This study investigated the collaboration between public and third-sector organisations (TSOs) in the framework of collaborative governance. We examined how TSOs portray their collaboration with public organisations and what kind of collaboration agency can be identified based on these descriptions. Using a discourse analytical approach, we identified three multifaceted, and somewhat paradoxical, types of collaboration agency discourse in third-sector organisations: situationalised, service system–oriented, and dependency-driven. We argue that collaborative governance both sets expectations and shapes the agency of TSOs. At the same time, TSOs strategically use these opportunities to their advantage, constantly reshaping their collaboration with public organisations.

Guelph, Ontario, is one of a few cities in Canada that relies solely on groundwater for drinking water. City officials anticipate that the municipality will experience a water deficit in the near future. In response to water security issues residents have actively engaged in the state-sanctioned water source protection committee. This article explores the water management planning process upheld by Ontario’s Clean Water Act, 2006, and examines the question: Is the Clean Water Act’s participatory mode to water governance inclusive of “environmental, health, and other interests of the public”? The analysis of this question engages with the political ecology literature and, in particular, Linton and Budds’s three-part hydrosocial cycle framework. It is argued that the technology of regulatory law (i.e., the Clean Water Act, 2006) constructs the power dynamics and social relations within the state-sanctioned water committee resulting in the weakening of the environmental interests expressed by the public.

Collaborative governance among multiple stakeholders is typically essential for conserving complex social-ecological systems. Mexico’s ‘biocultural landscapes’ – a territorial governance initiative – may be seen as pioneering models to promote this. However, actual outcomes depend on the initial conditions, institutional design, leadership and details of the collaborative process. We used a mixed-methods approach combining social network analysis and semi-structured interviews to analyse the structure of the collaboration network within Mexico’s Sierra Occidental Biocultural Landscape (SOBL). Our findings revealed a sparse, low-reciprocity network dominated by a few public managers, indicating potential power imbalances and challenges to building trust. Stakeholder interviews showed misalignments with theoretical collaborative governance including power imbalances, limited inclusiveness and a lack of trust among participants. While the SOBL has achieved collaborative results, such as the community forest fire brigades and the development of land management plans, achieving its full potential as a model for biocultural conservation requires addressing power dynamics and building a more equitable governance structure.

This article examines the challenges Indigenous communities face in safeguarding their intangible cultural heritage (ICH) in the digital age, using two case studies. Referring to the Te Hiku Media case, it analyzes the threat of data colonialism posed by corporate digitization projects. The article argues that existing legal frameworks provide limited protection for Indigenous ICH, prompting Indigenous communities to develop the innovative theory of Indigenous data sovereignty (ID-SOV). The Government of Nunavut–Microsoft partnership case highlights the benefits and drawbacks of public–private partnerships (PPPs) for Indigenous ICH. Key takeaways from both cases’ analysis lead to our proposal of integrating ID-SOV principles into PPPs to limit data colonialism risks and improve the sustainability of Indigenous ICH digitization projects. The article contends that implementing ID-SOV principles by design and by default in PPPs can empower Indigenous communities while leveraging the oversight of public actors and resources of private partners to safeguard Indigenous ICH through digital tools.

Businesses have traditionally been seen as reluctant participants in equality policy initiatives. However, emerging governance guidelines increasingly advocate for gender mainstreaming, encouraging active business engagement. Our research examines this potential transformation, focusing on the role of businesses adopting Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) practices compared to traditional equality policy actors – governments, equality organizations, and academia – within the Colombian context. Using a collaborative governance framework and participatory decision-making techniques, we identify potential role shifts toward proactivity and specific contributions from each actor group. Our findings highlight discordant mutual expectations, or “role mismatch”, and divergent perceptions within the business sector, which may undermine traditional actors. These insights emphasize the risks inherent in business participation in equality policy. By delineating contributions and clarifying self-perceptions and mutual expectations, we offer a practical approach to designing participatory processes that foster mutual recognition, trust, and shared responsibility as foundations for advancing equality policies.

This contribution analyses the EU’s new data acts. Interoperability is a common denominator of the EU’s new data acts. This paper demonstrates that the new data acts provide various approaches or concepts of collaborative governance to regulate interoperability. Although the EU’s new data acts are far from a uniform governance concept, we detected certain institutional arrangements organising the collaboration between private self-regulatory bodies, other private stakeholders and public bodies to lay down rules for interoperability.

