ABSTRACT
Evidence suggests that the US water sector is characterised by multiple arrays but not an overarching sector-wide arrangement encompassing all the major decision-making participants. The water policy field is marked by considerable fragmentation in structure, as well as by largely-uncoordinated policy. Several forces – including ‘metapolicy’ shifts, professionalism and alterations in professional dominance, and the tension between advocates of more integrated water policy-making (on the one hand) and interests favouring the status quo (on the other) – have influenced the dynamics of network changes over time. Evidence also suggests that the structure of network organisation in the water sector has impacts on policy outputs. The network idea adds to the understanding of policy change in the US case, but there are also reasons to expect network-based investigations to face limitations in explanatory power in the field of comparative policy.
