Magnus Nergård Stud.no.: 11087552 18.08.2017 MSc. in Business Administration – Entrepreneurship and Innovation Track University of Amsterdam Supervisor: Ileana de Bresser
How can local environmental
government benefit from
environmental governance?
2 Statement of originality This document is written by Student Magnus Nergård, who declares to take full responsibility for the contents of this document. I declare that the text and the work presented in this document is original and that no sources other than those mentioned in the text and its references have been used in creating it. The Faculty of Economics and Business is responsible solely for the supervision of completion of the work, not for the contents.
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Table of contents
i.
Abstract ... 6
1
Introduction ... 7
1.1 Justification of the research question ... 7 1.2 Research question ... 10 1.3 Limitations of the research question ... 10 1.4 Outline of the literature review ... 11 1.5 Choice of method ... 11 1.6 Outline of the thesis ... 122
Literature review ... 12
2.1 Governance ... 12 2.2 Empirical Content ... 14 2.3 Conceptual framework ... 163
Research questions ... 20
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Methodology ... 21
4.1 Introduction ... 21 4.2 A qualitative research approach ... 22 4.3 Research strategy: Case Study ... 23 4.4 The case study ... 24 4.5 Research method ... 24 4.6 Sampling ... 25 4.7 Data analysis techniques ... 25 4.8 Guaranteeing the research quality ... 255
Results ... 26
5.1 Coordination between local government and participants ... 264 5.1.1 Interdependence between organisations ... 26 5.1.2 Continuous interactions between network members ... 28 5.1.3 Game-like interactions ... 29 5.1.4 A significant degree of autonomy from the state ... 29 5.2 Characteristics of appropriate public involvement ... 30 5.2.1 Planning goals ... 30 5.2.2 Nature of planning problems ... 30 5.2.3 Number of participants ... 32 5.2.4 Potential for participant learning ... 32 5.2.5 Integrity, willingness and commitment of participants ... 33
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Discussion ... 33
6.1 Findings ... 33 6.1.1 The ability of local government to collaborate with partners ... 34 6.1.2 The ability of the environmental governance network to contribute to local government ... 36 6.2 Political implications ... 38 6.3 Theoretical implications ... 397
Conclusion ... 39
7.1 Limitations ... 40 7.2 Future research ... 408
References ... 41
Appendix ... 47
Frequency table ... 47 Code explanation ... 49 Interview 1: translated transcript and coding ... 61 Interview 2: translated transcript and coding ... 70 Interview 3: translated transcript and coding ... 875 Interview 4: translated transcript and coding ... 95 Interview 5: translated transcript and coding ... 103 Interview 6: translated transcript and coding ... 109 Interview 7: translated transcript and coding ... 116 Interview 8: translated transcript and coding ... 123 Interview 9: translated transcript and coding ... 131 Interview 10: translated transcript and coding ... 139
6 i. Abstract Governance has for a long time received much political and theoretical attention as a method of conducting environmental management and continues to do so. Ongoing environmental concerns create a demand for innovative solutions and keep topics of environmental management subjected to openness to new ways of handling issues. More local responsibility was internationally introduced in 1992 during a UN Conference on environment and development, with the catchphrase: “Think globally, act locally”. The reason for imploring more local responsibility lies in the opportunities of combining local knowledge and increased commitment with environmental management and scientific findings. The combined effort of local governments and non-state actors has, ideologically, higher potential for solving issues that continue to ruin our planet and our local communities. Much research has been committed to environmental governance, but less on local environmental governance and even less literature has been committed to understanding how characteristics of local environmental governance networks effects the ability of governance to be conducted productively. This thesis offers an explorative study of governance and the characteristics it is subjected to. By a qualitative research design the thesis attempts to learn more about how local environmental government can benefit for environmental governance. Interviews conducted with members of different local governments have constructed an understanding of how local government can collaborate with other members of their governance network to achieve more successful results. The ability to make the public aware of ongoing efforts, the ability to negotiate and openness to public suggestions and public knowledge are qualities that have been identified as important to transform government into governance. Keywords: Local environmental governance, collaboration, inclusive government, comparative advantages, local knowledge
7 1 Introduction This chapter introduces the objective of the research and how the research is structured. 1.1 Justification of the research question Not too long ago, governance was generally equated with government (Baron and Lyon, 2011). Today, the meaning of governance equates to a form of government that is including, or “including government”. By including, I mean, more involvement of non-state actors. The strength of conducting governance over government lies in the possibilities closer collaboration with the population brings. Collaboration between the government and non-state actors enables the government to find which solutions are more desired by the population and it gives the government access to means that they otherwise would not have, that they can use in working towards solutions in more effective ways and solutions that would have been otherwise inconceivable.
To offer a more a better understanding between the two different sets of ruling, I will offer a fundamental explanation first spurred by Milton Friedman, a Nobel Laureate in economics and one of the world’s most influential academics (Chen, 2007, p.15).
“So the question is, do corporate executives, provided they stay within the law, have
responsibilities in their business activities other than to make as much money for their stockholders as possible? And my answer to that is, no they do not”
(Friedman 1970, p.1). The idea behind this statement is that corporations have a comparative advantage over governments when it comes to conducting business, in being able to only focus on profit. Likewise, for governments, having a comparative advantage in handling externalities as profit is not an objective, but the commonwealth of the people is. In this view, governments are left to handle environment externalities alone. Governments have essentially two means to protect the environment, subsidies and policies. A popular economic ideology is the environmental policy of internalising externalities through a tax equal to the marginal social damage, created by the sale of each product, called Pigovian tax (Pigou, 1932, p. 1). Implementing a Pigovian tax system on a
8 national level has, however, proved too great of a challenge to ever be realised and the handling of environmental protection has grown more difficult and more important over the years. With the rise of complexity in environmental government, the need for governments to involve a wider network in the work for environmental protection has become apparent. This transformation involves a broader distribution of power and authority in addressing environmental issues.
Contemporary governing arrangements are said to involve a wider range of actors than in the past, whose interactions are increasingly complex. The actors are likely to include private and public bodies from local, regional and national governments, civic organisations, scientific experts, labour unions and private interest groups (Paterson, 1999).
