| New regulatory water management requirements on an international level increasingly challenge the capacity of regional water managers to adapt. Stakeholder participation can contribute to dealing with these challenges because it facilitates the incorporation of various forms of knowledge and interests into policy-making and decision-making processes. Also, by providing space for informal multi-stakeholder platforms, management experiments can be established more easily in rigid regulatory settings, allowing for social learning to take place. Stakeholder participation is currently stipulated by several legal provisions, such as the Water Framework Directive, which plays an increasingly important role in European water management. Drawing on recent... |
