Description:
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p>Despite the reported success of introducing collaborative governance to the field of Estonian forest policy, conflicts over regulations escalated to an unprecedented extent in 2017. We analyze the institutional design and process of collaborative governance in this area in order to understand the reasons behind the failure of this governance arrangement. Our empirical analysis is based on a mixed methods approach combining network analysis with qualitative analysis of interview data. Our analysis reveals that the collaborative institutions were unable to generate shared understanding of the mission and the ground rules of decision‐making, provided uneven facilitation, failed to build trust, and thus were unable to establish an arena conducive to learning. We further stress the role of network methods in capturing adequate information from an institutional setting involving multiple participants.</jats:p>