The Limitations of Policy-Level Collaboration: A Meta-Analysis of CALFED

Abstract

While collaboration has become a mainstream approach to managing natural resources, it faces difficulties in cases involving high-level policy. In 1994, state and federal partners agreed to collaborate on managing California's water resources in an effort known as CALFED. The program spent more than $3 billion on research, environmental restoration, and administration before its dissolution in 2007. Its outcomes are interpreted as having varying degrees of success. In this article, we identify theorized limitations of policy-level collaboration and use a meta-analysis of 32 sources on CALFED to evaluate the evidence explaining its dissolution. Our findings identified limitations in the literature related to problem, societal, and policy context, but highlighted different interpretations about politics, leadership, and governance arrangements. The lessons from CALFED include the limitations of adaptive management, the risk of dependence on political leadership, the challenges of an informal structure, and the flaws in efforts to more formally structure CALFED.