Regional Collaboration Stewardship Across Boundaries

Capacity

In addition to leadership and representation, starting and sustaining regional collaboration hinges on two critical capacities:


Organizational Capacity

To be effective, regional intiaitives – whether ad hoc or more formal – need some organizational capacity – staff, funding, and information. Given the diversity of partcipants that are likely to be involved, there must also be a clear sense of roles and responsibilities.

Roles and Responsibilities

Given that regional collaboration creates a forum to allow individuals and organizations from multiple jurisdictions, sectors, and disciplines to work together, it is critical to clarify the structure and function of the effort. Without a common understanding of the goals and roles and responsibilities of participants, regional collaboration quickly resembles an attempt to play football without first establishing a common set of rules – a Canadian team would play by Canadian format, an American team by their country's rules, Australia by theirs, and so on.

In the context of regional collaboration, clarifying roles and responsibilities may take various forms, including ground rules, a work plan, charter, compact, memorandum of understanding, terms of agreement, or business plan.

Regardless of the name, these protocols typically address the following common elements:

  • Specify who will take responsibility for convening, facilitating, recording, chairing meetings, representing key stakeholders, and providing expert advice.
  • Set rules regarding the involvement of alternates and observers.
  • Finalize the agenda, ground rules, work plan, and budget in writing.
  • Assess options for communicating with the constituencies represented, as well as with the general public.

Examples


Scientific and Technical Capacity

Regional stewardship efforts require a scientific and technical capacity for two distinct reasons. First, citizens, policymakers, and scientists agree that land use, natural resource, and environmental policy should be based on the best available science. However, producing scientifically credible information across multiple jurisdictions, sectors, and disciplines is often a challenge.

Second, the technical and scientific information necessary to guide regional land-use and conservation decisions must be perceived as legitimate and relevant in the eyes of all stakeholders in order to create a common foundation for understanding the issues in question. This suggests the need to build the capacity to communicate and educate to multiple audiences.

One of the most promising strategies to facilitate both types of learning is joint fact finding – a collaborative approach to build a common understanding of the issues in question and to thereby prevent or resolve disputes over scientific and technical information.

The purpose of joint fact finding is to allow stakeholders and decision makers to work side by side with experts to seek agreement on what they know; what they don't know; and what they need to know in order to make timely, informed decisions. The following chart explains the process of joint fact finding: