Politikwissenschaftliches Seminar

Name Straße PLZ, Ort Bitte bestellen Sie bei Ihrer Buchhandlung oder bei: Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft | 76520 Baden-Baden | www.nomos.de Der Brückenbegriff Governance ermöglicht einer transdisziplinären Politik-und Verwaltungswissenschaft, durch die Integration sozialwissenschaftlicher Ansätze zu einem umfassenden Verständnis politisch-gesellschaftlicher Steuerung und Integration zu gelangen. Um theoretische Breite mit analytischer Schärfe zu verbinden, werden im vorliegenden Buch auf der Basis von grundlegenden Theorien aus der Ökonomie, der Soziologie und der Politikwissenschaft acht idealtypische Governance-Formen defi niert. Alle Idealtypen besitzen eine Mikro-Fundierung, d.h. eine handlungstheoretische Basis. Zudem werden die jeweils zentralen Institutionen und Mechanismen defi niert. Mit Hilfe dieser Typologie wird der Wandel von Paradigmen und Realitäten der Steuerung und Integration in U.S.-amerikanischen Großstadtregionen von 1850 bis 2000 analysiert.

In an age of transnational flows and interdependencies, democratic citizenship cannot be conceptualized anymore exclusively within national boundaries. This paper presents a conceptual map that allows tracing emerging and proposed forms of citizenship within and beyond the nation state in a comprehensive and differentiated way. We disentangle two anchor points: membership in a political community as the fundament of citizenship and the arena of political decision-making as the focal point of citizenship rights, identities and practices. For the former we differentiate between a single national community, the universal community of humankind and multiple (national) communities. For the latter we distinguish the national, supra-national and transnational arena. Our typology thus consists of nine different forms of democratic citizenship. It is used to provide a brief overview over normative proposals and empirical findings leading to the following insights: while membership in a particular national community still dominates the reality in all three political arenas, in the normative discourse it is perceived as deficient. Membership in the universal community of humankind is widely endorsed in the normative discourse, but almost inexistent. In contrast, membership in multiple communities is not only a growing reality but also normatively promising for democratizing a transnationalizing world.

Dual/multiple citizenship has become a widespread phenomenon in many parts of the world. This acceptance or tolerance of overlapping memberships in political communities represents an important element in the ongoing readjustment of the relationship between citizens and political communities in democratic systems. This article has two goals and parts. First, it evaluates dual citizenship from the perspective of five normative theories of democracy. Liberal and republican as well as multicultural and deliberative understandings of democracy deliver a broad spectrum of arguments in favour of dual citizenship. Only communitarians fear that dual citizenship endangers national democracies. Nevertheless, empirical evidence and national policies largely contradict these fears. The second part of the article reverses the perspective and shows that most theories of democracy do not only legitimate and facilitate the acceptance of dual citizenship – the phenomenon of multiple citizenships induces innovation in democratic theory in turn. A second look at the relationship between dual citizenship and theories of democracy reveals that dual citizenship stimulates refinements, expansions and reconceptualisations of these theories for a transnationalising world.

(German) Der Beitrag analysiert den zunehmenden Horizontalföderalismus im politischen Mehrebenensystem der Schweiz und fragt nach den Gefahren und Chancen für die Weiterentwicklung der Schweizer Demokratie. Die Evaluierung erfolgt auf der Basis der komplexen Demokratietheorie von Fritz Scharpf, ergänzt um die konstitutiven Perspektiven einer reflexiven Demokratietheorie. Insgesamt wird deutlich, dass der Horizontalföderalismus vor allem aus einer liberalen Position innerhalb einer Output- orientierten Demokratietheorie als problematisch angesehen werden muss, da die kantonale Exekutive gegenüber der Legislative gestärkt wird. Der Aufsatz betont aber die Chancen für die schweizerische Demokratie, da der Horizontalföderalismus grosse Ähnlichkeiten mit den Entscheidungsfindungsprozessen auf internationaler Ebene besitzt. Er liefert damit der Schweiz ein Übungsfeld, um ihr traditionell sehr introvertiertes Verständnis von demokratischer Selbstbestimmung zu überwinden und anzuerkennen, dass in einer interdependenten und mobilen Welt die “Einbeziehung des (externen) Anderen” ein Bestandteil einer legitimen demokratischen Ordnung darstellt. (English) Is the growth of inter- und transgovernmental policy-making among cantons a threat or an opportunity for Swiss democracy? The essay provides a differentiated answer to this question on the basis of an extended version of Fritz Scharpf’s complex theory of democracy. The phenomenon which is called Horizontalföderalismus has to be seen as a threat to democracy from a liberal position within an output-perspective because the already dominant executive branch is strengthened in comparison to the legislative branch. Nevertheless, the essay emphasizes the fact that Horizontalföderalismus creates also an opportunity to overcome the traditional and limited understanding of democracy in Switzerland. Democracy is conceptualized, institutionalized and idealized in Switzerland as the self-determination of small autonomous collectives. In a world which is increasingly characterized by cross-border interdependencies and mobility, such an understanding of democracy is normatively not acceptable anymore. The debate on Horizontalföderalismus might be helpful to perceive horizontal intergovernmental cooperation not only as a means for effective policy making but also for the “inclusion of the (external) other” which is becoming a primer criteria for judging the legitimacy of democratic systems.

