In the literature we can identify many articles discussing and evaluating the management system of the Rhine. It is used around the world as a pattern for well functioning transnational water management regime. The governance system of the Rhine can be described as a polycentric governance system. ‘Polycentric Systems exist when multiple public and private organizations of multiple scales jointly affect collective benefits and costs’ (E. Ostrom 2010a). Originally developed in the 1960s to describe metropolitan governance (V. Ostrom 1961), recent publications adopted the concept to the issue of climate change mitigation (E. Ostrom 2010b). It is argued in this article that the theory of polycentric governance systems with its practical implications is also applicable to climate change adaptation. Coming back to the case study, the leading research questions of this paper are: How is adaptation to climate change integrated into the polycentric governance system of the river? Does the governance system change? If, yes, how and how should this be interpreted in a broader context of environmental governance? The methodology applied in this paper is the social ecological systems framework (SES) developed by Ostrom (2007, 2009). The SES Framework is used to structure the case study of the Rhine governance system. The framework was developed to analyze the governance of complex social ecological systems. Researches using this framework mostly focus on the micro level, individuals being the smallest unit. The action situations in this case study are on diverse levels, actors are inter alia governmental agencies and companies. Following this, the paper also aims to contribute to the question how the SES-Framework can be scaled-up. The paper concludes with reflections on advantages and disadvantages of polycentric river governance systems and their ability to cope with climate change adaptation.
