Interorganizational Policy Studies: Lessons Drawn from Implementation Research

Contingency approaches to organizing suggest that policy objectives are more likely to be achieved if the structures employed for implementation mesh with the policy objectives being sought. Interorganizational arrangements are used increasingly in carrying out public programs, and contingency logic can be used to assess the degree of match between policy objective and interunit structure. Such a perspective would seem to offer an approach of practical significance. Here the contingency logic as applied to interorganizational implementation is reviewed and its assumptions identified. To probe these assumptions, empirical evidence is analyzed from one policy sector which would seem especially promising. The findings suggest that even under highly favorable conditions, a contingency perspective provides only limited help. The research demonstrates the need for additional conceptual clarification and theoretical care in reaching conclusions about the impact of interorganizational structures on policy settings. Complicated interorganizational arrangements are increasingly important in public management. How governance in the public interest may be possible in structures of high interdependence among public and nonpublic actors is a subject of considerable theoretical and practical significance. This article utilizes ideas developed in the study of interorganizational policy implementation to offer guidance regarding three matters: the agenda for interorganizational analysis; the link between analysis and prescription; and the role of the analyst of hnterorganizational arrangements. * A preliminary version of this article was written while the author served as research fellow in the joint program in public administration, Leiden University and the Erasmus University Rotterdam, during 1989. This generous assistance is gratefully acknowledged, as is the support of Auburn University for the leave period. An earlier version of the artide was presented at the National Public Management Research Conference at the Maxwell School, Syracuse University, September 1991. The empirical research reported in this article was financed in part by the U.S. Department of the Interior, Geological Survey, Reston, Virginia, as authorized by the Water Resources Research Act of 1984 (P.L. 98-242), through the Water Resources Research Institute of Auburn University, Alabama.