Drawing general inferences on the basis of single-case and small-n -studies is often seen as problematic. This article suggests a logic of generalization based on thinly rationalistic social mechanisms. Ideal-type mechanisms can be derived from empirical observations in one case and, based on the assumption of thin rationality, used as a generalizing bridge to other contexts with similar actor constellations. Thus, the “portability” builds on expectations about similar mechanisms operating in similar contexts. We present the general logic behind such “rationalistic generalization” and relate it to other ideas about generalization from single-case studies.
Despite the growing body of literature on participatory and collaborative governance, little is known about citizens' motives for participation in such new governance arrangements. The present article argues that knowledge about these motives is essential for understanding the quality and nature of participatory governance and its potential contribution to the overall political and administrative system. Survey data were used to explore participants' motives for participating in a large-scale urban renewal program in Stockholm, Sweden. The program was neighborhood-based, characterized by self-selected and repeated participation, and designed to influence local decisions on the use of public resources. Three types of motives were identified among the participants: (a) Common good motives concerned improving the neighborhood in general and contributing knowledge and competence. (b) Self-interest motives reflected a desire to improve one's own political efficacy and to promote the interest of one's own group or family. (c) Professional competence motives represented a largely apolitical type of motive, often based on a professional role. Different motives were expressed by different categories of participants and were also associated with different perceptions concerning program outcomes. Further analysis suggested that participatory governance may represent both an opportunity for marginalized groups to empower themselves and an opportunity for more privileged groups to act as local citizen representatives and articulate the interests of their neighborhoods. These findings call for a more complex understanding of the role and potential benefits of participatory governance.
Where do governance networks come from? How do they emerge and why do they arise? Until recently these issues have not been prioritized in the network governance literature. Focus has been on the outcomes and political consequences of governance networks. Still, it seems appropriate to claim there is a lack of elaborated theoretical arguments about governance network formation (Hay & Richards 2000). If, however, governance networks are ‘here to stay’ and network governance should be ‘taken seriously’, we need a better understanding of the mechanisms of governance network formation. If the ‘second generation of network governance research’ specifically address meta-governance strategies (cf. Sørensen & Torfing in the Introduction), a crucial element should be systematic attempts to answer the questions above. It is the purpose of this chapter to develop some theoretically informed arguments about the formation and institutionalization of governance networks from what I call a contextual and ‘thin’ rational choice perspective.
How may ethnic organizations work as mechanisms for political integration in suburban multicultural contexts with participative and network modes of governance? The overall argument of the paper is that a shift from vertical to more horizontal modes of governance affects the prospects for ethnic associations to fulfil different democratic functions. It does so in a complex, multidimensional and somewhat contradictory way. Although network modes of governance are often argued for in terms of openness and inclusion, it should not be taken for granted that such governance structures do promote democratic functions of ethnic associations. Drawing on an in-depth case study of ethnic associations and network politics in Botkyrka, Sweden, the purpose of the article is to provide theoretically informed arguments on how the political integration potential of ethnic organization is affected when they participate in local network-like arrangements and institutions. In brief, the article outlines three arguments: (1) There are different mechanisms of ethnic organization that might contribute to a more politically integrated society. (2) More horizontal network modes of governance generate new conditions for these integrative mechanisms to emerge out of ethnic organization. (3) In such a context of network governance, the different integrative mechanisms of ethnic organizations are not always supplementary, but sometimes contradictory, causing genuine dilemmas to be dealt with by local actors.
Strategies for revitalizing marginalized neighborhoods often include participatory innovations. According to the participatory bias argument, however, participatory governance arrangements benefit the privileged rather than the poor. In the present article, the validity of this argument is examined by analyzing how individual resources and social positions relates to recruitment to, participation within, and outcomes derived from participation in a most-likely case of bias in participatory neighborhood governance. Although the privileged were overrepresented in recruitment, the pattern was less clear regarding influence within the processes, and quite the opposite regarding certain outcomes of participation. Also in a most-likely case for bias, participatory neighborhood governance may induce empowerment among poor. Based on the observation that participants that differ with regard to available resources and social positions also have different motives for participation, a mechanism-based account regarding why and how bias in early phases under certain conditions may produce empowering outcomes is proposed.
Grounded in a rational choice perspective, this thesis tries to develop the study of network governance. The starting point is a puzzling pattern of local multi-organizational cooperation observed in official evaluation reports on urban neighbourhood renewal in Sweden. Although collaboration between social authorities, housing companies and tenants’ organizations repeatedly end in frustration over processes as well as outcomes, new cooperation efforts are continually implemented. That is, while the governance literature claims lack of cooperation to be the most important factor explaining policy failures and implementation deficits, Swedish urban renewal seems to be a case of repeated cooperation without progress and frustration without disintegration on the local level.
Why is that? Is the phenomenon possible to explain without giving up the assumption that actors in local policy are more or less rational, given their aims and perceptions?
An ideal type definition of network governance is suggested and a mechanism approach to network governance is outlined. Four cases of neighbourhood renewal over twenty years or more are analyzed from a rationalistic perspective. The first is an intensive case study based on primary data from minutes, informal meetings, in-depth interviews and official documents. This close analysis of one case is then combined with process analysis of three more cases based on secondary data.
The final analysis is a rationalistic interpretation of repeated cooperation with frustration in the four cases. Although the key actors all have a preference for more cooperation, the four cases are characterized by an endless search for specific modes of cooperation. In terms of game theory this is interpreted as a problem of generosity or a “battle of the sexes” game. Hence the “negotiators dilemma” that informal networks are supposed to handle according to the theory, seems to repeat itself on the level of institutional design.
Among a number of proposals regarding ‘late’ forms of urban neoliberalism, it has recently been argued that urban entreprenurialism has become ‘common sense’ or even ‘dull compulsion’. In this article, we contribute to this discussion by exploring the structural conditions and local strategies for normalizing city-centre-oriented urban entrepreneurialism in a Swedish context. In doing so, we return to an important but sometimes overlooked aspect of David Harvey's original concept: the delicate act of organizing urban entrepreneurialism across public and private spheres of the local polity. From this perspective, the act of making urban entrepreneurialism normal is far from ‘dull compulsion’. Drawing on longitudinal case studies of two different public-private partnerships related to city centre development in the two largest Swedish cities, we highlight the active use of sly, or cunning, de-politicization strategies among local elite actors. Our analysis leads to the more general claim that we should expect similar sly de-politicization strategies to be necessary for normalizing urban entrepreneurialism in political contexts characterized by relatively strong local authorities, and in relation to spaces and topics of interest to many and diverse actors.