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Facilitating Monitoring, Subverting Self-Interest and Limiting Discretion

其他書名	Learning from 'New' Forms of Accountability in Practice
出版	SSRN, 2010
URL	http://books.google.com.hk/books?id=08XdzwEACAAJ&hl=&source=gbs_api

註釋A profoundly innovative and very different approach to environmental and natural resource governance, referred to in this Article as “New Environmental Governance” (“NEG”), has emerged across the globe. NEG is characterized by a range of innovative elements, including collaboration, participation and learning, and adaptation. As with most approaches to governance in the western world, accountability in NEG is vital to prevent the abuse of public authority, ensure that public resources are used appropriately, and secure performance expectations of governance endeavors. However, many scholars suggest that NEG's innovative properties actually render it vulnerable to being “captured” or perverted into a rent-seeking vehicle. Others claim that NEG can in fact secure accountability through replacing or supplementing traditional accountability controls with “new” forms of accountability, such as “mutual” accountability between collaborators or the “professional” accountability of industry. However, the efficacy of these and other “new” forms of accountability remain under-explored in practice. Drawing on eighty interviews with key stakeholders across three diverse environmental and natural resource case studies, this Article provides empirically based insights into these debates by critically examining whether and to what extent a range of NEG accountability mechanisms have been effective in practice. The Article finds that all the cases evidenced shortfalls in their different approaches to accountability, giving rise to potential capture, unprincipled deal-making, and rent-seeking. This leads to the identification of a number of recommendations for policy makers and scholars regarding achieving effective accountability. These recommendations fall into three main groupings: (i) supporting effective monitoring processes; (ii) setting overarching performance goals to “bound”/limit discretion and decision-making; and (iii) fostering effective professional and mutual accountability to subvert self-interested behavior. The Article also provides some important insights into an issue that has posed significant practical and conceptual challenges for law and for lawyers, namely the nature and role of conventional law and regulation in NEG. Based on the analysis, this Article argues that a “hybridity thesis” descriptively captures this relationship between law and new governance.