At this stage, local, regional, national and international levels of government are all conducting environmental governance in order to steer businesses somewhat off of Friedmans ideology and involve and exploit private expertise. It is increasingly common for corporate responsibility initiatives to lower green impact. The assumption of traditional economics literature, that consumers and investors ignore the environmental externalities associated with their market activities, has changed in recent years (Baron and Lyon, 2011). Firms can be rewarded by investors for their environmental or other social performance; by employees through higher retention rates, improved hiring, or lower wages; and directly by consumers who reward firms with a record of environmental accomplishment by paying a premium for their products (Graff-Zivin and Small, 2005; and Baron, 2008, 2009).
Non-government initiatives were a frontrunner for environmental governance, as environmental activists grew increasingly frustrated with government as a tool for achieving environmental improvements, they began to directly engage companies through the marketplace. It became increasingly clear that government policy was only one tool available to those pressing for environmental protection (Baron and Lyon, 2011).
Today, environmental governance is understood to include the full set of pressures and incentives that motivate business to improve its environmental performance. This includes markets for green products and investments, regulatory relationships, and NGO/corporate engagements (Baron and Lyon, 2011).
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Today, international environmental governance takes place predominantly within numerous independent institutional arrangements (Oberthür and Gehring, 2004). The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), whose mandate is to coordinate the United Nations (UN) environmental activities, is closest to being the “leading global environmental authority”, but they are far from being the global environmental institution that leads the world. A study conducted in 1992 for the UN Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro identified more than 125 separate international environmental regimes (Sand, 1992; and Charnovitz, 1996). Five additional environmental agreements have been concluded on average per year thereafter, up to 1999. (Beisheim et al., 1999, p. 350–351). International governance is a process of bargaining, negotiation and compromise (Pielke, 2007). International tensions are the rule rather than the exception, ‘facts are uncertain, values in dispute, stakes high and decisions urgent’ (Funtowicz and Ravetz, 1991). Organising dialogue between science and policy-making is challenged by credibility, relevance and legitimacy (Cash et al., 2003; and Farrell and Bridgewater, 2012).
Environmental governance is different from country to country and within countries all over the world (Duit, 2015). National differences in environmental concern and in countries’ willingness to take actions that safeguard environmental resources are well established (Franzen and Meyer, 2010; Scruggs, 2003). Switzerland and Scandinavian countries lead in national willingness to make trade-offs between immediate economic benefits and current and future environmental benefits, whereas countries like India and Iraq lag behind (Emerson et al., 2012). Economic ability has been linked to willingness to invest in environmental sustainability (Franzen, 2003; Gelissen, 2007). A study by Yan Wang (2017) showed that for countries with high-income, conducting environmental governance encouraged people to participate in sustainable consumption, but in low-income countries people were discouraged by the governance approach. Differences like these lead to there not being any standardised best way of environmental governance (Harrington and Morgenstern, 2004).
As environmental governance requires tailoring to fit the area of which it is conducted, there is a need for research to be committed on environmental governance networks with
10 different characteristics. In that way, we can perhaps find ways governance can be adapted in order to be successful with the characteristics it is deployed under. Perhaps more conceivable and more practically oriented, we can offer an evaluation of appropriate use of governance in networks with similar characteristics as the ones researched.
This thesis will attempt to contribute to the field of environmental governance by evaluating a set of local governments’ ability to conduct local environmental governance. Previous research has been committed to characterise important aspects for successful governance. This allows this research to use previous findings of important characteristics as a framework for evaluation. The research will study several local environmental governance networks that are located in the same region. With this method, we can achieve the benefits of a greater sample size and we can reduce biases based on different characteristics, and rather focus on the characteristics of the sample we are researching. 1.2 Research question How can local environmental government benefit from environmental governance? I will attempt to answer this question by researching the following sub-research questions: a) Are local governments open to involvement from other participants, and do they have the structure needed to have a productive collaboration with an extended network? b) Is an extended network that can productively contribute available to local government? 1.3 Limitations of the research question The findings, analysis, conclusion and the research question itself should be interoperated with the following limitations in mind: This research is important because environmental governance requires tailoring to fit in the area of which it is conducted, but that is also a limitation of the research. This research will not attempt to explore conditions for governance to exploit, but merely explores how governance works in
11 the conditions it is exposed to. To counter this limitation, the thesis will offer a code-description of the conditions of the sample researched in the appendix, in order for the reader to know under what conditions this research may be applicable. 1.4 Outline of the literature review This chapter will explain central topics of environmental governance and review some of the most relevant research committed. Furthermore, it will provide a perquisite history of the institutionalization of environmental work from an international scope down to the scope of the sample, at a local level. Lastly, the theoretical framework, that will be used to analyse the findings of this research, will be presented, justified and explained. 1.5 Choice of method
To answer my research question, I have chosen to apply a qualitative method. My research involves understanding construction and handling of complex social networks with so many potentially effecting variables that I believe a quantitative method would not provide findings that could eliminate biases in the same way a qualitative method can do. I believe narrowing the research to a smaller sample - rather than a larger one in a quantitative method - and give that sample a more investigating focus, is better suited to understand the topic and discover findings that can be useful to answer the research question.
This study will first take on existing literature of the topic to get a more profound understanding in order to be able to create relevant interview questions that produce answers which can enlighten the situation, needs and ability of the studied sample as it is today. Through interviews, the thesis will explore how environmental governance is used today and how well it is being implemented according to theoretical frameworks created by researchers of governance in previous research.
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1.6 Outline of the thesis
This thesis starts by giving a theoretical understanding of the central topics of governance, environmental work and the political structure of the sample. A framework for assessing governance will be provided, together with an explanation of how it can be used to as a tool for exploring the sample under study. The method of which the theoretical framework will be used to explore environmental governance will be explained in the following method chapter. The method chapter will also further explain what sample has been chosen to explore this topic, as well as why and how the sample must be viewed in the context of its conditions. An analysis of the research will then be presented and an explanation of interpretations will be explained with references to the most vital data collected. The significance, relevance and meaning of the findings will be discussed and form the results of this research. It will be presented in the discussion chapter. Lastly, how this research can contribute to existing literature and suggestions for further research, will be discussed in the conclusion chapter. Primary data collection is available as an appendix to the thesis.
