Collaborative governance in the making: Implementation of a new forest management regime in an old-growth conflict region of British Columbia, Canada

Collaboration of multiple actors is a taken-for-granted aspect in many discussions about forest governance, while scant attention is being paid to how the more complex arrangements needed to make collaboration work come into being and develop a life of their own. The present paper argues that attention to the ways in which collaborative arrangements develop addresses the key question of authority in forest governance. It draws on empirical evidence of an implementation study after a high-profile land use decision had been made in British Columbia’s forestry sector, and zooms in on what actors do with policies, once they are agreed to. Asking which drivers for collaboration exist, what role authorities play in the overall process, and which outcomes are generated, the study finds that government inaction, deregulation and purposeful obscuring of decision-making determines collaborative governance in the making. If these dynamics take hold, the delivery of public goods from forests is put at risk.