Delivering sustainable drainage systems through the English planning system: A proposed case of institutional void

Following a series of flood events, the major flooding of 2007 finally triggered legislative change through the Flood and Water Management Act of 2010 and proposed the introduction of Schedule 3 (S3), to provide a stronger regulatory system for the implementation of sustainable drainage systems (SuDS). However, S3 has been abandoned in England in favour of implementing SuDS through a “strengthened” planning system. By taking a broader governance perspective, this article explores the limited uptake of SuDS through the strengthened planning system. We argue that the so‐called strengthening of the planning system creates an institutional void: a lack of policy clarity that occurs when the role of the state is scaled back and other actors take up governance roles. While institutional voids can create successful outcomes, in the case of SuDS implementation they have been sub‐optimal. We trace the cause of these outcomes to the unwillingness of the Government to engage in designing policy. This creates a lack of consistency and uniformity, as the implementation of SuDS becomes a matter of ad hoc negotiations and power relations between local authorities and developers. We conclude that the current policy has reduced potential to deliver better outcomes and highlight the options for increased SuDS uptake going forward

Using Learning and Action Alliances to build capacity for local flood risk management

Learning and Action Alliances (LAAs) are becoming an increasingly popular method for overcoming the challenges associated with participatory forms of governance, where decision making requires collaboration between stakeholders. In flood risk management, LAAs provide a mechanism through which institutional participants can come together, share knowledge, innovate, and devise solutions to ‘wicked’ problems. While the social learning generated at LAAs is now well understood, the mechanism by which this learning is translated into action is less so. In this paper, we argue that in order to maximise the potential for action, LAAs must attend to different elements of capacity building, in order that action can diffuse outwards, from the individual members of the LAA, to their organisations and society beyond. By investigating two UK case study examples, we illustrate how different elements might be utilised in combination, to maximise the potential for longer-term, longer-lasting change. We conclude that the architects of participatory processes, including LAAs, should attend to different elements of capacity building, and consider those best suited to their individual contexts and objectives

Articulating resilience in practice: chains of responsibilisation, failure points and political contestation

Resilience has become a fashionable concept in UK policy-making in the last years. Many commentators have interpreted resilience as a neoliberal strategy that seeks to responsibilise individuals in anticipation of the retreat of centralised forms of risk management and protection. However, the haste with which the concept has been adopted also means that little attention has been paid to how resilience works in practice. This article analyses the implementation of a resilience initiative designed to build community resilience to flooding in the UK. It argues that the implementation of the policy is enabled by a long governmental chain of responsibilisation comprising several linkages that are also endangered by potential failure points where political contestations play out. It concludes that looking for what resilience ‘does’ requires investigating the implementation of specific resilience policies and the degree to which they are successful

The hollow politics of resilience: the case of flood governance in England

This thesis is concerned with what it means to govern through resilience, with emphasis on flood governance. Resilience has become a pervasive idiom of global governance and has grown in popularity over the last decade in UK policy making. It is increasingly seen as a policy ideal, a benign attribute whose fostering appears appropriate for dealing with many contemporary predicaments. While many academic contributions agree that resilience is a policy ideal that needs fostering, others regard it as politically problematic. Resilience is said to represent a neoliberal strategy that seeks to responsibilise individuals, away from state-centred forms of protection. However, I contend that these contributions, while welcome, are general interpretations of the meaning and uses of resilience, derived mostly from official documents and rhetoric. This thesis makes a contribution to knowledge by analysing a full length policy initiative centred on resilience, from policy design to implementation. As resilience gradually moves from high-level official rhetoric to actual policy, there is a need for critical investigations to shift from theoretical pronouncements of what resilience ‘is’, to what it ‘does’, or fails to do in practice. I argue that, in practice, the implementation of resilience is characterised by failure points and breakdowns, which signify severe disconnects between the goals of the policy and its mechanisms for implementation. These failure points challenge the substantiality of the argument that resilience is a form of neoliberal strategy. In fact, the findings of the research suggest that if resilience is to be produced at all on the ground, it requires substantial orchestration ‘from above’, by ongoing authority. Overall, I argue that the content of resilience policies is vacuous, and if resilience is to be transformed in more productive directions, the work needs to begin with an acknowledgement that resilience policies present themselves as a hollow shell