Governance

Governance refers to "all of processes of governing, whether undertaken by a government, market or network, whether over a family, tribe, formal or informal organization or territory and whether through the laws, norms, power or language." It relates to "the processes of interaction and decision-making among the actors involved in a collective problem that lead to the creation, reinforcement, or reproduction of social norms and institutions."

Origin of the word
Like government, the word governance derives, ultimately, from the Greek verb κυβερνάω [kubernáo] (meaning to steer, the metaphorical sense first being attested in Plato). Its occasional use in English to refer to the specific activity of ruling a country can be traced to early modern England, when the phrase "governance of the realm" appears in works by William Tyndale and in royal correspondence between James V of Scotland and Henry VIII of England. The first usage in connection with institutional structures (as distinct from individual rule) is in Charles Plummer’s The Governance of England (an 1885 translation from a 15th-century Latin work by John Fortescue, also known as The Difference between an Absolute and a Limited Monarchy). This usage of governance to refer to the arrangements of governing became orthodox including in Sidney Low’s seminal text of the same title in 1904 and among some later British constitutional historians.