Pre-adoption phases of innovation are understudied in the innovation literature. This article addresses pre-adoption phases of innovation by running a prospective analysis. We assess the readiness of municipalities for the adoption of a digital tool that brings about process innovation concerning stakeholder management. Through an online survey, we elicit the public managers’ attitudes and their adoption expectation towards the tool. By drawing on insights from Diffusion of Innovation Theory and Theory of Planned Behaviour, we investigate which attributes of innovation along with managerial, organisational and environmental factors, contribute to a favourable attitude and an increased likelihood of innovation adoption. Our analysis reveals that while the perceived attributes of innovation such as its relative advantage and compatibility are major determinants of attitude formation and adoption expectation, pro-digitalisation beliefs, innovation-oriented organisational culture and environmental context factors such as high population and rates of new residential growth are critical in translation of positive attitudes to increased likelihood of adoption. Hence, in addition to perceived attributes of innovation and managerial characteristics, our findings also highlight the importance of organisational and environmental factors to the adoption expectation, and thus provide a more nuanced understanding of pre-adoption phases of innovation.

A network perspective to urban water governance provides a useful analytical perspective. Network approaches allow systematic descriptions and analysis of the structure of interactions among actors and technical elements. This chapter presents conceptual approaches, theoretical elements, and methodological tools related to actor networks in urban water governance. The chapter starts by presenting theoretical aspects and related research questions at the intersection of network governance and urban water governance. After an introduction to the main concepts and measures of Social Network Analysis, the chapter focuses on how network approaches can help in analyzing processes of digitalization and decentralization, not least with the concept of sociotechnical network approaches that combine actor networks with technical networks.

Calls for supporting sustainability through more and better research rest on an incomplete understanding of scientific evidence use. We argue that a variety of barriers to a transformative impact of evidence arises from diverse actor motivations within different stages of evidence use. We abductively specify this variety in policy and practice arenas for three actor motivations (truth-seeking, sense-making, and utility-maximizing) and five stages (evidence production, uptake, influence on decisions, effects on sustainability outcomes, and feedback from outcome evaluations). Our interdisciplinary synthesis focuses on the sustainability challenge of reducing environmental and human health risks of agricultural pesticides. It identifies barriers resulting from (1) truth-seekers’ desire to reduce uncertainty that is complicated by evidence gaps, (2) sense-makers’ evidence needs that differ from the type of evidence available, and (3) utility-maximizers’ interests that guide strategic evidence use. We outline context-specific research–policy–practice measures to increase evidence use for sustainable transformation in pesticides and beyond.

The role of the parliamentary arena and members of parliament (MPs) therein for both mainstreaming and cross-sectoral policy integration is largely unknown. Studying the case of Switzerland, this paper analyzes the integration of the biodiversity issue into policies of 20 different policy sectors over a period of 19 years to assess how two specific actor attributes - issue and sector specialization - increase the chances of MPs of engaging in both biodiversity mainstreaming and its cross-sectoral integration. The results based on a comprehensive collection of political documents from the parliamentary arena, and multilevel regression models show that an increase in MPs' sector specialization is associated with both a decrease in mainstreaming and a decrease in cross-sectoral integration activities. By contrast, an increase in issue specialization typically translates into biodiversity-related activity in a larger number of sectors. In the parliamentary arena, therefore, it is primarily a small group of "issue specialists" who take responsibility for the integration of crosscutting issues, such as biodiversity, into critical sectoral policies.

Prominent current policy problems such as climate change, migration, or the financial crisis embrace a multitude of issues that are tackled within single- or multiple-policy subsystems. However, interdependencies among actors that arise due to their multi-issue engagement are often discounted when studying policy processes, including learning dynamics and alliance or trust formation among actors engaged in multiple issues. Various issues compete for actors' attention, and actors need to choose an appropriate set of issues to deal with given their scarce resources. In this, why do actors engage in multiple issues? We present an innovative inductive approach that identifies policy issues related to Swiss water politics and actors involved therein. We use a two-mode exponential random graph model to estimate actors' multi-issue activity. Results show that 39% of actors engage in more than one water-related issue and that cross-subsystem and homophily clustering and clustered issue popularity drive this issue engagement.