2 Literature review 2.1 Governance
Today, the meaning of governance equates to a form of government that is including, or “including government”. It means involving non-state actors and creating a network that can collaborate towards common purposes, or negotiate purposes to find solutions that are more beneficial for all parties (Baron and Lyon, 2011).
Environmental governance can be defined as sharing responsibility and power among government and non-state actors in decision-making on environmental concerns (Carlsson and Berkes, 2005). Governance is about distributing political power and authority from government agencies to other societal actors, so that modes of governing can broaden and evolve in order to increase the ability to tackle a range of environmental challenges that they were set up to address (Newell et al., 2012; Stoker, 2002; and Rhodes, 1996). Considering this, a substantial amount of research on national environmental governance has been committed on how nations delegate power to regional and local level of government, but little on how this system works for further
13 delegation of power and participation of NGOs, private research institutions, private citizens and businesses (OECD, 2002). Research has been committed on improving science-policy interfaces (Vatn, 2005; and Young, 2008). Transparency, participation and accountability (Singh, 2013) and local governance creating situated-based knowledge (Leino and Peltomaa, 2012) is amongst many of the topics researchers have been trying to learn more about in order to help nations adapt their governance in according to their needs and abilities. Politically appointed bodies play a central role in governing processes (Hildingsson, 2014) The role they play, varies depending on modes of governing and locus of authority, and is therefore an important area for research (Hildingsson, 2014; Hysing, 2010).
Government is considered the principal agent in environmental work. The local government’s role in addressing environmental challenges has been under change as well as the use of climate governance (Lafferty, 2001). Multilevel governance has become increasingly relevant in environmental research, in order to capture what each faction of the government can contribute with in the governance network (Balme and Ye, 2014). A critique against multilevel governance research is that it tends to research from a top-down perspective, despite that in reality, focus is increasing on local level efforts (Kern and Mol, 2013).
Local knowledge is knowledge that is practical, collective and strongly rooted in a particular place (Geertz, 1983). Integrating local knowledge into environmental work can yield richer understandings of community concerns (Petts and Brooks, 2006). In turn, this understanding can create more problem-specific responses (Lach et al., 2005). Studies show that solutions from efforts that come from publicly inclusive collaborations are more likely to be supported and accepted by the public (van Ast and Boot, 2003).
However, some studies have discovered reluctance coming from scientists and government officials towards local knowledge in the context of environmental governance (Giordano et al., 2010). Differences between scientific and local knowledge can sometimes lead to divided opinions towards what counts as knowledge in environmental decision-making (Berkes, 2004).
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2.2 Empirical Content
In general, institutionalisation refers to the ongoing process of patterning, preservation, construction, organisation and deconstruction of day-to-day activities and interactions in institutions (Leroy and Tatenhove, 2000). Certain actions within the context of national sustainable development strategies, can move a country towards institutionalisation of sustainable development precepts. For example, some countries have included sustainable development and its achievement in their constitutions and legislation. Responsibility for sustainable development can be assigned, whether it be the Office of the Prime Minister, the Finance Ministry, or a Sustainable Development Ministry or Office. Funding for sustainable development can be included in government budget processes where it will be subjected to real debates regarding trade-offs across competing economic, environmental and social priorities and also savings and investment plans for the longer term. Sustainable Development Councils can be developed in order to encourage the views of a wide range of stakeholders. And Parliaments can be fully involved in sustainable development monitoring and oversight to ensure that the political dimensions of sustainability are not neglected (OECD, 2007). In Norway, the political institutionalisation of environmental issues began in the late 1960s and peaked at the beginning of the 1970s, as result of a greening of public opinion (Hovik and Reitan, 2004). The public interest in environmental protection helped put environmental issues at the top of the political agenda. Political focus was directed towards creating central bureaucracies and developing expertise fit to address environmental issues (Dryzek, 1997). At this time, within the political, as well as environmental science, ideological trends were in favour of decentralisation. Elected county councils were established in 1975 with the responsibility of overseeing planning processes of municipalities in their own counties and national interests were controlled by new regional environmental administrations who oversaw cases of environmental concerns (Flo, 1999; and Nenseth, 1994).
In respect of management of environmental problems in the political sphere, at the level of supranational governance and as well for organisations, sustainable development was formalised in 1987, when it was first expressed in the well-known “Brundtland Report” on behalf of the World Commission on Environment and Development: “Sustainable development is
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development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (HSDC, 2002).