This article demonstrates the empirical relevance and elaborates the theoretical foundation of a “polity-centered” causal mechanism of international environmental regulation which has been only superficially touched upon in international environmental regime theory and which challenges the policy-centrism of this field of research. Motorboat regulations on Lake Constance demonstrate the limits of established approaches in regime theory in explaining the strict regulations of this early regime. Rationalist explanatory approaches are not convincing since there are no helpful structural constellations and no functional need. According to normative-cognitive approaches, the institutional density and differentiation that exists in the transboundary Lake Constance region makes an “advocacy coalition” approach better suited than an “epistemic community” approach. Yet, even this perspective cannot explain the international breakthroughs towards strong regulations. To fill the remaining gap, it is necessary to account for the symbolic value of water in representing emerging transnational identities and institutions. Polity-centered coalitions of political leaders around the lake “performed” innovative regulations in a highly symbolic policy field in order to gain attention and recognition for their institutionalization of the idea of a “Euregio Bodensee.” The article ends by demonstrating the empirical relevance of this causal mechanism beyond Lake Constance and discusses the theoretical consequences in the field of transnational water governance.

Methodological reflections about case study research have increased within recent years. According to our account, there are three distinct approaches to case studies: co-variational, causal process tracing, and congruence analysis. The main goals of this article are to lay out the distinct ways in which causal inferences are drawn for the cases under study and to scrutinize the different understandings and directions of generalization within these three approaches. By doing so we highlight two aspects: First, causal process tracing and congruence analysis should be seen as two distinct alternatives to the dominant co-variational template. Second, the main characteristics of case studies, their thickness, provides only an unavoidable dilemma if we aim to generalize the findings towards a wider population of similar cases as in the co-variational template. If we would like to get deeper insights â-“ as the causal process tracing approach does â-“ or if we would like to use the empirical evidence for a broader theoretical discourse â-“ as the congruence analysis does â-“ case studies do not face a trade-off.

Since the 1990s, a new metropolitan regionalism has stimulated many reform attempts in the United States to change or introduce new forms of metropolitan governance. The article aims to provide a differentiated view on the goals and governance concepts within the latest wave of metropolitan governance reforms. Three different concepts can be identified: first, a “communitarian governance” approach perceives the socio-spatial segregation as the most pressing problem and tries to gain political majorities through a reconstruction of formal institutions, local interests and mobilizing values. Second, a “civic governance” approach aims at sustainable development and advocates deliberative forums in order to stimulate cross-functional learning and to reach a consensus for joint development plans and regulations. The third approach is called “creative governance” and focuses on economic competitiveness. The advocates within this camp propose the building of synergetic exchange networks between private and public actors in order to create innovative projects and an attractive image for the city-region. The implementation of these three approaches has been very uneven. Whereas the communitarian governance approach failed even under the most favorable conditions, the civic governance approach has been partly implemented in many regions as a result of a strong anti-sprawl movement. In most metropolitan areas, only the creative governance approach, backed by powerful urban regimes, has been able to challenge and complement the dominance of localism and functional differentiation that has traditionally characterized US metropolitan governance and that is legitimized by various strands of the public choice theory.