Food loss and waste throughout the food supply chain is a growing issue with significant economic, social and environmental implications. Wasted food represents lost profits for the food industry, increased food insecurity in communities and the unnecessary production of greenhouse gas emissions, among many other detrimental consequences. Due to the large number of stakeholders involved in the food supply chain and the complexity of their relationships, there is increasing interest in addressing food waste issues through collaborative governance approaches, such as food policy councils (FPCs). Assessing how FPCs engage diverse stakeholders and organizations in food waste reduction efforts can provide important lessons for improving local food systems governance more broadly and contribute to the creation of more sustainable food systems. To do this, we leverage the theoretical concept of ‘collaborative advantage’ to analyze how FPCs foster collaboration, both internally and with external partners, to achieve policy and programmatic goals that individual stakeholders could not achieve alone. Drawing on plan documents and semi-structured interviews with members of five FPCs across the USA, we find that FPCs can foster collaborative advantage by establishing comprehensive food system plans, systematically measuring progress toward objectives, and transparently communicating the evidence of their progress to the communities they serve.

To address complex social problems, such as long-term unemployment, local authorities in many countries are developing “holistic” or “integrated” services, where multiple actors and professions collaborate with a view to better meet the needs of the individual citizen. By breaking with existing practices and regulations, collaborative services must be legitimized in new ways so as to appear acceptable not only in the eyes of the public and politicians, but also to caseworkers and the long-term unemployed persons. This article examines the multifarious and sometimes neglected efforts to make these collaborative services legitimate in the eyes of this plurality of stakeholders on multiple levels of governance. Our study indicates three distinct but mutually interrelated spheres of audience that require partly conflicting justification work. We also find that the narrow pursuit of justification work to ensure legitimacy with one audience may potentially jeopardize the justification work in the other two.

Protecting marine biodiversity and ensuring sustainable use through a seascape approach is becoming increasingly widespread in response to the ecological, social and institutional challenges of scaling ocean management. A seascape approach means clustering spatial management measures (marine protected areas) based around the principles of ecological connectivity, and developing or enhancing collaborative governance networks of relevant stakeholders (managers, community groups, non-governmental organizations) based around the principles of social connectivity. As with other large-scale approaches to marine management, there is minimal evidence of long-term impact in seascapes. This study uses a theory-based, participatory impact evaluation to assess perceived changes attributed to the Atlántida seascape in Honduras (initiated in 2015), encompassing three well-established marine protected areas and the non-legally managed waters between them. Using an adapted most significant change method, 15 interviews with a representative subset of seascape stakeholders yielded 165 stories of change, the majority (88%) of which were positive. Enhanced social capital, associated with cross-sectoral collaboration, inter-site conflict resolution and shared learning, was the most consistently expressed thematic change (32% of stories). Although most stories were expressed as activity- or output-related changes, a small proportion (18%) were causally linked to broader outcomes or impact around increased fish and flagship species abundance as well as interconnected well-being benefits for people. Although minimal (and occasionally attributed to prior initiatives that were enhanced by the seascape approach), this impact evidence tentatively links seascapes to recent related research around the effectiveness of appropriately scaled, ecosystem-based and collaboratively governed marine management that balances strict protection with sustainable use.

‘Communities’ – whether local, regional, or transnational – can provide an essential force in the protection of our global underwater cultural heritage (UCH). As an issue of low political concern, with its protection vulnerable to externalities and compliance weaknesses, UCH forms an ideal test case for exploring governance solutions without reliance on the state. It is also an area where communities are increasingly integrated within governance models. This article examines the theoretical justification for reducing reliance on top-down laws to protect natural and cultural heritage, exploring Ostromian arguments for greater community self- and co-regulation. Using this theoretical framework, it highlights numerous advantages of community-oriented governance in the management of a complex global concern, such as UCH protection, and underscores the role and importance of the appropriate design of meta-regulation in steering communities towards wider public objectives. The article also identifies where communities or ‘networks’ have provided important additional protection for UCH, and discusses further policy mechanisms – such as community buy-in, incentivization, and self-regulation – which could help to facilitate community-led governance in the future.