At this point, the public opinion in Norway underwent a new green wave. In this commission, environmental issues were approached on a deeper level, discussing the complex relation between environmental issues on a national and local level. Historically, Norwegian municipalities have had control of several areas that have a large impact on the environment, such as local waste disposal, local health, water quality, land-use planning and recreation, but this was to be reinforced. The growth of the environmental movement differed strikingly from one country to the other in this period. In 1991, where in Holland 17 per cent of the total adult population belonged to environmental organisations, in Germany it was 7.5 per cent, in Britain 4.7 per cent, in Belgium 3.4 per cent and in France only 2.4 per cent (Krohberger and Hey, 1991). From 1991 to 1997, these differences only increased (Van Der Heijden, 1997). Regarding the participation of environmental organisations in the policy process, differences between countries were also notable. Where, for instance, the Dutch Stichting Natuur en Milieu, the lobby organisation of the environmental movement, was represented in seventy governmental advisory boards, the German, the French and many other national movements completely lacked this form of access (Van Der Heijden, 1997). In Norway in 1989, the Brundtland government presented their environmental strategy called: “the sector responsibility principle”. It called for the responsibility of sustainability to be shared between all levels of government and explicitly stated that municipalities should conduct their policies according to sustainable development ideologies (St. meld. no. 46, 1988-89, page 145). Municipalities’ responsibility as main planning authorities was emphasised to battle local environmental issues, as well as to carry out goals set on a national level (Hovik and Reitan, 2004). The institutionalisation of environmental issues was carried out by developing local environmental agencies and funding to municipalities increased for such work. The programme contained both experiments to develop local political and administrative institutions for environmental policymaking. An important mean to achieve this goal was to offer earmarked
16 grants to the municipalities in order to employ local environmental consultants. This part of the programme was a success. In early 1993, one year after the general reform was introduced, 96% of the municipalities had employed an environmental consultant (Hovik and Johnsen, 1994). Norway was a frontrunner in institutionalising local governments’ roles in environmental work. Internationally, local responsibility was implored at the UNCED conference in Rio concerning The Local Agenda 21, “Think globally, act locally” (Aall, 1998). LA21 is a declaration to carry out responsible development. It declares that local governments should have a role and responsibility in making sure that global sustainability is met. Part of the national level LA21 strategy, was to finance LA21 coordinators on a regional or county level, that could stimulate participation and help progress in the municipalities (Lafferty, 2002, page 96; Bjørnæs and Lafferty, 2000). The regional LA21 coordinators were to facilitate and provide expertise to local governments. In 1997, Norway’s national government officially changed their main priority of environmental protection politics from “the sector responsibility principle” to LA21 (St. meld. no. 58, 1996-97). With the change, however, Norwegian municipalities’ earmarked grant for employment of local environment consultants was incorporated in the general state grant, or in other words removed. When the grant changed from being earmarked, the number of municipalities who had employed a consultant decreased by 27% and the position’s workload was reduced in another 31% of all municipalities by the year 2000 (Bjørnæs and Lafferty, 2000). This was actually opposing the findings from an international comparison by Chang and Hu (2011), that revealed that subsidies from the central government could result in a free-rider problem in municipalities. They showed that subsidies from the central government tended to not increase total investments from local governments in environmental issues. The reason for this inconsistency can have been found by Wang (2017), when her multilevel analysis based on data from 31 countries showed that effective environmental governance encourages people better in high-income countries. 2.3 Conceptual framework
Kjær (2004) distinguishes between governance in public administration and public policy, governance in international relations, European Union governance, governance in comparative politics, and good governance as extolled by the World Bank. The several uses have little or
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nothing in common (Watson, 2005). It is therefore important for this thesis to distinguish what kind of governance is being researched, in order to employ the right type of framework. This thesis will focus on governance in public administration and public policy. Rhodes, a political scientist who has committed research on policy networks and governance since 1979, states that the purpose of governance in public administration is to improve coordination between government departments and the multifarious other organisations, and defines it as the following:
1. Interdependence between organisations. Governance is broader than government, covering non-state actors. Changing the boundaries of the state means the boundaries between public, private and voluntary sectors become shifting and opaque. 2. Continuous interactions between network members, caused by the need to exchange resources and negotiate shared purposes. 3. Game-like interactions, rooted in trust and regulated by rules of the game negotiated and agreed by network participants. 4. A significant degree of autonomy from the state. Networks are not accountable to the state; they are self-organising. Although the state does not occupy a privileged, sovereign position, it can indirectly and imperfectly steer networks (Rhodes, 1997, p. 53).
Table 1 (Rhodes, 1997, p. 53)
The framework gives guidance to important needs of governance, but should be interpreted according to the situation it is used to study. I allow myself to give a further explanation of the framework to offer my understanding of how the framework is used in the research of this topic. Interdependence between organisations describes a relationship where two or more parties are involved in a partnership where they, to some degree, depend on each other. It is more evolved than one party being hired by the other and dependency created by consequences of dissolving the collaboration. Shared interests and negotiation between differences of interest to form a collaboration that work for all participants’ benefit, are important to create interdependence between organisations.
To both create beneficial partnerships and benefit from existing partnerships, continuous interaction is needed. There is no measure to say what amount of interaction is the correct one, but availability, openness, initiative and persistence are things we can look for to determine whether an organisation has the ability to interact with other network members. Conflict, confusion and time-consumption are some of the elements we can study to see if the level of
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interaction is appropriate.
Established rules of conduct can help facilitate collaborations by reducing insecurity and create a guideline that expedites the process of creating partnerships. Trust can decide appropriate need of rules of a negotiation and can vary depending on the situation. It is important for this measurement that participants agree on the rules and that disagreements in that regard do not create friction that stands in the way of forming collaborations.
Networks’ autonomy from the state needs to exist in order to collaborate, rather than work together. The difference between collaboration and working together lies in the division of responsibility, being accountable for independent solutions and enabling self-control on how to solve problematics. Thus, enabling network members to contribute with competency, assets and comparative advantages.
Rhodes argues that the framework can be used to analyse coordination between government departments and other private organisations. This thesis will however - in light of Smiley’s et. al. (2010) argumentation of there being significant differences in power in collaborations between state and non-state actors - also use Smiley’s et. al. framework for “public involvement”. The framework is specialised to analyse “public involvement” on collaborative decision making in planning contexts that occur primarily under the state’s influence or direction. “The public”, here, is defined as non-state actors, such as members of the public, and individuals representing interest groups, aboriginal communities, businesses, and nongovernmental organisations. The framework has five broad characteristics that shape the context for public involvement in local environmental governance (Smiley et. al., 2010). Characteristics of appropriate public involvement in local environmental governance: Broad characteristic Subcharacteristics Planning goals • Development of a decision-making partnership • Consideration of local impacts • Urgency of plan completion and implementation • Consistency across regional jurisdictions Nature of the planning problem • Accessibility of pertinent information
19 • Geographic scale of impacts • Alternative solutions Number of participants • Diversity of needs and interest to be represented Potential for participant learning • Experience with pertinent information • Time and resources available to support learning Integrity, willingness, and commitment of
participants • Degree of respect for decision-making process and for other participants • Extent to which ongoing involvement in decision making and/or decision implementation is possible Table 2 (Smiley et. al., 2010) Planning goals – In cases where it is a planning goal to ensure that the local environmental, social,
and economic impacts are solved in a way that benefits the common good of a community, increased public involvement is important. However, if the planning goal is quick completion or merely to be able to implement, a lower degree of public involvement is appropriate (Smiley et. al. 2010). More involvement is better suited to ensure optimised solutions, but may require more time and resources. The appropriate solution is therefore based on the goal of the plan. Nature of planning problems – Complex planning problems may contain aspects where solutions do not benefit stakeholders fairly and some not at all. It requires a value judgement that is difficult for one organization to hold alone and may require to be commonly accepted in order for the solution to be realized or enforced. This may involve scientific research, evidence, consideration of alternative solutions and local knowledge. Because of this, complex environmental planning problems demand a high degree of public involvement (Smiley et. al., 2010). Simple planning problems are usually without the need of value judgements and several solutions are widely accepted by the public. For simple planning problems, a high degree of public involvement may not be needed (Smiley et. al., 2010).
