dr. (Ingmar) IF van Meerkerk

Profile

**Dr. Ingmar van Meerkerk (1986) is assistant professor at the Department of Public Administration and Sociology at Erasmus University Rotterdam. **

Van Meerkerk graduated his Master cum laude in 2009 on the basis of his thesis on the (financial-economic) steering relation between Ministries and quasi-autonomous executive bodies. In 2014 he defended his PhD thesis. His PhD thesis is about the role and effects of boundary spanners on democratic throughput legitimacy and performance of governance networks in the field of complex land use issues. Two different kinds of governance networks have been studied: governance networks in which governmental organizations have a leading role and governance networks in which self-organizing citizens have a leading role. Both quantitative survey research and qualitative (comparative and single) case study research have been conducted in this respect. His thesis is based on 4 international peer-reviewed articles and a book chapter in an International Edited Volume on interactive governance.

After completion of his Ph.D. research, van Meerkerk continued working as a researcher at the Department of Public Administration at Erasmus University Rotterdam, doing both research projects, such as an evaluation study of interdisciplinary research for the ARCH FP7 project, and lecturing (e.g. lecturing and guidance of Bachelor theses).

In 2014, van Meerkerk received a research grant from IHS Erasmus University Rotterdam for his research proposal about an international comparative study on boundary spanning for community driven co-production in dealing with poverty reduction and urban regeneration. In October 2014 van Meerkerk started as a post-doctoral researcher at the Department of Public Administration, conducting this research project.

His current research activities are focused on citizen self-organization or citizen initiatives (mostly in the field of urban regeneration). He specifically uses the concept of boundary-spanners and boundary-spanning activities to analyze the interaction between citizen collectives, professionals and traditional institutions of policy and politics. He focuses on the role, activities and challenges of boundary-spanners in such encounters, as well as their mutual interaction and effects on legitimacy and performance of urban regeneration.

Key words of research activities / publications: Citizen Self-Organization; Citizen participation; Boundary Spanning; Governance networks; Democratic (Throughput) Legitimacy; Network Performance;