In the last decade, a number of smart city initiatives have flourished around the world. While the literature is ripe with descriptions of those projects and pioneering cities, there is far less systematic research on why some cities are more advanced than others. As single locating entities, cities are posited to have strong geographic rootedness. Hence, spatial and socio-economic context, considered as the main stimulant of organizational innovation, can be particularly important for cities. We investigate 22 Swiss cities with smart city projects and use fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis to determine the configuration of conditions that make some cities more advanced than others in their smart city development. Results indicate that a configuration of high share of service sector, presence of research institutions and high urban density is sufficient for the outcome, whereas population size, new residential development and participation to international networks appear as less important. By providing insights into the spatial and socio-economic underpinnings of smart city development, the study contributes to the understanding of the geographies of smart cities.

Managing environmental problems requires cross-sectoral and cross-level collaboration among actors. Scholars of institutional arrangements investigate how rules shape such collaboration. Scholars of the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) look for explanations for collaboration in actors' values and beliefs. Rarely have these two factors been considered together when studying collaborative behavior. This paper considers institutional arrangements and actor values to examine the structure and potential drivers of actor collaboration. The study combines the Institutional Analysis and Development framework and the ACF, applying social network analysis to explore an interaction network prescribed by rules and a surveyed collaboration network. It tests the influence of actor beliefs, reputation, and institutional arrangements on collaboration investigating water management in the German Ruhr catchment. The study finds that perceived power and actor beliefs explain actor collaboration better than institutional arrangements and that perceived interactions are more diverse and denser than hierarchically structured networks of prescribed interactions.

Resilience is generally defined as the capacity of a system to recover quickly after shocks. Such an ability for continuity is also relevant for political systems. Important shocks to political systems can be triggered by natural disasters, political regime change, or other major events. We conceptualize political systems as political networks consisting of several interconnected political actors tackling problems on the political agenda. We investigate political networks' ability to recover from shocks. To do so, we first identify different types of shocks that have the ability to impact political networks. Second, we review the literature on resilience and discuss concepts related to political resilience. Third, we outline network measures and models able to grasp the reaction of a political network to shocks, so that we can operationalize the level of resilience of such a system. Throughout the text, we illustrate our theoretical ideas with selected case studies and empirical examples. We conclude that political networks need to allow for change and flexibility during the "after shock" situation: a resilient political network is not one that adopts the exact same shape, but one that has reinforced elements of its structure as a response to a shock. Finally, we outline pathways to future research.

To improve sustainable service provision, the public sector has been repeatedly subject to administrative reforms. Yet, the question arises of which types of organizations might be preferred. To address this, we systematically analyze which water supply organizations decision-makers and stakeholders, across different levels of government in Switzerland, prefer. We find that the actors prefer public organizations that involve coordination between municipalities and reject private organizations. Distinguishing between different actor levels reveals a distinct pattern, mainly related to the level of responsibility: the national (confederation) and regional (cantonal) actors only prefer coordination across municipalities, where local politicians lose a degree of control. In contrast, the local actors prefer those organizations where they can maintain democratic control the most. However, such organizations are not expected to perform sustainably, mainly because of lengthy decision-making processes, lack of access to external funds, and short-term financial planning. We, thus, conclude that, at the local level, there is potentially a trade-off between democratic values and performance.

We summarize what we assess as the past year's most important findings within climate change research: limits to adaptation, vulnerability hotspots, new threats coming from the climate-health nexus, climate (im)mobility and security, sustainable practices for land use and finance, losses and damages, inclusive societal climate decisions, and ways to overcome structural barriers to accelerate mitigation and limit global warming to below 2°C.