In the theoretical debate on metropolitan governance, we are witnessing new discourses beyond the traditional dispute between localists and regionalists. New dichotomies emerge, for example, “jumping of scale” versus “relativation of scales”; “deterritorializiaton” versus “reterritorialization”; “spaces of place” versus “space of flows.” These dichotomies can be interpreted as different proposals and/or diagnoses in respect to the geographic scale and functional scope of emerging institutions of metropolitan governance. The paper aims to trace the empirical question of which direction we are heading by analyzing recent metropolitan governance reforms in six West German metropolitan areas. The findings show that there is a general trend to create soft institutions of governance on a larger scale as a reaction to global competition and continental integration. Beyond this commonality, we discover quite different institutional trajectories. The regions which are strongly embedded in the global economy tend toward a “deterritorialized” form of metropolitan governance with rather weak institutions characterized by large geographic scales and functional specialization. In contrast, the regions which are not as much embedded in the global economy have been able to create strong governance institutions on a regional level characterized by a rather small geographic scope and based on a territorial logic of functional integration and geographic congruence.

(German) Der Aufsatz beschreibt die historische Entwicklung und die jüngsten Formen politischer Steuerungsansätze in sechs westdeutschen Großstadtregionen. Es sind dies die Regionen Hamburg, Bremen, Hannover, Frankfurt, Stuttgart und München. Zu diesem Zweck wird im theoretischen Teil eine zweidimensionale Typologie von Formen der Metropolitan Governance entwickelt. In der ersten Dimension werden Governance-Formen nach dem Strukturmuster der Interaktion unterschieden, in der zweiten Dimension werden die Governance-Formen aufgrund der zugrundeliegenden Handlungstheorie (normatives, utilitaristisches, kommunikatives und dramaturgisches Handeln) differenziert. Mit Hilfe der dadurch gewonnenen acht Idealtypen wird im darauf folgenden empirischen Teil gezeigt, dass bis in die 1970er Jahre normative Steuerungsformen die Diskussion beherrschten und diese in den 1980er Jahren durch ein utilitaristisches Paradigma in Frage gestellt wurden. Seit Beginn der 1990er Jahre wurde verstärkt auf kommunikative und dramaturgische Governance-Formen gesetzt, auf deren Grundlage können sich aber ganz unterschiedliche Governance-Schwerpunkte und z.T. auch ausdifferenzierte “Governance-Landschaften” in den verschiedenen Stadtregionen etablieren. (English) The paper describes the historical development and the recent forms of political governance in six large metropolitan areas of Western Germany. These are the regions of Hamburg, Bremen, Hannover, Frankfurt, Stuttgart and Munich. To this end, the theoretical section develops a two-dimensional typology of the forms of metropolitan governance. The first dimension differentiates among governance forms according to how interactions are structured; the second dimension divides governance forms in relation to their underlying theory of behavior (normative, utilitarian, communicative and dramaturgical action). The thereby obtained eight ideal types help to show in the following empirical section, that, until the 70s, normative steering forms dominated the discussion and, in the 80s, these were challenged by the utilitarian paradigm. Since the beginning of the 90s, there has been a stronger emphasis on communicative and dramaturgical forms of governance. If we compare the forms of metropolitan governance across various regions, we discover that some regions implemented just one form of governance, whereas other established a plurality of forms of governance.