Number of participants – The appropriate degree of public involvement in a planning process is
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high, then it is appropriate to have a high degree of public involvement to achieve representation of all the differences. If an issue requires a high number of participants in order to achieve representation it may be warranted for individual involvement to be low (Smiley et. al. 2010).
Potential for participant learning – A high degree of involvement in a process can increase
understanding, commitment and ownership of a process. Participant learning becomes important in cases where involvement is limited because of general lack of knowledge about the topic (Smiley et. al., 2010). Integrity, Willingness, and Commitment of Participants – Integrity influences stakeholder’s ability to contribute in decision-making by giving honest opinions and respecting the process of how to come to a decision and how decisions have been made. With high willingness and commitment, the potential for learning is higher, which again increases contribution. This increases chances of overcoming obstacles in the process, to develop trust and respect. These conditions make a high degree of public involvement appropriate (Smiley et. al., 2010). 3 Research questions
Regional governance of environmental protection is a responsibility that falls to the county governor, in Norway. The county governor is elected by the sitting national government to ensure that environmental development on a regional level is in accordance with national policies and plans. Despite the fact that this power and responsibility is controlled by one central institution, research has shown that the sub-national regional environmental governance is not as uniformed as one would think. Research on differences in regional governance policies on environmental protection has indicated that there are large differences in how the regional governance is conducted (Nenseth, 1994). As municipality electives are not elected by one central institution, but the people of each individual municipality, it is natural that local environmental governance is less uniformed than regional environmental governance. Research has been done on how regional governance towards municipalities differs between counties, but little research has been conducted on how local governance networks in different municipalities interact with and take advantage of the resources available in their governance network. An effective research question to learn more about this issue would be:
21 How can local environmental government benefit for environmental governance? I will attempt to answer this question by researching following sub-research questions: a) Are local governments open to involvement from other participants, and do they have the structure needed to have a productive collaboration with an extended network? b) Is an extended network that can productively contribute available to local government? 4 Methodology 4.1 Introduction
This chapter provides a description and motivation of the methodology in this study. Furthermore, it explains in more detail the study case, as well as how data is collected and processed.
The meaning of method is to follow a specific path towards a goal, and entails how you chose to collect, analyse and interpret information (Johannesen et al., 2004, p.32). The best suited research method is based on the topic that is being researched, the desired research approach, the topic issue, the purpose of the research and the ability of the method to collect data of interest (Johannesen et al., 2004, p.32). This research has an inductive approach, because the topic of research has little research literature that focuses on the interpretation of collected data, and because the nature of the research has a low degree of uniformity that makes similar previous research of a different sample less considerable than if the uniformity were greater. An inductive approach consists of doing required examination, analysis of the collected data and it then builds a theoretical understanding based on this (Ghauri and Grønnhaug, 2010, p. 16). Furthermore, it is important to choose a suited research design or framework for data collection and data analysis (Ghauri and Grønnhaug, 2010, p. 54). Research design is distinguished between three major different designs: explorative, descriptive, and explanatory. This research will commit to the use of an explorative design. Explorative design is often used when there is little existing theory on the research issue, and the topic is not well understood (Ghauri and Grønnhaug, 2010, p. 56). The main benefit of an
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explorative research design is that it gives a large degree of flexibility to solve the research issue. This method allows for the research to concentrate on mapping and understanding the challenges and possibilities of the topic, without potential distortion from findings from research of less similarity. 4.2 A qualitative research approach “Research is an organised and systematic way of finding answers to questions” (Collins, 2010, p. 10). There are two main methods for research: qualitative and quantitative. Qualitative research is “at best an umbrella term covering an array of interpretive techniques which seeks to describe, decode, translate, and otherwise come to terms with the meaning, not the frequency, of certain more or less naturally occurring phenomena in the social world” (Van Maanen, 1979, p. 520). Qualitative research sees meaning as something that is not fixed. Meaning, in a social context, is not agreed upon, nor is it measurable (Merriam, 2002). “Meaning is socially constructed by individuals in interactions with their world” (Merriam, 2002). Ask what the meaning of environmental protection is to a politician, a business owner, a lumberjack, a mother and a professor, and you might get five different answers. Ask them again in one year, and you might get five new answers. The professor might have an academic answer such as; “The meaning of environmental protection is to reduce negative environmental externalities”. But again, what does negative environmental externalities mean? The mother might say that it is the negative impact from the environment on the health of her children, the lumberjack might say it is erosion that reduces the quality of soil that trees grow in and the businessman might say it is costs of adapting production to the environment or costs of following rules set to preserve the environment. Meaning, is an interpretation of reality. It changes over time as both reality does and individuals’ exposure to reality change. “Qualitative researchers are interested in understanding what those interpretations are at a particular point in time and in a particular context. Learning how individuals experience and interact with their social world, the meaning it has for them” (Merriam, 2002, p. 5).
Environmental protection is a social process and I have therefore chosen a qualitative research approach. Perhaps is it even more needed in the topic of governance as the very essence
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of governance is that individual interpretations are included, and are able to influence and complement the process in hand.
As opposed to quantitative research methods, a qualitative approach makes use of a small sample size. This decreases the probability of the results being generalizable, but as the nature of the topic is too complex to capture by quantified variables, I find it more useful to seek to decomplexify possible biases and learn about the social perpetration of the variables.
4.3 Research strategy: Case Study
“A case study is an empirical inquiry that investigates a contemporary phenomenon within its real-life context, especially when the boundaries between phenomenon and context are not clearly evident. In other words, you would use the case study method because you deliberately wanted to cover contextual conditions—believing that they might be highly pertinent to your phenomenon of study”
(Yin, 2009, p. 18).
