The irrevocable urge to innovate : Governance of the countryside in the Netherlands after the hegemonic Green Front

Summary

Ever since the Commission Kroes in 1992 concludes that the Ministry of LNV must make major changes, away from the hard and strongly top-down mode of steering and way of working, the consecutive ministers of LNV engage in an urge to innovate the countryside policy by launching new and ambitious policy plans. Repeatedly new plans are presented as novelties with major ambitions and yet minor implementing powers. This has triggered my interest in understanding more of the processes that leads to new plans and how the implementation is conducted. The knowledge gap covered is the need for more insights into how innovation policies work in practice. The study covers not only the official storyline but also the stories from behind the scenes of officialdom; e.g. the public and the hidden transcripts (Scott, 1990). The aim is to enhance our understanding of how public policy innovation processes of the Ministry of LNV work. The study covers an investigation of plans from three consecutive minsters of LNV in the period 1994-2006, and their bumpy road of implementation, when many forces are pulling in various directions, forces influenced by ambiguity, various forms of struggle and reciprocity. We then cannot just take official communication at face value as such information might differ greatly with narratives from unofficial settings. The study covers matters of why and how the public innovations are carried out and what they deliver in terms of achievements. The narrative is structured using the concepts public and hidden transcripts (Scott, 1990). Scott developed this understanding of power relations which he used to analyse power relations among peasants, enslaved and other oppressed people. Public transcripts are the official stories of the dominant rulers of policy and the action that is openly avowed to the other party. The hidden transcripts are the stories told offstage. This is however not a situation where the official story is false, and the offstage transcript is true. They have both their own roles to play, in their own scenery. The interplay between the transcripts is essential for the understanding.---It is shown that results are hard to achieve due to often hidden resistance, leading to a lack of clarity, struggle for influence and insufficient collaboration, but the Ministry of LNV does open up the agenda to more than just agriculture, and new ways of working are introduced. The recommendations are based on a need to produce less plans and more implementation. As simple as this sounds, as hard it is in reality, which we have seen in this study. For future policy innovation ambitions and practice, three interlinked recommendations are presented. First, establish shared understandings of problems by the inclusion of ambiguity, reciprocity and struggle. Second, develop breeding ground for joint experiences to enhance the social capital. Third, invest in governance crafting by acknowledging convoluted institutions and celebrate small wins.