Yet Another Policy Fad? Multistakeholder Partnerships and New Modes of Governance in Post-Conflict Settings.

Multistakeholder partnerships (MSP) are said to deliver more inclusive, effective, and sustainable policy-making by bringing together governments, businesses, and civil society in a new process of interaction on policy design and implementation. Despite their increasing popularity both at the global and at the national policy level, so far multi-stakeholder partnerships have received little systematic scholarly attention. We argue that more needs to be said about main features and modes of operation of MSPs as well as about whether and how they are distinct from other types of collaborative arrangements. By developing a framework for the study of MSPs, this paper tries to fill a gap in the existing literature, as well as to provide practitioners with a useful framework for the analysis and strategic management of projects. In particular, civil servants and international organizations staff are given the task of designing, implementing, monitoring and assessing participatory initiatives with very little guidance on the peculiarities of these arrangements. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]