The ability to conduct governance can be understood as the ability to exploit the available network. When trying to answer how municipalities can improve their ability to conduct governance in environmental protection, it is then important to find a case study that covers as much as possible of the environmental network of a Norwegian municipality. The municipalities’ environmental network is explained by Norway’s environmental power distribution. The municipalities are the principal agents in local environmental development. They have the primary responsibility of areas such as: waste disposal, health, water quality, land-use planning and recreation. The regional government is responsible for making sure municipalities follow national laws, rules and goals. It is also an institution of aid for all their municipalities when it comes to environmental protection and it rules in cases of dispute between municipalities or between a municipality and civilians. The national government has traditionally enforced municipalities as the principal agent in environmental issues, and tries to direct a national environmental policy through grants, subsidies, expertise and other incentives, but it does also makes environmental laws and rules.
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A case study involves collecting in-depth observations in a limited number of cases—to focus on fewer "subjects," but more "variables" within each subject (Galloway and Sheridan, 1993). Case studies can follow one of two major designs: a single case study where a single subject is examined in-depth, or a multiple case study where several cases or events are studied (Galloway and Sheridan, 1993). I have chosen to conduct a single case study as it allows me room to go more in depth on that case, rather than dividing my effort across several case studies. I have, in other words, chosen to prioritise validity over generalisability. As this is an explorative study, of which the goal is to learn more about real practical use of governance, I find validity to be the most vital objective. To ensure generalisability to the study, the choice of case has been done with generalisation being of highest priority. 4.4 The case study
The case study takes place in Akershus, a county surrounding the capital of Norway, where increase in population has deemed in necessary to upgrade infrastructure both in Akershus and from Akershus to the capital. In this process, environmentally friendly means of transportation has been given great priority. The national government has set it as a goal for 8% of all transportation to be done by bi-cycle (Espeland and Amundsen, 2012). Development of bi-cycle opportunities and promotion of bi-cycle as an alternative mean of transportation has gained focus for municipalities in Akershus in this upgrading process, and by choosing this case-study the research can hope to have a case that the entirety of the sample is working on. The case study is the work of municipalities to increase number of travellers using bi-cycles.
4.5 Research method
To answer the research question, primary data has been collected by conducting interviews. There are several types of interview methods that can be used to collect data. Often these are separated into three major types; structured interviews, unstructured interviews, and semi instructed interviews. These types of interviews are separated by the degree in which the questions are fixed before the initiation of the interview. I have used a semi structured approach to all the interviews in this research. The interviews have been structured by having a list of
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potential questions prepared before the beginning of the interview and by asking a large portion of the same questions to all the interview candidates, but the interviews have been fairly unstructured as choice of questions during the interview have not been rigid or fixed. During an interview, it is possible to see that some questions are not relevant for the strategy that interview candidate is part of and it is possible to discover areas of interest that were not apparent before the interview, which require new questions to be investigated. With an explorative research design, it is important to be open-minded and flexible in an interview and allow for topics, earlier perceived as uninteresting, to be explored. Semi-structured interviews give the interviewer the possibility of collecting useful findings from a broader spectrum, though flexibility, and at the same time allow, to some degree, direct comparison standardisation (Johannesen et al., 2004, p.145). 4.6 Sampling The sample is purposively selected to be located in the same region where all collaborate with the same County Council. They all follow the same rules to receive national and regional funding and are all working under the same laws and regional instructions. The sample consists of all the municipalities in the county that were willing to contribute to the research, in total nine. In addition, an interview is conducted with a representative from the County Council. 4.7 Data analysis techniques The data are analysed through the following steps and procedures: Records of the interviews are transcribed verbatim; the transcripts have been translated to English and the transcription is analysed in the frameworks, presented earlier, of Smiley’s et. al and Rhodes. Codes for relevant parts of the framework, as well as annotations, are added to the translated transcript. The transcript, annotations and codes, together with the framework, will be available for the reader in the appendix to show the connections drawn in the research. 4.8 Guaranteeing the research quality With respect to the validity of case studies, a central concern is external validity— the extent to which the findings from a small number of cases can be generalised (Yin, 2009). Internal validity,
26 or the extent to which the reported findings accurately reflect the concept under investigation, is an additional methodological concern for case study research (Yin, 2009). This research will be transparent in all reflexions and keep records of the data collected, data processing and analysis available for the reader. Researchers has emphasised the importance of this so that the audience can evaluate the utility of the work for their own endeavours (Lincoln and Guba, 1985). 5 Results This part of this thesis will cover the results of the research. All findings are based on collected data from the interviews with representatives from different local primary agents in the environmental governance network. An analysis of all the elements of the theoretical framework will be presented, starting with Rhodes’s framework of coordination between government departments and other private organisations followed by the framework of Smiley et. al for appropriate public involvement.
5.1 Coordination between local government and participants
5.1.1 Interdependence between organisations
For the entirety of the sample, the local primary agents of the governance network work in reliance with the same regional and national government. Despite having equal collaboration partners, the perceived degree of dependence to higher form of governments ranged from almost completely dependent to independent with desire for interdependence to maximize results. One informant described how the work they do in their municipality can be enforced by the engagement of the regional government: “I am very happy the County Council made their own
bi-cycle strategy because many of the bike paths in this municipality is under County ownership. So, to increase the awareness and commitment through a County-strategy, I think, is very important for also us to complete ours” (Interview 2). The municipality is working in union with
the County to increase the results of their own effort. This falls in contrast with the complete dependency on the County’s work that I found in some other municipalities. “We could have
decided our own bi-cycle strategy with knowledge that it probably wouldn’t be realised”
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Regarding collaborations with non-governmental organizations, the degree of dependence with collaborating partners vary with the characteristics of the project. However, some municipalities display the ability to develop collaborations where partners work in interdependence, and collaborative efforts are used to increase the results and enable possibilities. This is done is two ways. Firstly, in projects where the municipality is dependent on the collaboration of a partner that does not share having the environment as a target goal. Some municipalities manage to go into an interdependent collaboration by finding other target goals of potential partners and negotiate a collaboration where both partner’s target goal benefits from the collaboration. “Often, we are the party that contacts the landowners to make a trail. Then they say: “it’s okay, but could you also look at the width of the road, the trench and so on. And so, we asphalt the road in exchange for also making a bi-cycle path. That way we get permission to go through their land” (Interview 2). Secondly, in projects where the municipality is initially independent of any partners to accomplish their goal, some municipalities are much more active in finding and working together with partners that have the same goals. The interviews discover several cases where this method eased the workload of the municipality, but the strongest benefit from collaboration of this type seem to be more optimal solutions.
