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AbstractCompetitive grants are increasingly used to induce proactive collaborative action by a range of actors to reduce forest wildfire risks. Given the rigidity of past wildfire risk governance, it is important to assess the adaptability of competitive grants as a new governance approach. Adaptive governance theory is used as a lens to assess the adaptability of the Colorado Wildfire Risk Reduction Grant (WRRG) program, which awards funds to successful applicants to reduce fuel on non‐federal lands at a community scale. Four best practices from the theory were applied: participation of and collaboration among diverse actors; co‐production of knowledge and learning toward adaptive management; cross‐scale interactions and fit between the scale of governance and the scale of the ecological problem; and the capacity for innovation and re‐organization. Using data and information about the WRRG structure and processes, awarded grantees from the first five granting cycles from 2013 to 2016, our direct participation‐observation as part of the Advisory Committee, and results from the WRRG effectiveness monitoring report, we examine the extent to which the WRRG program exhibited adaptive governance attributes. For each adaptive governance attribute, we found evidence of factors facilitating and frustrating adaptiveness of the WRRG program. We situate our findings within the broader context of using competitive grants as a forest wildfire risk governance approach and address additional directions for adaptive governance research.

AbstractThe number of policies promoting collaborative processes in national forest management has increased considerably over the past decade but do mandates alone increase the levels of collaboration in national forest management? Collaborative governance literature identifies the importance of the situational context for the emergence and performance of collaboration but does not identify the role of specific attributes and processes. This article presents a comparative case‐study analysis of factors influencing levels of collaboration in USDA Forest Service stewardship contracting processes. Incorporating concepts from the collaborative governance literature and Institutional Analysis and Development framework we found policy and administrative guidance alone will not increase the use of collaborative processes associated with stewardship contracts. A combination of existing agency‐community planning efforts, leadership, and agency support were essential for collaboration to materialize. Top‐down policy direction meant to increase the use of collaboration to achieve natural resource management objectives must incorporate opportunities to establish these conditions.

AbstractIncreasingly severe wildfires have focused attention on forested watershed vulnerabilities, causing significant changes to policies and governance. We utilized the Multiple Streams Approach (MSA) to understand institutional innovations of federal agency–large water provider partnerships in Colorado to protect watersheds through joint planning and funding. Ambiguous problem definition and focusing events were significant aspects of these partnerships. We interviewed individuals in the partnerships, with MSA ideas of how solutions to policy problems develop, and the role of policy entrepreneurs. We found that wildfires served as focusing events, creating space and time for learning, collaboration and new problem framing, increased political attention, and institutional innovation. In this study, windows of opportunity stayed open longer, policy entrepreneurs and agencies played larger roles in communication and coupling streams and the context of fast‐moving, unpredictable ecological crises changed responses to issues. Our findings also have implications for broader policy studies and environmental governance scholarship.