To what extent are we experiencing a transformation from ‘spaces of place’ to a ‘space of flows’ as proposed by Manuel Castells? Applying his thesis to the political system leads to the following implications. Socio-economic processes of ‘glocalization’ are undermining the gate-keeper position of national governments. Furthermore, governance is becoming ‘deterritorialized’, an aspect which is characterized by Elkins as an ‘unbundling’ of identities and jurisdictions. But does this process of unbundling lead to a federal system of multi-level governance where the national level is complemented by supranational and subnational levels of governance; or does it imply an even more radical transformation towards an architecture of governance which is characterized by a proliferation of single-purpose governments with variable and flexible spatial scales? A final implication is the transformation from ‘government to governance’— which means a broader array of actors and changing modes of interaction. This article traces these theses by analysing institutions of governance in four cross-border regions in Europe and North America. In all regions we indeed find many cross-border networks and institutions undermining the national gate-keeper position. In Europe, cross-border collaboration is producing another soft, but institutionalized, comprehensive, stable and territorially-defined layer in the European ‘multi-level-system’. In North America, by contrast, only informal, fluid, specific and non-territorial institutions are evolving across national borders. Here, the territorially-based nation state is not complemented by similar kinds of political institutions, but is instead being challenged more fundamentally by new kinds of institutions: transnational socio-economic exchange networks and transnational ideological coalitions which embody enormous transformational power. In conclusion, cross-border regional governance in Europe still follows the logic of ‘spaces of place’, whereas in North America quite different ‘spaces of flows’ are emerging as complementary logics of community and institution building.Jusqu'où s'exerce la transformation d'un ‘espace de lieux’ en ‘espace des flux’, comme le suggère Manuel Castells? L'application de cette théorie au système politique a plusieurs implications. Les processus socio-économiques de ‘glocalisation’ désagrègent la position de garde-barrière des gouvernements nationaux. De plus, la gouvernance se ‘déterritorialise’, phénomène qu'Elkins appelle la ‘séparation’ des identités et des domaines de compétence. Mais à quel type de gouvernance cette ‘séparation’ mène-t-elle: à un système fédéral à plusieurs niveaux où le plan national est complété de plans supra- et infra-nationaux de gouvernance? ou à un changement plus radical vers une architecture caractérisée par une prolifération de gouvernements à finalité unique dont les échelles spatiales varient et s'adaptent? Une dernière conséquence est le passage de gouvernement à gouvernance, qui se traduit par une diversification des acteurs et de nouveaux modes d'interactions. L'article retrouve ces thèses en analysant des institutions de gouvernance dans quatre régions transfrontalières européennes et nord-américaines. Dans toutes les régions, l'étude identifie en effet de nombreux réseaux et institutions transfrontaliers qui minent la position de garde-barrière nationale. En Europe, la collaboration transfrontalière crée une strate souple, quoique institutionnalisée, étendue, stable et aux limites territoriales définies dans le ‘système européen à plusieurs niveaux’. En Amérique du Nord, en revanche, n'interviennent à travers les frontières que des institutions informelles, fluides, spécifiques et non-territoriales; l'État-nation lié au territoire n'est pas complété d'institutions politiques de types similaires, étant plutôt profondément mis en cause par des institutions d'un genre nouveau: réseaux d'échanges socio-économiques et coalitions idéologiques transnationaux qui expriment une énorme dynamique de transformation. Pour conclure, la gouvernance régionale transfrontalière en Europe obéit encore à la logique des ‘espaces de lieux’ tandis qu'en Amérique du Nord, des ‘espaces de flux’ tout à fait différents apparaissent dans une logique complémentaire de construction de communautés et d'institutions.

In almost all subfields of political science in the last third of the twentieth century, it was claimed that we are witnessing a transformation of political order from hierarchies to networks. This paper traces institutional change during the twentieth century by examining structures and modes of interaction in transboundary regions in Europe and North America. First, it challenges functionalist explanations of institution-building and institutional change. Instead, the impact of general discourses and ideas is highlighted. Second, it takes a closer look at the hierarchies-to-networks transformation thesis. Whereas this thesis can be confirmed if we define hierarchies and networks as patterns of interaction, if we define hierarchies and networks in terms of modes of interaction this is less certain. De jure, institutional elements implying a “hierarchical order” have been supplanted in newer institutions by provisions allowing for “majority voting.” De facto, nothing has changed, since these modes of interaction have never actually been used. In practice, the only way to achieve joint action has always been and still is through “agreement” or “consent.” What has changed over the years, though, is the institutionalized approach to reaching “agreement.” The older approach uses a technocratic-deductive logic. In recent years, we have been able to observe various new approaches in cross-border regions: a symbolic-inductive logic in Western Europe, a utilitarian-evolutionary logic along the U.S.-Mexican border, and a normative-constructivist logic along the U.S.-Canadian border. Based on the empirical findings, I conclude that institutional theory should pay more attention to the fact that many political institutions provide orientation, shape identities, and mobilize activities through emotional symbols.

