A world polity view on reorganization and institutional change in natural resources management

Abstract

World polity theory as a part of sociological neo-institutionalism provides interesting insights into institutional change and similarities between national organizations. These organizations depend on rules and actor networks in a postulated world culture based on recipes for appropriate behavior of nation states and organizations. The field of natural resource management, and in particular sectors with strong global commitments such as the water sector, exhibits structural adjustment or isomorphism influenced by world polity. This paper aims to explain organizational isomorphism from a world polity perspective using the example of the water sector. Since the late 1980s, standardization and homogenization of national water organizations and policies have accelerated. Worldwide, national water organizations have emerged in a similar fashion based on universal paradigms and principles such as those related to the integration of management responsibilities, efficiency in resource use, and the participation of stakeholders or communities. This reorganization in the water sector has promoted certain best practices in sustainability and management, but it can also hinder problem solving regarding locally specific water issues.