Interactive governance emphasizes the various forms of public and private interactions as adaptive, collective, proactive, or passive, depending on the system's properties. Such interactions may foster or hinder governing efforts, making the system more or less governable and beyond governors' complete control. Government systems are in flux rather than a steady state. Interactive government must be dynamic, drawing upon different approaches that see the system as reflexive and flexible.
We can distinguish governance from management by its broad tasks, responsibilities, and goals. Interactive Governance defines these by order and associated elements.
To what extent are young people involved in the following orders of governance, in either their natural or social systems, at an individual, household, institution, or community level?
Assessing governability requires detailed examinations of the (natural and social) systems to be governed, the governing system, and the governing interactions. After mapping the diversity, complexity, dynamics, and scale of a social-ecological system, we focus in on local youth's roles and relationships within the system-to-be-governed.