WY
wai-hang yee
The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen
Shenzhen, China
About this Research Topic
Manuscript Submission Deadline 19 February 2027
This Research Topic is currently accepting articles
Background
Subnational governance has become a critical field of inquiry as contemporary governments navigate ever-deepening structural complexity, large-scale shocks, and persistent uncertainty. In recent decades, the increasing decentralization of policy responsibilities has positioned subnational entities—states, provinces, regions, and municipalities—as pivotal actors in governance systems. Yet, despite their growing importance, our understanding of how these actors adapt institutionally and organizationally to complexity remains fragmentary. Comparative studies highlight that some subnational systems exhibit remarkable flexibility, experimentation, and learning, while others struggle to mobilize effective responses. Existing research has pointed to the central role of feedback mechanisms, institutional design, and policy networks, but consistent frameworks and systematic comparative analyses across diverse subnational contexts remain limited. Understanding these dynamics is crucial to developing more resilient, adaptive governance structures capable of coping with ongoing and future crises.
This Research Topic aims to advance comparative research on how subnational governments adapt—or fail to adapt—their institutions, policies, and decision-making processes under conditions of uncertainty and complexity. It seeks to identify the institutional, political, and organizational factors that shape these adaptive capacities and to uncover patterns of learning and flexibility that influence governance resilience and robustness. Key questions include: What conditions foster adaptive behavior within subnational systems? How do institutional and political contexts enable or constrain learning processes? Which mechanisms facilitate or hinder the diffusion of adaptive practices across jurisdictions? Through rigorous comparative approaches, this topic aims to deepen theoretical and empirical understanding of subnational governance adaptation.
To gather further insights into the diversity and determinants of adaptive subnational governance, we welcome contributions that employ comparative methodologies across or within countries, focusing explicitly on subnational units. We particularly encourage empirical, methodological, and theoretical works addressing, but not limited to, the following themes:
- Comparative patterns of organizational and policy adaptation among subnational governments facing persistent uncertainty
- Mechanisms of learning, feedback, and policy experimentation across subnational jurisdictions
- The role of political institutions, leadership, and bureaucratic structures in fostering or inhibiting adaptive capacity
- Cross-jurisdictional coordination, policy diffusion, and the emergence of learning networks
- The influence of federal and multilevel governance systems on subnational adaptive responses
- Institutional and contextual factors shaping resilience and robustness in subnational governance systems
Article types and fees
This Research Topic accepts the following article types, unless otherwise specified in the Research Topic description:
- Brief Research Report
- Conceptual Analysis
- Data Report
- Editorial
- FAIR² Data
- General Commentary
- Hypothesis and Theory
- Methods
- Mini Review
Articles that are accepted for publication by our external editors following rigorous peer review incur a publishing fee charged to Authors, institutions, or funders.
Keywords: Subnational governance, Comparative governance, Policy adaptation, Institutional resilience, Multilevel governance, Policy learning
Important note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.