Although the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) emerged in Western democratic contexts, scholars increasingly apply it in other parts of the world to analyze diverse policy topics. These cross-country comparisons have provided a means for advancing comparative research, drawing lessons about policy processes, and offering opportunities to refine the framework. In this paper, we provide an overview of the ACF and its use as an analytical tool for comparative research. Through a systematic literature review, we identified 27 applications in 15 African countries, including democracies, authoritarian governments, and hybrid systems. Based on these applications published in peer-reviewed journals, we explore this illustrated collection of case studies to see how the ACF has been applied outside of Western democracies and to identify strengths and weaknesses of the ACF as a portable framework. These applications confirm the basic postulations of the ACF, but we also identify a few nuances and expectations. Based on these insights, we finally lay out a research agenda and a new generation of questions for applying the ACF in the African context as well as globally.

Während das Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF) in westlich-demokratischen Kontexten entstanden ist, wird es von Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftlern zunehmend in anderen Teilen der Welt angewandt. Diese länderübergreifenden Analysen haben es ermöglicht, die vergleichende Forschung voranzutreiben, Erkenntnisse über diverse politische Prozesse und Themen zu gewinnen und den analytischen Rahmen des ACF zu verfeinern. In diesem Papier geben wir einen Überblick über das ACF und seine Verwendung als Analyseinstrument für die vergleichende Forschung. Durch eine systematische Literaturrecherche haben wir 27 Anwendungen in 15 afrikanischen Ländern identifiziert, darunter Demokratien, autoritäre und hybride Systeme. Auf der Grundlage dieser in Fachzeitschriften veröffentlichten Anwendungen untersuchen wir – in Form einer illustrierten Sammlung von Fallstudien – wie das ACF außerhalb westlicher Demokratien angewandt wurde, und ermitteln dabei Stärken und Schwächen des ACF. Die 27 untersuchten Fallstudien bestätigen die grundlegenden Postulate des ACF, aber wir zeigen auch einige Nuancen auf. Auf der Grundlage dieser Erkenntnisse entwerfen wir schließlich eine Forschungsagenda und eine neue Generation von Fragen für die Anwendung des ACF im afrikanischen und weltweiten Kontext.

The effective conservation and promotion of biodiversity requires its integration into a wide range of sectoral policies. For this to happen, the issue must receive attention across policy sectors. Yet, we know little about how attention to the issue evolves over time and across sectors. Drawing from the literature on environmental policy integration/mainstreaming and policy process theories, we develop competing hypotheses, expecting either increasing or fluctuating attention to the biodiversity issue. We tested the hypotheses using the case of Swiss politics between 1999 and 2018. Applying a combination of computational methods, we analyze the content of a comprehensive collection of policy documents (n ≈ 440,000) attributed to 20 policy sectors. Comparing the sectors, we find that (1) a persistent increase in attention is the exception, (2) if there is an increase in attention, it is likely to be temporary, and (3) the most common pattern is that of invariant attention over time. Biodiversity integration - if it does happen at all - tends to occur in cycles rather than in steady long-term shifts. This implies that the conservation of biodiversity does not follow the cross-sectoral nature of the problem, but is subject to the dynamics of "politics," where actors, because of limited resources, engage with (aspects of) an issue only for a certain amount of time.

Many policy problems such as climate change, water pollution, or biodiversity loss originate in one sector or location but deploy their effects elsewhere and so require comprehensive regulation that is both source-directed and cross-sectoral. But, how can we assess a country’s cross-sectoral policy performance when it comes to solving complex (environmental) problems? To answer this question, the study examines pesticide regulation in Costa Rica. Synthetic pesticides are widely used to sustain agricultural production, but they constitute a risk for humans and nature. To assess policy performance, both the substantive (policy instruments) and institutional (legislation) aspects of policymaking targeting pesticide risks mitigation are considered for evaluation. More specifically, the policy mix of instruments in respective action plans as well as legislation in respective laws and regulations are analysed. To assess the cross-sectoral dimension and to add to literature on policy density and intensity, criteria like formulation of objectives, target group integration, coordination and policy instrument types are used. The findings indicate that policy mixes in the water and health sector exhibit high cross-sectoral performance in terms of source-directed instruments, but cross-sectoral performance in the overarching legislation is limited.

