Summary
Contents
Key Concepts in Governance provides a clear introduction to the technical concepts and policies of contemporary governance through short definitional essays. Each entry features a snapshot definition of the concept, a contextualization of the concept, an overview of relevant debates, and a guide to further reading. The book also includes a substantial introductory chapter which gives an overview of governance studies as a whole, orientating and guiding the reader around the issues that the concepts address.
What is Governance?
Introduction
Governance can be used as a specific term to describe changes in the nature and role of the state following the public sector reforms of the 1980s and 1990s. Typically, these reforms are said to have led to a shift from a hierarchical bureaucracy towards a greater use of markets, quasi-markets, and networks, especially in the delivery of public services. The effects of the reforms were intensified by global changes, including an increase in transnational economic activity and the rise of regional institutions such as the European Union. So understood, governance expresses a widespread belief that the state increasingly depends on other organizations to secure its intentions and deliver its policies.
By analogy, governance also can be used to ...