(German) Der Aufsatz untersucht die historische Entwicklung der rechtlichen Regelungen im Bereich der außenpolitischen Kompetenzen in den Föderalstaaten Deutschland, Schweiz und Österreich seit dem Westfälischen Frieden von 1648. Die aktuellen Diskussionen zur Außenpolitik von subnationalen Einheiten werden dadurch in einen längeren historischen Kontext gestellt. Zumindest in Bezug auf den strukturellen Indikator „Monopolisierung der gate-keeper-Position zwischen Innen- und Außen-politik durch die nationalstaatlichen Exekutiven“ zeigt sich, dass die aktuellen Thesen von einem Wandel des Westfälischen Systems souveräner, territorial exklusiver Nationalstaaten und einer Entwicklung zurück zum mittelalterlichen System überlappender Herrschaften wenig Bestätigung finden. Die vergleichende Untersuchung verdeutlicht aber auch, dass sowohl beim Übergang von der mittelalterlichen zur modernen Ordnung wie auch bei den aktuellen Veränderungstendenzen bereits bei so „verwandten“ Staaten wie Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz erhebliche Unterschiede in Bezug auf die Dauer und die Stabilität des nationalstaatlichen Monopols in der Außenpolitik festzustellen sind. (English) The article provides a two-dimensional comparison of national rules concerning the distribution of competencies among national and sub-national administrations in the field of foreign affairs in the federal states of Germany, Switzerland and Austria. A first comparative dimension is the development over time. Starting with the Peace of Westphalia in 1648 three stages are differentiated in all three countries - before the national monopoly in foreign affairs, during the uncontested time of a national monopoly and current challenges to the monopoly. An uncontested monopoly in foreign affairs indicates the strength of the gate-keeper-position of the national executives between the international and the domestic political realms. The existence of such a gate-keeper-position is a basic structural feature of the modern political system of sovereign nation states ('the Westphalian Order'). In terms of general changes over time, the study shows only weak support for the hypothesis that we are currently witnessing a massive change in the Westphalian Order and a 'return to medieval times' with multiple and overlapping authorities in international affairs. The comparison between the three countries reveals remarkable differences in respect to duration and uncontested stability of the national monopoly in the field of foreign affairs. The specific paths of transformation from the medieval order to the modern order in the various nation states influences clearly the strength of the current challenges to the monopoly of the national executives in foreign affairs.

The Westphalian system of sovereign nation-states is being challenged as national administrations lose their `gate-keeper-role' between domestic and international politics. But what kind of political system is emerging `after Westphalia'? The article attempts to answer this question by looking at processes of political institution-building in cross-border regions in Europe and North America. A classification of political institutions is developed which, in a first dimension, distinguishes between instrumental and identity-providing institutions. Second, formal, encompassing and territorially based political institutions are contrasted with informal, specific and non-territorial institutions. Based on this classification, the forms of cross-border collaboration in four border regions in Europe and North America are compared. In Europe, cross-border collaboration is producing another soft, but formalized, comprehensive and territorially defined layer in the European `multi-level-system'. In North America, by contrast, only informal, specific and non-territorial institutions are evolving across the national borders. Here, the territorially based nation-state is not complemented by similar kinds of polities, but is instead being challenged more fundamentally by new kinds of polities — transnational socio-economic exchange networks and transnational ideological coalitions which embody enormous transformational potential.

(German) Der Schutz des Bodensees ist eines der ersten und erfolgreichsten Beispiele für internationale Zusammenarbeit zum Schutz der Umwelt. Während in den sechziger Jahren noch ein »Umkippen« des Bodensees befürchtet wurde, begann man im Jahr 1998 mit der Vermarktung von Bodenseewasser als hochwertigem Tafelwasser. In diesem Aufsatz soll am Beispiel des Gewässerschutzes am Bodensee ein Beitrag zur Entwicklung einer konstruktivistischenRegimetheorie geleistet werden, denn es wird gezeigt, daβ es dort auch dann zu grenzüberschreitenden Regulierungen kam, als weder eine zwingende Notwendigkeit (funktionalistischer Ansatz) noch eine günstige Situationsstruktur (rationalistischer Ansatz) gegeben waren. Die Profilierungsnotwendigkeiten von verschiedensten politischen Akteuren, die den sich konstituierenden transnationalen Raum einer »Euregio Bodensee« institutionell besetzen wollen, liefern die zentralen Motivationen für Regulierungen im symbolträchtigen Gewässerschütz.Vom Fallbeispiel ausgehend werden Schluβfolgerungen für die konstruktivistische Theorie gezogen: Ideen und Institutionen besitzen neben dem normativ-regulativen Aspekt auch eine symbolisch-integrative Dimension. (English) The protection of Lake Constance is one of the first and most successful examples of international cooperation in environmental protection. While it was still feared in the sixties that Lake Constance would be » lost « to pollution, by 1998 water from the lake was being marketed as a high-quality mineral water. Surprisingly, however, although the conservation of Lake Constance continues to be mentioned as a forerunner in the domain of international environmental-protection regimes, a detailed analysis of this regime has still not been published. This paper is intended to close this gap, and also to make a contribution to the development of constructivist regime theory. It will be shown that international regulations were developed for Lake Constance even in cases where there was neither a compelling necessity (functionalist approach), nor a favorable situational structure (rationalistic approach). The need to create a positive political image on the part of a variety of different political actors who wish to occupy the developing transnational institutional space of an Euregio Lake Constance provides the central motivation for regulations in the symbolically important domain of water conservation. On the basis of a case study, conclusions will be drawn for constructivist theory. Ideas and institutions, besides their normative-regulative aspect, also possess a symbolic-integrative dimension.

