Hybrid governance instruments for built environment sustainability and resilience: a comparative perspective

Mandatory and voluntary governance instruments (such as statutory code compliance; regulation, voluntary certification; bench marking schemes) have been slow in achieving targeted improvements in environmental and resource sustainability of the built environment, facing well documented regulatory and market barriers (Wilkinson, 2013; Van Der Heijden, 2014). If such schemes have not delivered to expectation, are other instruments needed, and what should they look like? Should they be compliance or market driven? Recent research (Van Der Heijden, 2014; Green Construction Board, forthcoming) has identified that hybrid instruments which build on the strengths of mandatory and voluntary instruments hold the potential to overcome the weaknesses of both. This paper seeks to better understand whether such hybrids have the potential, in ways that previous schemes have not, to effect behaviour change. Different types of hybridity are identified and categorised to enable further scrutiny, particularly to better understand their potential value in stimulating changed behaviours by individuals and corporations to achieve improved environmental and resource sustainability of the built environment in Europe and beyond. Through this paper a deeper understanding is sought regarding (i) why these hybrids have emerged; (ii) what they look like, what actors are involved, and how responsibilities are organised; and (iii) why they have the potential to affect behavioural change. A desktop study is used to identify, map and to the extent possible evaluate these