LIST OF PANELS

Governing societal activities, institutions and work has always been ubiquitous but never self-explanatory. With respect to addressing global problems and pursuing important societal aims, such as combating climate change, easing up urban congestion, advancing welfare or providing education, it is difficult to disentangle public policies and agencies from private interests, economic institutions and civic activities (Johanson and Vakkuri 2017; Pekkola et  al. 2020). Recent developments in the domains of commissioning public services, welfare mixes, corporate social responsibility and the global rise in social enterprises signify the fluidity of institutional boundaries. Societies have learnt that both evolutionary adaptation and institutional design occur at multiple levels, which produces impacts that remain largely undetected by our current policy instruments and conceptual/analytical frameworks.

This panel “Policies for hybrid governance”, investigates the relationship, potential rationales and tensions among public, private and civic domains contributing to policy outcomes. While all these domains have a role in how intended aims of public policies ultimately transpire, governments have fundamental problems with understanding why, how and with what policy instruments this occurs. The problem is even more pronounced given the interplay between these domains,  conceptualized in the form of hybridity as a policy issue. By hybridity we refer to the interaction among public, private and civil society via distinct modes of ownership, parallel but often competing institutional logics, diverse funding bases and various forms of social and institutional control (Skelcher and Smith 2015; Grossi et al. 2017).

We propose three main research questions:

1)     How are public policies influenced by hybridity and hybrid forms of governance?

2)     How do governments influence (e.g. foster or mitigate)  hybridity through their policies?

3)     How does hybridity shape the agenda-setting of public policies?

The policies of the nation states are often labeled as “public” primarily due to the dominant role of governments in instigating political agendas and social change in their territories. Therefore, it is also commonplace to understand the multiplicity of policy rationalities that affect people and societies via “public sector” outputs as well as outcomes. However, policies often include several aspects of public-private linkages and collaboration between governments and business corporations, as well as public-private-civil societal relationships (Erkkilä 2012). Hence, there is a need for shedding light on how hybridity shapes the agenda-setting of public policies

There is no definite theory of rationality regarding how the necessary activities of societies should be governed and what the roles of governments, business firms or non-profits should entail (Williamson 1999; Kooiman 2003). Nevertheless, it has been assumed that mixing “public” and “private” creates contaminated institutions, moral abyss and dysfunctional modes of organizations (Jacobs 1992; Ménard 2004). The side effects of specialization of scientific disciplines have contributed to the assumption of “monstrous hybridity”, which is assumed to both compromise the neutrality of government and distort the efficiency of business operations (Vakkuri and Johanson, 2020). Accordingly, the governance solutions of societies have been based on a narrow understanding of institutional mixtures. In our view a more balanced approach is needed, where hybridity appears equally as deliberate design of institutions and policies, and as an intended or unintended outcome of an emergent, evolutionary social process. Hybridity over time may have evolved both “by design” and “by default” (Johanson and Vakkuri 2017).

The panel chairs include: Tero Erkkilä, jan-Erik Johanson, Romulo Pinheiro, Jarmo Vakkuri

This panel invites both conceptual and empirical contributions that explore various facets of hybridity and hybridisation of societies, in view of their implications on public policy analysis.

Papers may address (among other possibilities) the following issues and questions:

What is the impact of public policies on hybridity? Do public policies increase hybrid forms of governance? Why? How? And under what particular historical and contextual circumstances?

Empirical approaches to assessing the way in which public policies approach hybridity: How is it different from governing public agencies or private enterprises? How differences of policy fields contribute to different ways of regulating hybrids?
Does the existing literature on governing hybrids enable us to see hybrids as a novel subject for public policies, and if so what are the consequences for both future research and policy/praxis?

A comparison of the perspectives on ‘hybridization’ vs. ‘policies on hybridity’ adopted by policy relevant research and practical policy action: What new trade-offs does hybridity have on the agenda-setting and policy formation?
How do different types of hybrids (e.g. state-owned enterprises, social enterprises, universities) both react to (adapt, resist, etc.) and attempt to shape public policies? How do community self- and co-regulating practices in tandem with corporate social responsibility and entrepreneurial self-regulation influence public policies? What is the significance of different perspectives from both theory and practice?

A global perspective on hybridity: What are the differences between hybrid formation across politico-administrative regimes, countries and world regions? What type of differences there are in the configuration of different forms of hybridity (i.e. between public private and community developments)? how to describe trajectories that lead to the hybridisation of nation states and development of global formation of hybrids?