Towards a Tailored Institutional Analysis within the Complex Systems of Delta Regions The Design of a Tool for Institutional Analysis regarding Flood Risk Management in the Delta Cities of New Orleans, USA and Rotterdam, the Netherlands MSc Thesis Marga van den Hurk May, 2013 2 Towards a Tailored Institutional Analysis within the Complex Systems of Delta Regions 3 MSc Thesis Marga van den Hurk Towards a Tailored Institutional Analysis within the Complex Systems of Delta Regions The Design of a Tool for Institutional Analysis regarding Flood Risk Management in the Delta Cities New Orleans, USA and Rotterdam, the Netherlands Information Marga van den Hurk (1322192) [email protected] Delft University of Technology, Faculty of Technology, Policy and Management Section Policy Analysis MSc Systems Engineering, Policy Analysis & Management SPM5910 Master Thesis Project May 2013, Delft Graduation Committee Chairman: Prof.dr.ir. W.A.H. Thissen (Section Policy Analysis) First supervisor: Dr.ir. M.P.M. Ruijgh-van der Ploeg (Section Policy Analysis) Second supervisor: Dr. ir. B. Broekhans (Section POLG) External supervisor: Ir. J. van den Berg (RoyalHaskoingDHV) External Sponsor Royalhaskoning DHV NWO: Integrated Planning and Design in Delta regions (IPDD) Urban Regions in the Delta (URD) 4 Towards a Tailored Institutional Analysis within the Complex Systems of Delta Regions 5 MSc Thesis Marga van den Hurk Achieving water security and safety requires institutional, legal and regulatory support and capacity for change, adaptive management structures, new forms of relationships, and multilayered models capable of integrating complex natural and social dimensions. Michel Jarraud, UN – Water Chair, Analytical Brief, World Water Day, 22 March 2013, The Hague. The previous words capture in one sentence the challenge and complexity of analyzing institutions related to the water safety. As a consequence the project that is in front of you is the end result of nine months talking, working, interviewing, analyzing, travelling, discussing, writing, reviewing, discussing and rewriting. The activities resulted in an institutional analysis tool that enables practitioners to analyze institutions in the complex, adaptive environment of delta systems. The project started in the end of the summer of 2012 and is executed in the form of a Master Thesis Project for the master program System Engineering, Policy Analysis and Management of the Delft University of Technology, in collaboration with the engineering company Royalhaskoning DHV and the NWO-URD research consortium: Integrated Planning and Design in Urban Delta regions (IPDD). How to read this Report The report starts with a theoretical discussion on the definition of institutions and its role within the complex systems of delta regions, followed by the development and presentation of the institutional analysis toolbox and guideline. The thesis ends with a discussion, conclusions and reflection. The readers whom are only interested in the guideline or theoretical foundation of the institutional analysis toolbox are referred to the: • Guideline: Institutional analysis toolbox and guide. Analyzing institutions in the complex systems of delta regions (Hurk, 2013a) • Scientific Article: Towards a Tailored Institutional Analysis within the Complex Systems of Delta Regions Acknowledgments Looking back, one can say that the thesis project I conducted, was part of a complex, dynamic environment consisting of engineering companies, research institutes and governmental organizations that were all represented by professionals with different disciplines. Being part of this large multi-actor system allowed me to put in practice the competences I learned during my master program SEPAM. Nevertheless, I definitely did not just applied knowledge I gained within the last couple of years. During the last months I had many new experiences. I never executed a project on my own for such a long time, I never went on a field research to another country, nor did I worked in a large engineering company, let alone did I developed a tool or wrote a guideline. It is not surprising that I could not do this project solitarily. Therefore, I would like to thank Dr. Ir. Tineke Ruijgh – van der Ploeg for supervising this process. I am pleased with the expertise, guidance and involvement she provided throughout my thesis. I am also grateful to Job van den Berg for providing me with many opportunities. Without him I would not have experienced to work within a research consortium and to go on a field research in New Orleans. Moreover, I would like to thank Professor Wil Thissen and Dr. Ir. Bertien Broekhans for being part of my graduation committee and supporting me with useful feedback and research suggestions. In general I was amused by the enthusiasm during the various meetings with my graduation committee. 