(German) Der Artikel beschreibt die Bildung und den Wandel politischer Institutionen in europäischen und nordamerikanischen Grenzregionen im Laufe des 20. Jahrhunderts und liefert damit einen Beitrag zur Diskussion um ein Regieren in vernetzten bzw. entgrenzten Räumen. Nach einem ersten theoretisch-konzeptionellen Teil wird gezeigt, dass spätestens seit den neunziger Jahren die nationalen Exekutiven ihre gate-keeper-Rolle verlieren und dass subnationale Akteure bei einer Vielzahl von neuen Institutionen inzwischen immer unabhängigere Rollen einnehmen. Das Strukturmuster der Interaktion wechselt damit zwar von formalen Hierarchien zu Netzwerken. Ein Wandel der governance-Form von Hierarchien zu Netzwerken kann damit allerdings kaum postuliert werden, denn hierarchische Interaktionsmodi konnten auch früher nicht festgestellt werden. Verändert hat sich aber die institutionelle Logik der Konsenssuche. Während in den älteren Institutionen eine technokratisch-deduktive Logik vorherrschte, führen in den jüngeren Institutionen eine symbolisch-induktive Logik (vor allem in Europa) sowie rationalistisch-evolutionäre und diskursiv-konstruktivistische Logiken (vor allem in Nordamerika) zum kooperativen Handeln in grenzüberschreitenden Regionen. Auch bezüglich der diskutierten „Deterritorialisierung“ von politischen Räumen ergeben sich deutliche Unterschiede zwischen den Kontinenten: während in Europa auch die neueren Institutionen einer Logik der „spaces of place“ folgen, orientieren sich die Kooperationsformen in Nordamerika deutlich stärker an einer Logik der „spaces of flows“.

(English) This paper is a contribution to the debate on political order and governance in a “debordered world” beyond the “Westphalian system”. It is based on empirical information about the development and change of political institutions in cross-border regions in Europe and North America in the 20th century. First, it is shown that the nation state is loosing its gate keeper role at the end of the century and that various sub-national actors institutionalise independent cross-border links or participate on an equal footing. Therefore, the pattern of interaction is changing from formal hierarchies to networks. Nevertheless, if we define hierarchies and networks as modes of governance, we cannot conform such a change since the mode of interaction has not changed over the years. There does not exist and never has existed any other mode of interaction as “negotiated agreement”. What has changed is the institutional logic for finding such a cross-border agreement. Whereas older institutions were designed to find a common solution by using a technocratic-deductive logic, younger institutions use a symbolic-inductive logic (mainly in Europe). In North America they are based either on a rationalistic-evolutionary logic (at the US-Mexican border) or on a discursive-constructivist logic (in the Pacific Northwest). Also in respect to the much proposed tendency towards “deterritorialization” of political orders we find strong differences between the continents: Whereas in Europe even the younger institutions are based on “spaces of place”, in North America the more recent institutions are much more oriented towards “spaces of flows”.

This article focuses on a comparison of states and markets in the management of transboundary water. Borders are often harbingers of change and areas of innovation. Nation states have struggled mightily to overcome problems of shared river basins and aquifers. Today, the state-centric model is losing its hegemony. Once the article has established the limitations of states as governing institutions, its attention turns to an alternative offered by public choice scholars. Proposals for functional, overlapping, and competing jurisdictions are subjected to critical scrutiny and found wanting. Both of these conceptual frameworks have serious flaws. While the state-centered model poorly captures the emerging complexities of intermestic politics, the market approach fails to incorporate institutions that foster intersectoral cooperation and communication. The article concludes that effective governance of fluid resources is increasingly and necessarily founded on the cooperative interrelationships of various institutions that represent the variety of complementing logics and functions within the transnational water arena.