Abstract
This chapter reflects on the time-space complexity of governance practices in the current era of post-national statehood. This is illustrated through two contrasting examples: the first is the growing emphasis on the “territorialization of social work”, where rootedness in place is increasingly emphasized (but generates a “territorial trap”); the second is the growing emphasis on the “Europeanization of employment policy”, where the role of the open method of coordination (OMC) is claimed to be an effective response to the clear tensions between national policies and the European-wide perspective (but maintains a “governance gap”). These cases show the high complexity of current governance practices and the high likelihood of governance failure. This brings the author to advocate the “multi-scalar meta-governance” perspective, in which the “governance of governance” as well as the “multi-faceted spatiality of governance” are at stake. However, this should not be misunderstood as another plea for “rational management” at a higher level. Instead, the author poses the principles of reflexivity, flexibility and irony as the basic premises of such an approach.
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Jessop, B. (2009). From Governance to Governance Failure and from Multi-level Governance to Multi-scalar Meta-governance. In: Arts, B., Lagendijk, A., Houtum, H. (eds) The Disoriented State: Shifts in Governmentality, Territoriality and Governance. Environment & Policy, vol 49. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-9480-4_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-9480-4_4
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