Les pesticides sont avant tout utilisés dans l’agriculture, mais aussi en milieu urbain et dans d'autres domaines. Sous forme de produits phytosanitaires, ils réduisent les pertes de rendement et de qualité dues aux organismes nuisibles. Toutefois, l'emploi actuel de pesticides porte toutefois un préjudice considérable à l'environnement et en particulier à la biodiversité. En dépit de certaines lacunes, les répercussions indésirables sont bien documentées. La présente fiche d'information aborde spécifiquement les incidences de l'usage de pesticides sur l'environnement, la biodiversité et les services écosystémiques et propose des pistes d'action possibles pour la politique et la société, visant à réduire les effets indésirables. Elle ne thématise pas, par exemple, l'importance des pesticides pour la production agricole ou les incidences sur la santé humaine.

Pestizide werden primär in der Landwirtschaft, aber auch im Siedlungsraum und in weiteren Bereichen eingesetzt. Als Pflanzenschutzmittel vermindern sie Ertrags- oder Qualitätseinbussen durch Schadorganismen. Der heutige Pestizideinsatz belastet aber die Umwelt und insbesondere die Biodiversität beträchtlich. Trotz Wissenslücken sind die unerwünschten Auswirkungen gut dokumentiert. Das Faktenblatt nimmt spezifisch die Auswirkungen von Pestiziden auf Umwelt, Biodiversität und Ökosystemleistungen in den Blick und zeigt mögliche Handlungsansätze für Politik und Gesellschaft zur Reduktion der unerwünschten Nebenwirkungen des Pestizideinsatzes auf. Nicht thematisiert werden im Faktenblatt etwa die Bedeutung von Pestiziden für die landwirtschaftliche Produktion oder die Auswirkungen auf die menschliche Gesundheit.

Centralities are a widely studied phenomenon in network science. In policy networks, central actors are of interest because they are assumed to control information flows, to link opposing coalitions and to directly impact decision-making. First, we study what type of actor (e.g., state authorities or interest groups) is able to occupy central positions in the highly institutionalized context of policy networks. Second, we then ask whether bonding or bridging centralities prove to be more stable over time. Third, we investigate how these types of centrality influence actors' positions in a network over time. We therefore adopt a longitudinal perspective and run exponential random graph models, including lagged central network positions at t1 as the main independent variable for actors' activity and popularity at t2. Results confirm that very few actors are able to maintain central positions over time.

Policy discourses are important platforms for political actors to express their preferences on certain issues and are usually linked to a specific policy subsystem. From a research perspective, they have the potential to indicate ideological coalitions, policy change and learning. Using discourse network analysis, we identify core policy actors, issues, and coalitions in Switzerland's climate policy discourse and investigate how they have evolved over the past 15 years. In line with the policy process literature, we expected to see more stability than change in the discourse linked to the mature climate policy subsystem. However, our results have shown that policy discourses are more volatile than policy subsystems, and that national and international policy developments are able to trigger change, particularly in terms of the configuration of actor coalitions and the issues discussed.

