Institutional Arrangements For Great Lakes Management: Past Practices And Future Alternatives. (volumes I And Ii) (water Resources, Policy, Organization Development).
Donahue, Michael Joseph
1986
Abstract
Great Lakes Basin resource management is pursued through a complex institutional ecosystem; an interrelated hierarchy of U.S. and Canadian political jurisdictions and a series of regional, multi-jurisdictional institutions recognizing hydrologic as well as political boundaries. The evolution of this institutional ecosystem has been accompanied by a long-standing yet poorly articulated sense of dissatisfaction within the region. It is further hampered by inadequate understanding of past and present regional institutions and their respective roles. To address this failing, a systematic review of past and present institutional arrangements for basin management--in the Great Lakes region and elsewhere--was undertaken to identify and analyze management strategies and organizational characteristics that hold promise for Great Lakes management. The corresponding goal is to encourage orderly and informed evolution of the institutional ecosystem and advance the efficiency and effectiveness of regional resource management efforts. A multi-faceted approach involving literature review, case study analyses, personal interviews, survey questionnaires and institutional observation was undertaken to (1) provide a binational perspective on regional resource management approaches in the Great Lakes Basin and elsewhere; (2) identify organizational characteristics and management strategies potentially applicable to Great Lakes institutional arrangements; (3) explore linkages within the institutional ecosystem and associated strengths and weaknesses; (4) develop guidelines, parameters and organizational criteria as benchmarks for assessing institutional adequacy; and (5) based on that determination, design alternate institutional arrangements that might be incorporated into, replace or otherwise augment existing arrangements to enhance the orderly and informed evolution of the Great Lakes institutional ecosystem. The investigation yielded four alternate scenarios for strengthening the Great Lakes management effort: preserving the status quo; incremental change to existing institutions; substantive revision of existing arrangements; and dramatic, single-step revision entailing outright elimination of present arrangements in favor of a new and significantly different one. Each is evaluated in light of political realities and operational constraints, with a recommendation for staged implementation of the second and third scenarios. Specific policy recommendations are applied to the existing institutional ecosystem and, in particular, its regional components.Subjects
Alternatives Arrangements Development Future Great Ii Institutional Lakes Management Organization Past Policy Practices Resources Volumes Water
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