevance of project-specific versus are a-specific conditions.

Who Governs Partnerships? On the Role of Boards, Donors, Partners, and Other Stakeholders

Much of the scientific debate on governance in areas of limited statehood centers on the question of how — that is, by what modes of governance — security and other collective goods can be provided in the absence of consolidated statehood. Yet it is equally important to address the question of who governs (Avant et al., 2010, p. 223) when it is not the state. Also, to evaluate the effectiveness of external governance, it is crucial to examine which individuals and organizations in a transnational public-private partnership (PPP) contribute in which phases of the policy process. In this book, we have introduced PPPs as a form of governance in which public and private actors interact. But who exactly is involved in PPPs? And who makes the decisions and holds the power? That is, who sets the agenda, makes the rules, establishes the programs, and monitors, evaluates, and finances the work of PPPs as external governance actors in areas of limited statehood?

Summing Up: Key Findings and Avenues for Future Research

This chapter summarizes the principal results of the case studies and comparisons in the volume and reflects on these results in the light of our overarching conceptual and theoretical framework.1 In Section 9.1 of this chapter, we summarize and synthesize the findings on the overall effectiveness of transnational partnerships, presented in Chapters 3–5. As shown, the effectiveness of the 21 transnational public-private partnerships (PPPs) in our sample varies widely. We find effectiveness to be influenced most strongly by the degree of institutionalization and process management, with other factors showing occasional influence: The effect of these factors matters to different extents for the different types of PPPs, and we offer an explanation as to why this is the case. As outlined in the conceptual framework (see Section 2.4), we differentiate three types of PPPs by their core functions (see Liese and Beisheim, 2011): Standard-setting partnerships focus on establishing rules — for example, by drafting a voluntary code of conduct, often together with a verification or certification scheme; service-providing partnerships focus on the distribution of resources and provision of services; and knowledge-transferring partnerships generate new expertise, engage in agenda setting, and provide a forum for the exchange and dissemination of best practices.

Can PPPs Make it Anywhere? : How Limited Statehood and Other Area Factors Influence PPP Effectiveness

Comparative empirical accounts of the local-level work of transnational PPPs are scarce in the academic literature (for some exceptions, see Compagnon, 2012; Hog, 2012; Jamali, 2004; Kolk and Lenfant, 2013; Marin, 2009). This chapter examines the local-level work of four public-private partnerships (PPPs) in areas of limited statehood in East Africa (Kenya and Uganda) and South Asia (Bangladesh and India). What happens when PPPs that were formed in multi-level governance contexts ‘hit the ground’ — that is, when they implement projects in diverse and challenging settings? And how do limited statehood and other area factors influence the effectiveness of PPP projects?