Despite an increasing number of people exposed to flood risks in Europe, flood risk perception remains low and effective flood risk management policies are rarely implemented. It becomes increasingly important to understand how local governments can design effective flood risk management policies to address flood risks. In this article, we study whether high flood exposure and flood risk perception correlate with the demand for a specific design of flood risk management policies. We take the ideal case of Switzerland and analyze flood risk management portfolios in 18 flood-prone municipalities along the Aare River. We introduce a novel combination of risk analysis and public policy data: we analyze correlations between recorded flood exposure data and survey data on flood risk perception and policy preferences for selected flood risk management measures. Our results indicate that local governments with high flood risk perception tend to prefer non-structural measures, such as spatial planning and ecological river restoration, to infrastructure measures. In contrast, flood exposure is neither linked to flood risk perception nor to policy preferences. We conclude that flood risk perception is key: it can decisively affect local governments' preferences to implement specific diversified policy portfolios including more preventive or integrated flood risk management measures. These findings imply that local governments in flood-prone areas should invest in raising their population’s awareness capacity of flood risks and keep it high during periods without flooding.

In this chapter we study the longer-term response of a national government to natural disasters. We are interested in when and how collaborative governance arrangements spark new national flood prevention policies. Our understanding of collaborative governance not only includes public and private actors that are involved in a complex network (see Nohrstedt 2015) but also the larger institutional setting as well as regulations in the domain of flood risk management. In other words, we conceive the full range from politics and polity to policies when defining collaborative risk management (see also Driessen et al. 2012). For national flood prevention this concretely means that decision making and implementation processes are designed multilevel and cross-sectoral, that competences and responsibilities are shared between different jurisdictions and policy subsystems, and that policies and regulations reflect this horizontal and vertical integration of actors and institutions (Ingold et al. 2018; Ingold 2017). [...]

Numerous pesticide policies have been introduced to mitigate the risks of pesticide use, but most have not been successful in reaching usage reduction goals. Here, we name key challenges for the reduction of environmental and health risks from agricultural pesticide use and develop a framework for improving current policies. We demonstrate the need for policies to encompass all actors in the food value chain. By adopting a multi-disciplinary approach, we suggest ten key steps to achieve a reduction in pesticide risks. We highlight how new technologies and regulatory frameworks can be implemented and aligned with all actors in food value chains. Finally, we discuss major trade-offs and areas of tension with other agricultural policy goals and propose a holistic approach to advancing pesticide policies.

Public policy analysis is interested in how policies emerge and develop in order to address societal problems. Issues related to water, such as the contamination of surface waters, floods, or plastic pollution in oceans are often highly complex, concern different jurisdictions, and require the collaboration of public and private actors. This complexity is addressed through integrated water management principles. However, these principles give room to open questions such as: what are the main challenges of policy analysis (research and practice) in terms of multi-level actor involvement (politics), cross-sectoral solutions (policies), and new institutional arrangements (polity)? To answer these questions, the seven papers of this Special Issue combine approaches borrowed from policy analysis with principles of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM). Each article tackles a complex, water-related problem and collectively, the papers present empirical evidence from case studies located around the world. We learn from all these analyses that adopting a policy perspective helps disentangling the procedural components of IWRM (the involvement of actors, the definition of the appropriate management area, the attribution of competences, etc.) from more substantial ones (like the development of a management plan and the implementation of measures). Addressing cross-sectoral and multi-level challenges is a difficult task, and policy analysis can help shedding light on both, the legitimacy of processes, and the effectiveness of their outputs and outcomes.

The world is in the grip of a crisis that stands unprecedented in living memory. The COVID-19 pandemic is urgent, global in scale, and massive in impacts. Following Harold D. Lasswell's goal for the policy sciences to offer insights into unfolding phenomena, this commentary draws on the lessons of the policy sciences literature to understand the dynamics related to COVID-19. We explore the ways in which scientific and technical expertise, emotions, and narratives influence policy decisions and shape relationships among citizens, organizations, and governments. We discuss varied processes of adaptation and change, including learning, surges in policy responses, alterations in networks (locally and globally), implementing policies across transboundary issues, and assessing policy success and failure. We conclude by identifying understudied aspects of the policy sciences that deserve attention in the pandemic’s aftermath.

