Actor and Network Analysis
Course subject(s)
3. Actor and Network Analysis
Actor and Network Analysis
This tutorial is about executing a systematic actor and network analysis. After discussing WHY actor analysis is important and WHAT it actually is, we show you HOW to do it. We systematically lead you through the six steps needed for executing a structured actor and network analysis and we illustrate each step with an example taken from the ‘Wind at Sea’ case.
Additional Resources
- Course Book: “Policy Analysis of Multi-Actor Systems” Chapter 4: Actor Analysis. This chapter fits the material covered in this tutorial.
- “What to do when stakeholder matters”, Bryson, 2004. This article, published in Public Management Review, contains a useful overview of techniques and methods for stakeholder identification and analysis
- Book “Actorenanalyses: Methoden voor een succesvol project of beleid” (Dutch). Boek met verschillende methoden voor actorenanalyses, verschillende situaties, telkens uitgewerkt met praktijkvoorbeelden. This page presents a link to order this book online.
Below are the recordings of the seven tutorial videos, accompanied by the slides that are treated in these videos.
Why actor analysis?
This video introduces actor analysis and presents an example to illustrate why you would use actor analysis: the sinking of the Brent Spar oil rig.
Why actor analysis?
What is actor analysis?
This video presents an illustrative example of a very complex actor network; the dispersed pollution case in the province of Utrecht. It is an example of a systematic exploration of the socio-political environment of the client organisation.
What is actor analysis?
How to do an actor analysis? Steps 1 and 2: Starting point and actor identification
This video presents the six steps for doing an actor analysis and the first two are treated in detail: taking the problem formulation of the client as a start and making an inventory of actors. We show how to use a causal diagram with the criteria Interest and Influence and present a number of actor identification techniques. Finally we show how you come from a longlist to a shortlist by using a power/interest grid.
How to do an actor analysis? Steps 1 and 2: Starting point and actor identification
Step 3: Mapping formal relations
How to do an actor analysis? This video presents the third step: mapping the formal relations in the network. The ‘wind at sea’ example is used to present the technique.
Step 3: Mapping formal relations
Step 4: Inventory of interests, objectives and perceptions
How to do an actor analysis? This video presents the fourth step in our method: making an inventory of the problem formulations of the different actors by looking at their interests, objectives and perceptions. We define the concepts, discuss how to do in-depth research and present the actor information chart and the overview table.
Step 4: Inventory of interests, objectives and perceptions
Step 5: Interdependencies
How to do an actor analysis? This video presents the fifth step: interdependencies. We make an inventory of the resources of the actors and assess the resource dependency (grid). We make an interdependency table to determine the critical actors and we assess their dedication and perception. We present the findings in one final matrix.
Step 5: Interdependencies
Step 6: Implications
How to do an actor analysis? This video presents the sixth step: implications for your client. We cover implications for problem formulation, for the interaction process with actors and for research questions and activities. For this, we revisit our system diagram and the power-interest grid. We end with a discussion of some of the limitations of actor analysis and a short summary.
Step 6: Implications
Problem Structuring Methods by TU Delft OpenCourseWare is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Based on a work at https://ocw.tudelft.nl/courses/problem-structuring-methods/.