Network

Between Adam Smith's invisible hand of the market-place and Max Weber's structured bureaucratic organization, there exists the concept of networks. At its broadest definition, a network is a group of interdependent actors and the relationships among them. Unlike a properly functioning market system, networks do not assume that members have complete information, nor do they assume that every individual with money may choose to be a member. Unlike a bureaucratic organization, a network may operate without clearly defined leadership, without a hierarchy, and even without employees.

At a personal level, networks may be about an individual's social connections, while at an organizational level, networks are about the recognition that organizations' actions seldom stand alone in the world. Human beings can, indeed, achieve more through coordinated, collaborative efforts than through individual efforts. Definitions of networks abound, however, and the term is used to mean very different things.

What is important to understand is that networks are not fuzzy, soft concepts. In fact, they may be either loosely or tightly institutionalized, and so some scholars have started referring to them as “networks and network structures.” Thus, when governance networks are being studied, the question is not merely how informal contacts change the functioning of organizational relationships. Instead, the question is what relationships have been structured between two or more programs or organizations that enable them to leverage the strengths and minimize the weaknesses of the collectivity. Networks are distinct social structures in that they involve multiple organizations, they do not need to involve hierarchical or contractual arrangements, there may be significant power differentials or size differences between the various actors, all the organizations are dependent on each other in at least some important aspect, and information or specific skills may be key sources of power rather than just financial and jurisdictional power.

Networks are often defined as interdependent structures linking several organizations, without hierarchy and absent of critical leverage. This definition is useful because it is seemingly general enough to incorporate a vast body of research since the mid-1970s on policy networks, policy communities and policy complexes, advocacy coalitions, social networks, policy issue networks, intergovernmental networks, interorganizational networks, and issue networks. The common threads of these approaches are that they represent a growing field of interorganizational theory as well as the evolution of interest group theories. Research on networks typically highlights the assorted interactions among parties with diverse or narrow interests struggling over the allotment of values. The development of this concept of a network is in keeping with general trends toward systems theory and toward flexible, collaborative organizational models.

Thinking in terms of networks runs the risk of devaluing the status of governments. Governments are responsible for making decisions in the public interest—broadly defined—and networks may narrow the definition of public interest considerably if such networks become the primary sources of input for politicians, diplomats, or administrators. On the other hand, rather than devaluing government, developing clear descriptions of how networks function may be useful as a heuristic device to identify specific potential problems in democratic administration. If all relevant interests are not included in a network, then democratic administration may have been derailed by the power of selected interests. How administrators working on a specific issue define “relevant” may be an important clue as well.

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