Failures of sectoral approaches to avert environmental degradation increase demands for integrated approaches that mitigate conflictual management of forest, tree, and land resources. Despite much agreement on the consequent need for a holistic landscape approach for a well-integrated governance system, the requisite governance interactions and processes remain under-studied. Under the idea of polycentric governance systems (PGS), we employ the Ecology of Games Theory (EGT) to investigate qualitatively the structure and functions of the current governance system supporting collective restoration of two agro-forest landscapes in central Malawi. The EGT offers theoretical grounding for context-appropriate assessment of the quality of a PGS, based on 35 focus group discussions with local-level resource-governance bodies leading restoration efforts, 21 key informant interviews (KIIs) with district-level officers and local traditional authorities, and 16 KIIs with national-level stakeholders. The current governance system shares some PGS attributes but does not foster adequate cooperation to address challenges of limited resource capacity, inequitable resource distribution, and negative institutional externalities. Social learning and coordination mechanisms helped to catalyze critical interactions to realize some PGS benefits, but need strengthening. Findings show promise for a PGS that can achieve inter-sectoral and cross-scale coordination, building on the effective operationalization of existing decentralization institutions offering multi-stakeholder platforms and coordination venues. Dynamizing relevant policy spaces, institutions, and processes that foster necessary deliberation, learning, and coordination is important to mitigate negative institutional externalities. Findings uncover challenges of governance integration and can inform necessary institutional arrangements for well-coordinated landscape-scale restoration in Malawi and similar contexts in sub-Saharan Africa.

部门方法在避免环境退化方面的失败增加了对减轻森林、树木和土地资源冲突管理的综合方法的需求。尽管对于一个完整的治理系统的整体景观方法的必要性达成了很多共识，但必要的治理交互和过程仍然没有得到充分研究。在多中心治理系统（PGS）的思想下，我们采用博弈论生态学（EGT）对支持马拉维中部两个农林景观集体恢复的当前治理系统的结构和功能进行定性研究。EGT 基于与领导恢复工作的地方级资源管理机构的 35 个焦点小组讨论，为根据具体情况对 PGS 的质量进行评估提供了理论基础，与地区级官员和地方传统当局进行 21 次关键知情人访谈 (KII)，与国家级利益相关者进行 16 次 KII 访谈。当前的治理体系具有一些 PGS 属性，但没有促进足够的合作来应对资源能力有限、资源分配不公平和负面制度外部性等挑战。社会学习和协调机制有助于催化关键的互动，以实现一些 PGS 的好处，但需要加强。调查结果显示，PGS 有望实现跨部门和跨规模的协调，建立在现有权力下放机构的有效运作之上，提供多利益相关者平台和协调场所。使相关的政策空间、制度和流程充满活力，以促进必要的审议，学习和协调对于减轻负面的制度外部性很重要。调查结果揭示了治理整合的挑战，并可以为马拉维和撒哈拉以南非洲类似环境中协调良好的景观规模恢复提供必要的制度安排。