When multiple streams make a river: analyzing collaborative policymaking institutions using the multiple streams framework

Although the Multiple Streams Framework (MSF) is frequently used to explain agenda setting and decision making across a variety of policy domains, it has been criticized for failing to contribute to theoretically rigorous and empirically falsifiable policy scholarship. This study argues that by explicitly attending to the institutional context in which a policy process occurs—a previously under-articulated aspect of the MSF—scholars can better develop and test theory about the framework’s components under delimited conditions. This approach is demonstrated through the development and analysis of a case study of transnational policymaking in the Colorado River Delta. By attending to how key MSF variables interact with features of the process’s collaborative institutional context, this study identifies case-specific drivers of policy change and develops broader theory about the mechanisms by which these factors may influence policymaking in similar institutional settings.