What can governance theory learn from complexity theory? Mirroring two perspectives

Abstract
Recently the New Public Governance (NPG) has been suggested as an alternative paradigm to the traditional Public Administration Model (PAM) and New Public Management (NPM). NPG strongly builds upon Governance Network Theory (GNT). This suggestion assumes that the governance network approach has evolved into a full-fledged theoretical approach both theoretically and in practice, and that it has developed as a response to NPM. This contribution examines these assumptions by discussing the roots of the theory, its current state of the art, and challenges it might face in the future. We argue that GNT has indeed developed into a full-fledge theory that has gained prominence within public administration. Yet the emergence of New Public Governance opens up new challenges. Rather than governance networks and network governance replacing PAM and NPM, hybrid practices will emerge. Addressing this topic, and other new challenges, will require GNT to further develop, and perhaps even reinvent itself. This is not without risks. If governance network theory evolves into a theory of everything, it will lose its explanatory power, ending up being a theory of nothing.