The concept of “advocacy coalitions” is the bedrock of the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF), one of the most established and successful approaches for understanding policy processes across the globe. This article revisits and sharpens the conceptual definition of advocacy coalitions. We summarize the lessons from its theoretical emphases under the ACF and specify its five attributes (policy actors, shared beliefs, coordination, resources, and stability). Through this specification, we identify the ideal coalition type and several coalition subtypes. We then clarify and make a distinction between how we think about coalitions as a concept and how we approach coalitions empirically. This article sharpens the lens for describing and explaining coalitions toward better observations, theorizing, and measurements. It ends with next steps for further deepening and broadening knowledge about advocacy coalitions.

Achieving effective, sustainable environmental governance requires a better understanding of the causes and consequences of the complex patterns of interdependencies connecting people and ecosystems within and across scales. Network approaches for conceptualizing and analysing these interdependencies offer one promising solution. Here, we present two advances we argue are needed to further this area of research: (i) a typology of causal assumptions explicating the causal aims of any given network-centric study of social–ecological interdependencies; (ii) unifying research design considerations that facilitate conceptualizing exactly what is interdependent, through what types of relationships and in relation to what kinds of environmental problems. The latter builds on the appreciation that many environmental problems draw from a set of core challenges that re-occur across contexts. We demonstrate how these advances combine into a comparative heuristic that facilitates leveraging case-specific findings of social–ecological interdependencies to generalizable, yet context-sensitive, theories based on explicit assumptions of causal relationships.

This paper focuses on cooperation among organizations in a common‐pool resource (CPR) problem situation. Cooperation is particularly challenging in settings where resource degradation is produced by a variety of different sectors and parts of the population; and where the problem, as well as public responsibilities, transcend borders and jurisdictions. Focusing on transboundary water quality management in the Rhine catchment area, we ask: What drives two actors in a CPR problem situation to cooperate with each other? We argue that the degree of threat to a CPR is an important driver for collective action, and focus on actors' exposure to and perception of a threat to a CPR. Furthermore, we rely on applications of the ecology of games framework (EGF), taking into account the larger institutional context of CPR management. This allows us to test whether actors' participation in forums, such as regional and international water body associations, helps to overcome the CPR problem by further enhancing interactions among actors. Based on survey data and applying advanced network statistics (exponential random graph models [ERGM]), we conclude that although problem exposure is one factor that enhances joint cooperation, participation in forums plays an even bigger role for cooperation in a CPR problem setting. Our study contributes to research on cooperation in CPR problem settings, highlights the need to more systematically include the effects that CPR problems have on actors when analyzing CPR problem settings, and stresses the function of forums as triggers for cooperation in CPR problem situations.

本文重点关注公共池塘资源（CPR）问题下的组织合作。当资源退化的“始作俑者”来自各类不 同群体，且CPR问题和公共责任超越了司法管辖范围时，合作会很困难。我们将焦点放在莱茵河流域 的水质管理上，并提出如下问题：在面临CPR问题的情况下，什么因素会驱动两个行为者进行合作？ 我们认为，对CPR的威胁是集体行动的驱动因素，因此，我们关注了行为者对CPR威胁的接触以及感 知。我们依赖于生态博弈框架（EGF），来考虑CPR管理背后更大的制度背景。我们检验了行为者参与 论坛是否会有助于增强行为者之间的互动，进而克服CPR问题。根据调查数据，我们采用了社会网 络高级统计分析方法（指数随机图模型，ERGM），并得出结论：对威胁问题的接触可以促进共同合 作；此外，参与论坛对于CPR问题环境下的合作更为重要。该研究有助于对CPR问题环境下的合作进 行探索，突出了在分析CPR问题时系统考虑其对行为者的影响的必要性，并强调了论坛引发合作的 这一功能。

