Theorising pathways to sustainability

Using a Pathways approach, controversies over environmental and natural resource management are viewed as expressions of alternative, or competing, pathways to sustainability. This supports deeper understanding of the underlying causes of natural resource management controversies. The framework is composed of two elements: the STEPS (Social, Technological, and Environmental Pathways to Sustainability) Pathways approach and frame analysis. Many sustainable development dilemmas are played out in specific places and consequently, the Pathways approach is integrated with a place-based frame analysis. The resulting framework guides empirical investigation in place-based contexts. This theorising about sustainability science can be used to cast light on contested natural resource management issues, in this case mining in northern Sweden. By exposing the range of alternative Pathways to critical norms of sustainable development, we ascertain whether action alternatives are compatible with sustainable futures. The framework provides a way in which sustainability science can better understand the origins of natural resource management conflicts, characterise the positions of the actors involved, identify the potential for cooperation between stakeholders leading to policy resolution and judge what Pathways help or hinder the pursuit of sustainable development. In addition, it can enhance sustainability science by guiding integrative sustainability research at the project scale

Clash or concert in European forests? Integration and coherence of forest ecosystem service-related national policies

This paper compares how forest ecosystem service-related policies are integrated in different national European forest governance contexts. Efforts to achieve policy integration at the EU and national levels are often described in terms of limited success. Our analysis of forest, energy/bioeconomy, climate, and conservation policies sug-gests that notions of progress or failure merit careful assessment. Combining theories of policy integration (PI), environmental policy integration (EPI), and policy coherence, we argue that integration outcomes depend on the combined effects of the degree and nature of PI, EPI, and multilevel coherence in the context of the prevailing forest governance system. The nature of the interdependencies, specifically anticipated synergies, and the scope of FES-related climate objectives, are crucial. Realizing the range of FES-related objectives entails safeguarding objectives not synergistically aligned with economic aims. Failures to safeguard biodiversity and regulating and cultural ecosystem services in the process of integration may have far-reaching consequences

The Nordic welfare model providing energy transition? A political geography approach to the EU RES directive

The EU Renewable Energy Strategy (RES) Directive requires that each member state obtain 20% of its energy supply from renewable sources by 2020. If fully implemented, this implies major changes in institutions, infrastructure, land use, and natural resource flows. This study applies a political geography perspective to explore the transition to renewable energy use in the heating and cooling segment of the Swedish energy system, 1980–2010. The Nordic welfare model, which developed mainly after the Second World War, required relatively uniform, standardized local and regional authorities functioning as implementation agents for national politics. Since 1980, the welfare orientation has gradually been complemented by competition politics promoting technological change, innovation, and entrepreneurship. This combination of welfare state organization and competition politics provided the dynamics necessary for energy transition, which occurred in a semi-public sphere of actors at various geographical scales. However, our analysis, suggest that this was partly an unintended policy outcome, since it was based on a welfare model with no significant energy aims. Our case study suggests that state organization plays a significant role, and that the EU RES Directive implementation will be uneven across Europe, reflecting various welfare models with different institutional pre-requisites for energy transition

Frame analysis, place perceptions and the politics of natural resource management

This thesis is an exploration into the politics of natural resource management. An objective is to integrate concerns for "place" in theory guiding management and resource politics. Conflicting perceptions of place appear to play a role in the making of resource management policy. So do multiple understandings of the meaning of policy and policy events. Consequently, another aim of this thesis is to make sense of actors' multiple understandings of places and policy. The empirical focus is on one forest related Government Commission and its expressions in the community of Jokkmokk in the North of Sweden. Many communities in the North owe their shape, character and identity to natural resource exploitation. They are often localised in landscapes which are recognised for high nature conservation values and conflicts over natural resource use are common. Such conditions are not unique to Sweden. By applying a neo-Durkheimian approach to frame analysis this thesis explores the role of place perceptions in politics of natural resource management. Drawing on theories of social spatialisation, actors' place related frames are identified. Questions of influence and power are investigated by using actors' place related frames as a point of departure for an interpretive policy analysis. The study demonstrates how a systematic analysis of place related frames helps explain important aspects of the policy making process. It shows how fundamentally conflicting place meanings divide the actors, their frames and Interpretive Communities. However, the study also shows that place perceptions do not always explain actors' political activities. Sometimes actors' social organisation and loyalties are more important. This thesis therefore offers a sociologically based approach to conceptualising place perceptions and their role in the politics of natural resource management. It accordingly shows how neo-Durkheimian theory may be applied in natural resource management contexts. Moreover, the thesis demonstrates how questions of natural resource management and rural development are interlinked – through place. The analytical approach enables an in depth understanding of the nature of policy making and intractable policy controversies. In the case of the Government Commission under study, it revealed a lack of local participation, disregard of local perspectives and, thus, insufficient legitimacy. As such,it may also contribute to efforts to manage conflicts as well as to develop more equitable and democratic governance systems

Skogens kontroverser : en studie om plats och politik i norra Sverige

Upprättat; 2009; 20150127 (andbra

Food, Paper, Wood, or Energy? Global Trends and Future Swedish Forest Use

This paper presents a futures study of international forest trends. The study, produced as part of the Swedish Future Forest program, focuses on global changes of importance for future Swedish forest use. It is based on previous international research, policy documents, and 24 interviews with selected key experts and/or actors related to the forest sector, and its findings will provide a basis for future research priorities. The forest sector, here defined as the economic, social, and cultural contributions to life and human welfare derived from forest and forest-based activities, faces major change. Four areas stand out as particularly important: changing energy systems, emerging international climate policies, changing governance systems, and shifting global land use systems. We argue that global developments are, and will be, important for future Swedish forest use. The forest sector is in transition and forest-, energy, climate- and global land use issues are likely to become increasingly intertwined. Therefore, the “forest sector” must be disembedded and approached as an open system in interplay with other systems