Shared interests are the most common reason for collaboration. These collaborations have an interdependency between partners that are not developed or formed by negotiation. There are some differences in the ability to find partners with shared interests. Some partners are more obviously interested in the work the municipality does and are more or less always a partner of the municipality when it’s called for. The informant from interview 1 put it this way, talking about planning processes: “Schools are always questioned about cases in areas near them. Citizens and businesses are always asked through plan cases, and any potential plan meetings. In relation to where the need is, sometimes the needs are obvious, but not always” (Interview A). In some municipalities, interdependent collaborations are limited to obvious partners like these, but some municipalities manage to craft partnerships that are more complex. “And we work together
28 camping site to a rail road station. Because they were interested in this stretch to be attractive. In this project, they contribute with financial means that match our contribution. We also got the State to match the numbers, which amounted up to close to one million kroner for this project… … They wanted a dialog on what that could be done on a stretch between a structure of theirs and the railroad station. The stretch mostly consists of municipal road and because of that their private actions are limited. So, they wanted a collaboration” (Interview B). Interestingly, municipalities that display increased ability to form partnerships with shared interests as the basis for the collaboration, also display the ability to develop a higher degree of interdependence in partnerships that are created despite less shared initial interests. 5.1.2 Continuous interactions between network members Measuring the frequency and how partners interact may provide insight to practises that ensure improved collaboration. In the case mentioned earlier, of obvious parties of interest, it is almost protocol to include the parties in concerned projects; “Schools are always questioned about cases in areas near them. Citizens and businesses are always asked through plan cases, and any potential plan meetings,” (Interview A). By protocol, I mean that it seemed a work in practice. Interaction between members is a fundamental need for governance. Municipalities contacting other parties is the first step towards taking advantage of an increased pool of abilities, but the motivation for contacting network members seems to differ between municipalities. Informant A put it this way, talking about a number of councils the municipality often contacted in planning processes: “These councils are used more or less as alibies for the strategy, afterwards. It’s also
open hearings, but for most possible weight behind our decisions we, in addition, send out invitations to more relevant parties of the decisions” (Interview A). This answer is not to say that this mentality is present in every planning process in this municipality, but it does highlight a concern that can present itself when a method of working in a specific method becomes protocol. Municipalities may follow protocol, but see it as a bureaucratic hinder for them before they can enable their plans.
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5.1.3 Game-like interactions
The name of the game or established conduct between network participants is strongly related to the municipalities’ ability to form collaborations and alter the degree of dependence between partners towards interdependence. As a basis for game-like interactions, there is a need for willingness and ability for it to start to take place. Many municipalities have faith in other network members’ abilities, and actively try to build trust for their network’s members by displaying that they have willingness and ability as well. The Informant in interview 2 put it this way when asked how the municipality was working to making sure effected parties are heard in cases they are working on: “…we put in an ad in the paper where we made it public that we had started to make shortcuts. Soon after we had a lot of new calls where actors wondered if we could improve their shortcuts as well. So, I think that the engagement is there and that we have worked in such a manner that we manage to handle these small projects, even with a limited administration, in such a manner that we can act upon the inquiry of other actors. As when students ask for bi-cycle parking for the schools, we answer: “yes, that we can do”. And not just after five years, but immediately. So, I think that this project in total is an involvement project in itself” (Interview B).
Rules of conduct seem understood between the network members in the entire sample. Agreements are mainly solidified by trust, and in cases where more formal agreements are needed, participants in the network have a mutual understanding of the necessity. “…and to be
frank, to put up something like a contract in these cases would not be appropriate, and would probably scare potential partners off working with us,” (Interview 8).
5.1.4 A significant degree of autonomy from the state
There are a few findings of collaborations were the municipality has given the collaborating partner self-control to solve the project without too much involvement. One example was found in a project of making the public aware of new bi-cycle paths in a municipality: “The sports center I mentioned has also done a spectacular job. We merely pitched the idea of them hosting a weekly bi-cycle trips and they have taken care of it from there. We fund the trips a little bit and there is no charge to join on these trips. It is great for us because they show off the new bike paths and it gets the word of mouth going. And it is great for them as they get good exposure for their gym,”
30 (Interview 8). However, overall, the municipalities are quite involved in most of the collaborations discovered in the research. As the municipalities are the principal agent in the local environmental network, it is to be expected that they are quite involved as well, but there is potential for the municipalities to facilitate more and control less. 5.2 Characteristics of appropriate public involvement 5.2.1 Planning goals
In most projects, there is a large degree of public involvement in the planning phase. The municipalities are quite good at including the public when they need local knowledge to make sure that their solutions are adapted to have a greater impact. The projects of the sample studied are mostly of a nature involving local environmental, social, and economic impacts, and a high degree of public involvement is warranted to optimise solutions. There are examples were the level of public involvement is low and this will be leading to extra work in the future: “I think we could have been better at gathering information before the bi-cycle paths were built in the first place. There are some patches that I think we should have look more into rebuilding, and more information could have given us a hint of that. However, now we are at a point where we receive that kind of information from the public and in our next phase we will look into upgrading the roads I just mentioned as well as try to be better at receiving information,” (Interview 8). 5.2.2 Nature of planning problems An appropriate degree of public involvement is highly dependent on the nature of processes that are going to be planned. To make an assessment of what degree of public involvement is appropriate, it is important to find the complexity of the problems and see if involving more participants can help solve them. There are some problems that become complex because they require value judgement to prioritise funding on certain areas. The municipalities take in appropriate feedback from the public in these cases, and as a representative from the County Council said, people in general have a shared value judgement in this regard: “They need to be, in
order to minimize failure. It is an agreement that locations with greater population gets some more attention,” (Interview 4). In projects where planning problems are complex because they
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require knowledge - information of travel patterns, etcetera - the municipalities mostly include more participants as well.