Multiple actors across different institutional levels play a role in water governance. The coordination of these actors is important for effective water governance. However, the joining together of multiple actors can have several implications, such as a redistribution of power across actors, a change in democratic control and citizen influence as well as shifting accountability structures. These implications can involve different barriers and bridges that might impede or foster coordination. Through qualitative and quantitative methods, we assess the following barriers and bridges for coordination: (1) reputational power in terms of who is perceived as important for coordination in the water sector; (2) democratic legitimacy in terms of actors' value of local control of water services; and (3) accountability in terms of the regional actors' capacity to steer in the water sector. This article focuses on three cases in a Swiss region that has experienced water provision challenges due to its highly fragmented water supply structures. We find that reputational power serves as a bridge in our three cases: when the actors responsible for water supply regard potential coordination partners as important, then we observe coordination. In contrast, we do not find conclusive evidence to support the assumption that a fear of losing local control is a barrier for coordination. Instead, our results indicate that accountability, in the form of vertical steering by the regional actors, serves as a bridge for coordination, and that this could help mitigate some of the potentially negative effects of democratic legitimacy perceptions: through convening local actors or providing positive incentives to municipalities to work together, regional actors can foster coordination.

Social-ecological network (SEN) concepts and tools are increasingly used in human-environment and sustainability sciences. We take stock of this budding research area to further show the strength of SEN analysis for complex human-environment settings, identify future synergies between SEN and wider human-environment research, and provide guidance about when to use different kinds of SEN approaches and models. We characterize SEN research along a spectrum specifying the degree of explicit network representation of system components and dynamics. We then systematically review one end of this spectrum, what we term 'fully articulated SEN' studies, which specifically model unique social and ecological units and relationships. Results show a larger number of papers focus on methodological advancement and applied ends. While there has been some development and testing of theories, this remains an area for future work and would help develop SENs as a unique field of research, not just a method. Authors have studied diverse systems, while mainly focusing on the problem of social-ecological fit alongside a scattering of other topics. There is strong potential, however, to engage other issues central to human-environment studies. Analyzing the simultaneous effects of multiple social, environmental, and coupled processes, change over time, and linking network structures to outcomes are also areas for future advancement. This review provides a comprehensive assessment of (fully articulated) SEN research, a necessary step that can help scholars develop comparable cases and fill research gaps.

In policymaking, actors are likely to take the preferences of others into account when strategically positioning themselves. However, there is a lack of research that conceives of policy preferences as an interdependent system. In order to analyse interdependencies, we link actors to their policy preferences in water protection, which results in an actor-instrument network. As actors exhibit multiple preferences, a complex two-mode network between actors and policies emerges. We analyse whether actors exhibit interdependent preference profiles given shared policy objectives or social interactions among them. By fitting an exponential random graph model to the actor-instrument network, we find considerable clustering, meaning that actors tend to exhibit preferences for multiple policy instruments in common. Actors tend to exhibit interdependent policy preferences when they are interconnected, that is, they collaborate with each other. By contrast, actors are less likely to share policy preferences when a conflict line divides them.

One open question in environmental sciences is whether effective management of natural resources depends on the fit between the bio-physical and the governance system. To address this question, we investigate water quality in transboundary rivers and ask to what extent a fit between the area covered by the physical extent of pollution and the area in which this pollution is addressed through management and policy regulation can be observed. We adopt a spatial approach and argue that the visualization of social-ecological overlap and misfit supports science and practice when taking decisions about how best to explain or address ineffectiveness and cause-effect mismatches in transboundary river management.
We focus on drinking water supply in the international river basin of the Rhine focusing on micropollutants. These persistent trace compounds have potential toxic effects on humans and ecosystems, which makes them a relevant type of pollution that needs to be taken into consideration. Based on a combination of mass flow and social network analysis, we can conclude that the Rhine River is characterized by large social-ecological overlap, but that some parts of the catchment area still lack integration.

