Governance and Meta-governance in the Face of Complexity: On the Roles of Requisite Variety, Reflexive Observation, and Romantic Irony in Participatory Governance

Governance is clearly a notion whose time has come. It appears to move easily across philosophical and disciplinary boundaries, diverse fields of practical application, the manifold scales of social life, and different political camps and tendencies. This terminological mobility enables it to organise significant narratives about contemporary social transformation. Yet it is also clear that governance is a polyvalent and polycontextural notion. Its meaning varies by context and it is being deployed for quite contrary, if not plain contradictory, purposes. And, by virtue of these terminological uncertainties, it is doubtful whether governance sans phrase can really provide a compelling theoretical entrypoint for analysing contemporary social transformation or a compelling practical entrypoint for coping with complexity. It is this paradox that I wish to pursue and resolve in the following reflections on governance, with the ultimate intention of providing a clear account of the nature and limitations of governance and meta-governance in a complex world.1 KeywordsInterpersonal TrustGovernance PracticeEffective GovernanceTheoretical ParadigmParticipatory GovernanceThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.