Challenges to multi-agency and multi-stakeholder collaboration in innovation and enterprise policy

Abstract

In recent times, collaborative governance networks that encourage wider stakeholder policy engagement have gained traction. To support this shift, significant investment in several policies, such as City Region Deals, have been introduced to ensure regional development is steered by local policy actors. However, regardless of the benefits of such decentralised policymaking, several tensions in multi-agency and multi-stakeholder collaboration exist in innovation and enterprise policy. The ability of policy networks to manage coordinating tensions influences their capacity to generate effective delivery. These tensions include munificence versus coherence; input efficiency versus output efficacy; collaboration versus competition; specialist versus inclusive participation; and top-down versus bottom-up input. This chapter illustrates these tensions through the City Regional Deals in Scotland and seeks to advance a governance framework for overcoming these challenges, which can ultimately lead to effective regional collaboration amongst all network actors involved.