3.4 Agency as the Strategic Use of Power
57
3.4 Agency as the Strategic Use of Power
3.4.1 Agency and Institutional Entrepreneurship
Agency somehow populates the governance milieu. Institutional architectures always
operate in relationship with actors’ behavior (Giddens 1984; Wendt 1992; Archer
2003; Biermann et al. 2009b). This relationship, known in the social sciences as the
“agent-structure debate”, makes agency and architecture two co-evolving sides of
the same coin (Biermann et al. 2009b; Earth System Governance Project 2018). On
the one hand, agency is embedded and shaped by existing conceptions, institutions,
and other ideational structures. On the other hand, these structures, being human
artifacts, only exist because they were created, i.e., because of agency (Wendt 1992;
Seo and Creed 2002).
There are multiple definitions of agency. Giddens (1984, p. 14) defined it as “the
ability to take action and make a difference over a course of events”. In the context of
earth system governance, Biermann et al. (2009b, p. 38) relate agency to authority and
describe agents as authoritative actors, i.e., as those in a position to prescribe behavior.
Alternatively, other theories may deal with agency issues using different concepts,
such as institutional entrepreneurship or advocacy coalitions (Sabatier 1988; Weible
et al. 2011). This book uses a broad definition of agency, more along the lines of
Giddens, not to miss any action that might be relevant to governance.
Institutional entrepreneurship, in particular, offers useful insights to policy
domains where different visions coalesce—as in the bioeconomy (Bugge et al. 2016;
Scordato et al. 2017). DiMaggio (1988) originally defined institutional entrepreneurship as the strategic action of organized actors with sufficient resources creating new
institutions in order to realize their interests. Later works have also recognized the
dominant role of organized actors engaged in maintaining existing institutions (Fligstein 2001; Zilber 2007), changing them (Kingdon 1995; Meijerink and Huitema
2010), or utterly destroying them (Maguire and Hardy 2009). The underlying observation is that policy and governance frequently become stabilized and dominated
by a paradigm or institutional framework that reflects and reproduces specific ideas,
norms, and conceptions (Cox 1987; Baumgartner and Jones 1991; Levy and Scully
2007; Meijerink and Huitema 2010). As such, some actors may work to preserve
an existing setting while others attempt to change it. As Levy and Egan (2003,
p. 806) put it, dominant structures are maintained “through an alignment of material, organizational and discursive formations which stabilize and reproduce relations
of production and meaning” (see also Cox 1987; and Gill 1991). Therefore, actors
wishing to change such structures may have to work on all those three dimensions
simultaneously (Levy and Newell 2002).
This understanding of actors as operating in a dialectical relationship with institutions does not match well with simplistic rational-actor models that assume generalized self-interest as a driver of action (Mutch 2007; Weik 2011). Instead, institutional
entrepreneurship has, from the start, attempted to go beyond it (see DiMaggio 1988).
Although the study of motivations has remained underexplored in the institutional
57
3.4 Agency as the Strategic Use of Power
3.4.1 Agency and Institutional Entrepreneurship
Agency somehow populates the governance milieu. Institutional architectures always
operate in relationship with actors’ behavior (Giddens 1984; Wendt 1992; Archer
2003; Biermann et al. 2009b). This relationship, known in the social sciences as the
“agent-structure debate”, makes agency and architecture two co-evolving sides of
the same coin (Biermann et al. 2009b; Earth System Governance Project 2018). On
the one hand, agency is embedded and shaped by existing conceptions, institutions,
and other ideational structures. On the other hand, these structures, being human
artifacts, only exist because they were created, i.e., because of agency (Wendt 1992;
Seo and Creed 2002).
There are multiple definitions of agency. Giddens (1984, p. 14) defined it as “the
ability to take action and make a difference over a course of events”. In the context of
earth system governance, Biermann et al. (2009b, p. 38) relate agency to authority and
describe agents as authoritative actors, i.e., as those in a position to prescribe behavior.
Alternatively, other theories may deal with agency issues using different concepts,
such as institutional entrepreneurship or advocacy coalitions (Sabatier 1988; Weible
et al. 2011). This book uses a broad definition of agency, more along the lines of
Giddens, not to miss any action that might be relevant to governance.
Institutional entrepreneurship, in particular, offers useful insights to policy
domains where different visions coalesce—as in the bioeconomy (Bugge et al. 2016;
Scordato et al. 2017). DiMaggio (1988) originally defined institutional entrepreneurship as the strategic action of organized actors with sufficient resources creating new
institutions in order to realize their interests. Later works have also recognized the
dominant role of organized actors engaged in maintaining existing institutions (Fligstein 2001; Zilber 2007), changing them (Kingdon 1995; Meijerink and Huitema
2010), or utterly destroying them (Maguire and Hardy 2009). The underlying observation is that policy and governance frequently become stabilized and dominated
by a paradigm or institutional framework that reflects and reproduces specific ideas,
norms, and conceptions (Cox 1987; Baumgartner and Jones 1991; Levy and Scully
2007; Meijerink and Huitema 2010). As such, some actors may work to preserve
an existing setting while others attempt to change it. As Levy and Egan (2003,
p. 806) put it, dominant structures are maintained “through an alignment of material, organizational and discursive formations which stabilize and reproduce relations
of production and meaning” (see also Cox 1987; and Gill 1991). Therefore, actors
wishing to change such structures may have to work on all those three dimensions
simultaneously (Levy and Newell 2002).
This understanding of actors as operating in a dialectical relationship with institutions does not match well with simplistic rational-actor models that assume generalized self-interest as a driver of action (Mutch 2007; Weik 2011). Instead, institutional
entrepreneurship has, from the start, attempted to go beyond it (see DiMaggio 1988).
Although the study of motivations has remained underexplored in the institutional