Paradoxes in collaborative governance

This article aims to move collaborative governance research beyond a fragmented consensus on its enigmatic nature by comprehensively and systematically extricating and codifying different paradoxes and proposing both paradox-handling mechanisms and paradox-based research agendas. We present a framework consisting of paradoxes between normative principles, paradoxes between normative principles and real-life practices, and paradoxes in the real-life practices of collaborative governance. We discuss how to handle these inherent paradoxes and propose research agendas for scholars and practical guidance for administrators based on the paradox perspective, which will enrich collaborative governance research and practices.