Lack of involvement includes all problems that could have been solved with greater involvement of other parties. Examples of this can be lack of competence in a field and not having knowledge about the public’s desired solution. Too much involvement includes all problems that could have been solved with less involvement from the public. Examples of this can be process delays and incompletion. In cases where municipalities collaborate with the county, the process is almost always slow, which show that cross government collaboration may delay implementation time. However, between government faction, the process of working together in order to secure quality in the implementation seemed worked in and all parties seem to expect projects to have a certain extended time-frame. This results in problems from delays being limited. I saw an issue of delays in a collaboration project between a Municipality, a private company and the County. “In this project, they contribute with financial means that match our contribution. We also got the State to match the numbers, which amounted up to close to one million kroner for this project... …It has taken a few years for us to get the financing, unfortunately. We are not that fast that way, but luckily the same people in Aspilin Ramm are still there and still have the same wish as they did back then,” (Interview 2). The nature of the problem was not complex, and a large degree of involvement was not needed, but the problem was funding and the framework for getting funding. This led, in this case, to too much involvement. The company contacted their municipality in hopes of working together on a project to freshen up a bi-cycle path to the train station, but the project was halted after the municipality wanted to involve the County for extra financing. At this point it is not sure if the collaboration will go through, but as the informant said: they are lucky, because the company still has the same wish.
Too much involvement is often the nature of problems stuck in gridlocks. Several municipalities mention projects where they are waiting for a decision from the County before they can take further actions. An informant explained that this was not an uncommon thing: “It’s
32 that must be coordinated. We have an example her in this municipality where we have for a long time have been on stand-by with concern for a new ramp on Europe Road 1. … It creates a void in this case because we don’t quite know where the new ramp will be located. Then it’s not relevant to use money on that stretch either,” (Interview 1). 5.2.3 Number of participants The number of participants is important to measure, to understand the ability, and to include different interests and needs. It is important that the number of participants is relevant and diverse.
All the interviewed municipalities show great contact with schools, kindergartens and sports facilities. It seemed to be a worked in process to include these parties in planning processes. In other less obvious projects, the municipalities differ in the way they include partners. There are, however, some municipalities that try to extensively find parties that have an interest in projects they are working on. Some municipalities have made use of campaigns through media to reach out to parties that are less obvious. “…we put in an ad in the paper where we made it public that we had started to make shortcuts. Soon after we had a lot of new calls where actors wondered if we could improve their shortcuts as well,” (Interview 2). 5.2.4 Potential for participant learning Involvement throughout a process can generate greater understanding of the decisions taken and is more important in cases of complex nature that limit the public to take part of the process. This is demanding on both time and resources and it is therefore not appropriate in smaller cases. As the bi-cycle strategy is not one of the municipalities’ greatest responsibility, findings of this strategy have not been found often. However, elements of it have been found in many municipalities. Media are the tool used for teaching the public of cases where public involvement is needed or wanted. One Municipality sticks out in the work of teaching its public about bi-cycle to a greater degree than the rest. “We have a motto: ‘The youngest first’. We think you have to
start early or start with the youngest so that they obtain good habits of biking. And to get running-bikes into kindergartens allows for many of them to know how to bi-cycle when they start in school. Because not all parents have the interest to teach their kids to bike, and more and more
33 people are not living in places where there are any bi-cycle opportunities and can teach their kids how to bike,” (Interview 2). 5.2.5 Integrity, willingness and commitment of participants The interview candidates all seem in agreement that the integrity of their collaboration partners is high. The interviews suggest that there is an understanding towards prioritizing areas with denser population before areas with lower population. Distance from central locations seems also to be accepted as a reason for prioritization. The acceptance of this shows great integrity among the participants. Self-interest is put second to reasoning of serving more people through a system of prioritization. The wide acceptance of this may be because of the district-policy revealed in interview number 4: “This being said, Norway has always had a district-policy that works with development of smaller places as well,” (Interview 4). Despite not being prioritized, there is a feeling of being taken care of and that not being part of the common good doesn’t mean being left behind. Furthermore, the interviewees have not found any struggles of finding participants willing to help plan better solutions. Reaching out to the public does not come by itself, but the effort is very limited. Municipalities that do reach out to the public, do so by help of media, questionnaires and holding stands that ask a few questions. The level of commitment depends more on how well the municipality includes the participants in the process, but for those well included, high commitment is suggested. This shows most commonly in schools, sports organizations and interest organizations. 6 Discussion 6.1 Findings This research has studied two essentials needs for local government to conduct governance in their environmental work. Firstly, I will discuss local government’s ability to work with partners and secondly, the available partners’ ability to work with local government.
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6.1.1 The ability of local government to collaborate with partners
The local government’s ability to conduct environmental governance is greatly influenced by their ability to create collaborations of interdependence. Especially for the principal agents of a network, it is important not to be dependent on other parties of the network, as it limits the ability to steer collaborations in a functioning and unified way. Municipalities are supposed to be the principal agents for environmental work in their own municipality, but they are greatly influenced by regional government nonetheless. I have therefore looked closer on this dynamic to see if this reduces the ability to conduct local environmental governance. Findings show that for some municipalities, this power-dynamic creates problems for local governance to be initiated by the municipality. In one case, the municipality displayed signs of not possessing the responsibility of being the principal agent in the environmental work and this greatly reduces the effort of that municipality. However, in the rest of the study, municipalities showed ownership of their role as a principal agent. For these municipalities, dependence on the collaboration with the County ranged from independent, dependent and interdependent. Independence from the County is not ideal as the municipalities do not take advantage of available resources, but this type of relationship was only displayed when smaller projects were studied. In smaller, non-complex projects, a smaller number of participants can be warranted in order to ensure efficiency.
Dependency on the County has been discovered to be problematic for some of the municipalities studied. This mostly consists of insecurity of funding and a time-frame which limits their ability to steer the direction of the work in the way they desire. The larger part of the sample has, however, displayed signs of working in interdependence with the County Council. They make use of the resources that are available through collaboration and show independence when resources are not provided. Most interestingly, municipalities that show signs of being able to form collaborations of interdependence with non-state actors, also manage to do this with the regional government. This shows that the political framework in not necessarily the factor that limits some municipalities, but rather that it is the ability to form collaborations where resources and competence are coordinated to work together towards a common goal.
