Do cooperative environmental planning mandates produce good plans? Empirical results from the New Zealand experience

Cooperative mandates represent new thinking about intergovernmental relationships and a shift from the top-down coercive approach. This research presents evidence on how a cooperative national environmental management mandate influences the quality of regional and district plans in New Zealand. Findings indicate that cooperative planning mandates such as New Zealand's Resource Management Act are difficult to translate into practice. The quality of regional and district plans was unimpressive. Empirical modelling shows that clear legislative provisions, the information dissemination strategies of central government, and subnational organisational capacity had an important impact on regional and district plan quality. Alternatively, the organisational capacity and plans of regional councils have little influence on the capacity and plans of district councils. These findings suggest that, though clear mandates are effective, more attention needs to be given to building subnational organisational capacity and to improving the information provision efforts of central government. More attention also needs to be directed to facilitating collaboration between regional and district councils.