Ideas, Interdependence, and Connectivity : Explaining Intergovernmental Policy Cooperation

Conférence de Jennifer Wallner, professeure adjointe à l'Université d'Ottawa. Ses intérêts de recherche portent sur le fédéralisme, la politique provinciale canadienne comparée et les relations intergouvernementales. Elle est l'auteure de Learning to School, paru chez University of Toronto Press.

Résumé
The vast majority of policymaking involves some form of cooperation among different orders of government. In federations, much of our scholarly work has focused on explaining cases of vertical cooperation between the central and substate governments. But what about cases of horizontal cooperation among the substate governments themselves ? What factors trigger horizontal cooperation in the first place ? What conditions foster horizontal cooperation without the coercive influence of the central government ? And why do the results of similar cooperative initiatives vary ? Using the Canadian education arena as an empirical anchor, in this presentation I will argue that policymakers in federations are nested within a shared climate made up of ideas, legal and economic interdependence, and organizational and cultural connectivity. Changes to this climate can stimulate cooperation ; but such changes to the climate are not experienced in the same way by all the constituent members of a federation. Instead, changes are mediated by the internal features that are particular to each jurisdiction and by their relations to one another.