Polycentricity can be perceived as an emerging property of a governance system (bottom-up) or as a strategic tool to improve how resources are managed and governed (top-down). How scale becomes a factor in the emergence and consolidation of polycentric governance systems is an issue that remains unexplored in much detail. There is an inherent assumption that because polycentricity includes (but is not limited to) multilevel networked interactions in a system, governance scales can be simply assumed to exist within the network, but these linkages are rarely if ever made explicit and explored in terms of timing, sequencing and system impacts. Does polycentricity emerge from the bottom-up or is it used as a normative tool to implement networked, power-distributed strategies of governance? In this track, we welcome papers and presentations that explore the different levels and scales of analysis and modes of implementation of polycentricity in resource (or other sectors’) governance systems.

Polycentric governance has largely been researched against the background of a structuralist understanding. Predominant research questions often focused on whether a particular configuration of governance was polycentric, to what degree, and how this shaped performance at a single point in time. Few empirical studies to date have taken more dynamic perspectives – for example, those that consider adaptiveness and resilience of governance over time. Understanding the dynamic qualities of polycentric governance poses multiple challenges which we want to discuss in detail in this session. In this session we thus invite submissions that examine how structures underpinning (polycentric) governance and processes and dynamics of governance relate to each other, and how we can evaluate the performance of polycentric governance over extended periods of time. Submissions might address questions about how to identify particular moments in governance that provide clues about performance; whether and what conditions underpinning polycentric governance may lead to desirable or undesirable pathways from a societal perspective; and other studies that assess dynamic change over time in polycentric governance systems.

Polycentric governance is frequently touted in the literature as being more democratic, inclusive, and empowering. Because two of the most relevant properties of polycentricity (networked interactions and power sharing) are also often associated with democratic inclusion, citizen participation and collective action problem-solving (Ostrom 2008), there has been a tendency in the scholarly literature on polycentricity lately to promote it as a tool to improve governance. But is it? How can we best harness the inherent properties of polycentricity to make systems more robust, more democratic, more inclusive and better designed? In this session, we welcome submissions that address one or more of the following questions:

• Does timing and sequencing affect the way in which a polycentric governance system emerges?
• How can we best use polycentricity to improve governance systems?
• Is the way in which polycentricity is understood in countries of the Global North useful for specific applications in the Global South and vice-versa?
• What are the potential drawbacks of attempting implementation of a polycentric approach to governance?

Complexity defines modern life. Even people living lives of relative isolation are impacted by complex social, economic and ecological processes that govern their living environment. Many positive changes, such as global improvement in standard of living, thanks to ever-advancing technologies, have benefited from, and added to, the complexity of our daily lives. More negatively, this complexity can exclude and distance people from the processes that shape their lives.

Our capacity to learn about these complex processes has not developed in step with the systemic and substantive complexity of modern life. The resulting alienation and disengagement are obstacles to public participation, undermining democratic decision-making.

The capacity to learn is a pre-condition to successful polycentric governance (van Zeben, 2019) but the complexity of, especially but not only, large polycentric systems is making this increasingly difficult. How can we create governance systems that allow for meaningful learning, even under conditions of complexity? Is complexity undermining the effectiveness and/or feasibility of polycentricity? What about the complexity that polycentricity itself creates through its state of constant change? What happens when the learning in polycentric systems is a result of not just humans learning, but machines?

The recent momentum of polycentricity studies in the environmental field has come along with an interest in exploring and testing new approaches such as historical and cross-sectional analyses, as well as techniques such as network analysis, qualitative comparative analysis or simulations. These new methods now coexist with and potentially complement longer-standing approaches like qualitative case studies and allow to address new research questions. The expanded breath of methods has also come along with an emphasis on hypothesis testing and an effort to systematize the characterization of different polycentric systems.
This track welcomes contributions that reflect on the opportunities and challenges of expanding the portfolio of methods to study polycentricity, whether from a qualitative or quantitative perspective, or with descriptive or explanatory purposes.

This track is dedicated to cross-cutting themes in applying polycentricity in practice, or working within parts of polycentric systems, across different types of commons. We welcome submissions from practitioners as well as scholars across disciplines, who work closely with communities to realize polycentric governance and overcome potential barriers on the ground. Some example topics include but are not limited to mobilizing cross-level or landscape level collective action, collaboration across professional sectors, multi-stakeholder dialogues and conflict solving, inclusion and empowerment, inequality, the intersections of traditional and state authorities, intersection of formal and informal rules, and designing flexible legal frameworks to fit diverse historical contexts.