6 I would also like to thanks Marcel Marchand, Jos Timmermans, Suzan van Kruchten, Jai Clifford Holmes and Patrick Martel for reading draft versions of the institutional guideline or parts of my thesis. The suggestions and expert opinion they gave me, were of great input for my thesis. I am thankful for the IPDD research consortium, the international comparison project team of IPDD led by professor Han Meyer, and my colleagues at the engineering company Royalhaskoning DHV for providing me a first professional working experience in the Netherlands. Finally, I promised to thank in my preface Stevan Spencer, Chief Engineer of the South Louisiana Flood Protection Authority East (SLFPAE), and Gerald Gillen, Executive Director of the SLFPAE, for providing me a three-hour private tour around the newly developed Hurricane and Storm Damage Risk Reduction in New Orleans. Marga Rotterdam, 1 May, 2013 Towards a Tailored Institutional Analysis within the Complex Systems of Delta Regions 7 MSc Thesis Marga van den Hurk Throughout the world delta areas are important centers for ecology, agriculture, economic activities, urban settlements and industries. Therefore, it is not only considered challenging, but also essential to adapt with suitable solutions to the growing physical (e.g. climate change; population growth etc.) and societal (e.g. political situation etc.) trends that explicitly manifest in these regions. Hence, it is crucial to understand why certain adaptive interventions are successful in a given delta. Typically, these arrangements consist of both technical and institutional components. Especially, institutions are significant to apprehend, as they are essential in safeguarding and protecting the values of actors in a delta system by providing stability and predictability. Additionally, for a delta system to work it needs certain institutions to guide and structure the positions, relations and behavior of the parties that own, (re)design, and operate the system. To date, various institutional analysis frameworks exist that are able to provide insight to practitioners in the institutional environment of complex systems. However, none of these frameworks is specified for the purpose of analyzing institutions regarding flood risk management in local areas in the complex systems of delta regions. This institutional analysis gap resulted in the following research question: ‘What is an appropriate tool to analyze institutions regarding flood risk management in local parts of the delta cities New Orleans in the Mississippi delta and Rotterdam in the Rhine, Meuse, and Scheldt delta?’. Various research methods are used to answer this question. A literature review is conducted to gain knowledge regarding the theoretical context of institutions in the complex adaptive systems (CAS) of delta regions. The conceptual framework and various secondary studies were the input of the development of the institutional toolbox and guideline. To refine, adjust and improve the toolbox, case studies and an expert panel were used for testing and reviewing. Furthermore to show and reflect on the usability for practitioners of the tool, case studies in the delta cities New Orleans and Rotterdam were conducted with the final version of the toolbox. The latter also provided recommendations for follow up studies. Results In this thesis institutions are defined as a system of interrelated, shared concepts consisting of strategies, rules and embedded norms used by humans to structure situations and behavior. When using this term, it implies that the multiple concepts need to be separately identified and treated as separate terms with a different frequency of change. Furthermore, delta regions are considered as complex adaptive systems (CAS). CASs are a special type of complex system formed to adapt to the changing environment and can be considered as open systems in which different elements interact dynamically. The interaction in delta regions results in the exchange of information, self- organization and the creation of many different feedback loops. Moreover, often the relationships between components are nonlinear, unpredictable or unknown. All the previous aspects result that the system as a whole has emergent properties that cannot be understood by the separate parts. A delta region is considered adaptive, because it has the capacity to change and learn from experience. Seeing a delta region as an CAS enabled to indicate certain challenges related to analyzing institutions in these type of systems. Resulting that the main challenges of analyzing institutions in deltas are: Defining the boundaries and scales; Dealing with temporal dynamics; Providing