We address a key puzzle in policy studies: why don't major differences in political systems and policy produce major differences in policy processes, outputs, and outcomes? We show why key aspects of fracking policy are similar in the UK and Switzerland despite the UK majoritarian government being 'all out for shale' and Switzerland’s consensus democracy favouring moratoriums. We use the 'advocacy coalition framework' and new survey data to show why differences in UK and Swiss processes are subtle. In both cases, actors cooperate and compete with each other by sharing information within and across coalitions.

This paper analyzes the prospects for introducing the precautionary principle in water protection policy. In situations where a problem enters the political agenda and scientific uncertainties remain about causes or effects, political actors can justify state intervention based on the precautionary principle. It allows for public action even if risks related to the problem remain unclear. While the precautionary principle is widely applied in health and environmental policy fields all over the world, the mechanisms leading to its adoption are not fully understood. To close this gap, the paper investigates decision-makers preferences for the precautionary principle and further asks: Which factors promote political actors' preferences for precautionary policy measures? In order to answer this question we study the case of emerging micropollutants – a water quality issue that recently entered political agendas, where many uncertainties remain about sources and effects. We rely on data gathered through a standardized survey among the political elite in Switzerland, which represents one of the first countries that adopted policy measures to reduce micropollutants in water bodies, despite the uncertainties that remain. Results analyzed through a temporal network autocorrelation model reveal that actors embedded in collaborative governance arrangements have the tendency to prefer precautionary action. Certain aspects of policy design, such as problem prioritization and target group membership, also impact the prospects for introducing the precautionary principle.

New techniques of unconventional oil and gas extraction, such as hydraulic fracturing, challenge current political, institutional and administrative practices in how to regulate activities in the underground. Conflicts of interests between economic promotion, landscape and natural resource protection, and new trends on energy markets are further intensified by the fact that techniques of oil and gas extraction come with a considerable amount of uncertainties regarding ecological and health impacts. Information exchange is one important aspect of how political actors try to reduce uncertainties and conflicts. Based on exponential random graph models (ERGM) for network data, we analyze to what degree ideologies, public authority, existing collaboration and scientific expertise drive information exchange in hydraulic fracturing regulation in the United Kingdom. Results show that technical and political information exchange have to be disentangled, and that the former is driven by expertise and existing collaboration, the latter by ideology, public authority and existing collaboration.

Recent years have seen a growing interest in the concept of social acceptance, especially in the wake of the transition from non-renewable to renewable energy sources. Social acceptance is thereby studied from very different backgrounds and based on distinct conceptualizations. We argue that the reason for the great variety in the use of 'acceptance' is not mainly its interdisciplinary and multidimensionality, but a missing policy making perspective and its insights and knowledge about processes, actors and (in)formal decision-making.
This contribution proposes a framework to refine the concept of social acceptance. Taking into account that the stage and specificity of the policy making process heavily influence the response towards RET and the process triggered, we identify three steps that need to be addressed when defining a research design that includes social acceptance: the object and context under scrutiny, the relevant actors, and the roles they play. Our proposed framework thereby adopts a political science point of view and the main research interest deals with political actors deciding upon and implementing future policies.

The study of public policy deals with subsystems in which actors cooperate or compete to turn their beliefs into policy solutions. Yet, most studies concern mature subsystems in which the main actors and their allies and enemies can easily be identified. This paper tackles the challenge of studying nascent subsystems, in which actors have begun to engage in politics but are uncertain about other actors’ beliefs. Actors therefore find it relatively difficult to identify their allies and opponents. Focusing on the Advocacy Coalition Framework, we examine three main ways in which actors might agree to support the same policy design before they decide whether or not to form long-term relationships within advocacy coalitions: they see the issue through the same lenses, they follow leaders, or they know each other from earlier cooperation. We use the case of fracking policy in Switzerland and the UK as a key example, in which actors have begun to agree with each other, but where final policy outputs were not yet defined, and long-term relationships not yet observable. We find that, when dealing with new issues, actors strongly rely on former contacts rather than shared ideologies or leadership.