Keywords

1 Introduction

People and landscapes are intimately connected from local to global scales. What we do, collectively as a world population, has impact on the Earth at a planetary scale (Steffen et al., 2015). These global interconnections necessitate policy goals and management that are matched in scale and reach. The adoption of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (UN Resolution 70/1, 2015) by the United Nations General Assembly, which includes the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), is the first international attempt to create a common framework for further dialogue on and implementation of global sustainability. Of the 17 global SDGs, seven are directly linked to natural environments and the values they represent for human wellbeing.Footnote 1

Besides the strong link to society-nature interactions and the value of nature for human societies, the SDGs are explicitly aimed at a global scale. The formulation of global goals that the international community agrees upon is relatively new and the identification and targeting of sustainable development at a global scale resonates with recent scholarship in sustainability science. Using a number of ideas and concepts – like “the Anthropocene” (Pálsson, 2020; Steffen et al., 2007, 2011), “social-ecological systems” (Folke et al., 2002, 2005; Ostrom, 2009), “earth system” (Lui et al., 2007); and “planetary” or “earth stewardship” (Steffen et al., 2011) – this literature emphasizes that human societies and nature are interconnected and interdependent at a global scale.

But, the realization of the SDGs, or any other global agenda, depends on institutions that are targeting people and places at lower scales, i.e. national, regional or local levels. “Localization” is a term explicitly used by the UN for tools to operationalize the SDGs at such scales, many initiated or supported by the World Organization of United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG)Footnote 2 and the Local2030 platform.Footnote 3 Localizing the SDGs is a critical element of success for sustainable development at global scales (Delgado-Serrao & Ramos, 2015).

In this chapter, we consider how efforts to achieve the SDGs materialise for Norwegian marine and coastal zones. Knowledge of these efforts are of great value, because marine coastlines and seas have high ecological value and are under growing pressure from increased human activity and exemplify the relevance of all the 17 SDGs. Moreover, the literature on SDGs includes very few examples from the Nordic context. This means that examples and lessons learned are not easily accessible to planners in Norway (Lundberg et al., 2020).

In what follows we review a selection of marine and coastal landscapes of Norway, in four management cases (Fig. 27.1) related to national, regional and municipal localization of the SDGs. To identify important social and ecological interrelations that shape the process of localization of the SDGs in these cases we will use Oström’s Social-Ecological System, and to this framework we now turn.

Fig. 27.1
figure 1

A map of the Norwegian marine and costal management cases we compare in this chapter: (a) Management plan of the Barents Sea, (b) Management plan for the Norwegian Sea, (c) Management plan for the North Sea, (d) Central Spitsbergen management plan, (e) Raet National Park, partly managed by Arendal Municipality. The municipalities are indicated with stars.

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2 Social-Ecological Systems and Localization

The SDGs, in their breadth and diversity, underscore the interrelations among nature and ecosystems, humans and institutions. To conceptualise these interrelations, we use a systems approach to highlight feedback between natural systems and human systems. Within the various complex systems approaches and frameworks, Ostrom’s Social-Ecological Systems (SES) (Ostrom, 2007, 2009) is particularly suited for studies of localization of SDGs, since it pays explicit attention to the role and function of institutions (Fig. 27.2). The development of the SES framework was motivated by the need for a systems approach, highlighting that it is not enough to look at institutions in a vacuum because they need to be related (or considered) in their wider social and ecological context. Our perspective is that Ostrom’s SES framework offers a comprehensive tool through which to capture the ecological and social complexities of coastal and marine areas, and the ways in which institutions try to intervene in these complexities. The SES framework is for these reasons the theoretical fundament for our study. For each of the cases outlined in this chapter, we apply an adapted version of the Ostrom SES framework.

Fig. 27.2
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A simplified Social-Ecological System diagram. Abbreviations of the system components are in grey boxes. The four main tiers (Resource Units, Resource Systems, Governance Systems, and Users) are indicated with boxes, and examples of each tier component are italicized. Arrows indicate interaction direction. (Adapted from Ostrom (2007, 2009))

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To begin, any SES is characterized by perpetual feedback among the components. For instance, within the Governance system the law shapes institutions, and these institutions enable and limit the actions of Users of the Resource system and its Units (Fig. 27.2; Ostrom, 2007, 2009). In turn, actions of the Users shape the Governance system. Thus, the cycle continues as the Governance system gradually moulds the Resource system according to our uses and needs and vice versa.

Localization of the SDGs in a marine or coastal area gives scale and scope to an SES. Localizing SDGs in an SES framework means to fully describe the local system in order to understand the systems aspects of Ostrom’s social-ecological topography. The SDGs apply across sectors and SES connects the SDGs to the relevant interactions and outcomes. In Fig. 27.3, we expand the traditional SES diagrams (Ostrom, 2007, 2009) by replicating the SES framework for three institutional scales: local, regional and national.

Fig. 27.3
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Organizational map over the three Norwegian EBM Ocean Plans in the Barents Sea, Norwegian Sea and North Sea regions. Light grey boxes represent the three EBM Ocean Plans. Overlayed darker grey boxes show the abbreviation of the applied Social-Ecological System, with reference to Fig. 27.2. Solid arrows indicate the communication among committees and groups. Hashed arrows indicate connections of the three adjacent ecosystems (see Fig. 27.1)

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To exemplify localization of the SDGs at the Norwegian national, regional and local level scales of marine and coastal planning, we have selected four sites and described the relevant management purpose. An aim of our study is to test the use of SES in localizing SDGs by mapping the sites main attributes according to Ostoms’s Social-Ecological System framework (Table 27.1). The mapping illustrates the contextuality and complexity in localizing SDGs in a SES framework, requiring thorough understanding of the relevant system and its sustainability challenges. Further, in facilitating localization of the SDG, we ask if academic interaction is a way forward, illustrated by interaction in the Andøy Municipality.

Table 27.1 Summary of the four case studies using Ostrom’s Social-Ecological System (SES) framework
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3 Localizing at the National and Regional Marine and Coastal Management Level

3.1 Background: Coastal and Marine Planning in Norway

Coastal zones, as hot spots of high human pressure and activity, exemplify the relevance of all the 17 SDGs. Coastal landscapes intersect Life on land (SDG 15) and Life below water (SDG14). In Norway, land-use planning, integrated coastal zone planning, and not least, marine or maritime spatial planning are all instruments that aim for trans-border management of different economic sectors.

Planning is a public process of analysing and allocating the spatial and temporal distribution of human activities in areas to achieve ecological, economic, and social objectives that have usually been specified through a political process.Footnote 4 Norway has adopted several planning acts, such as the Norwegian Land-Use Planning ActFootnote 5 that is, with few excemptions, cross-sectoral, as municipal land-use plans are political guidelines for planning across sectors. Coastal planning is delegated to the municipal level and is legally binding for future land use. The legislation aims for sustainable development but there is no mention of the SDGs. Norway, which is not a member of the European Union but is a member of the European Economic Area (EEA) agreement, has implemented the EU Water Framework Directive (EU, 2000)Footnote 6 but abstained from the Marine Strategy Framework DirectiveFootnote 7 and the Maritime Spatial Planning Directive.Footnote 8

Norway has signed the Oslo/Paris convention (for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the North-East Atlantic, OSPAR) and the Convention for Biological Diversity and other international instruments of relevance for nature protection. These agreements become most relevant in planning for special natural site that include the Arctic territory of Svalbard and the oceanic Ecosystem-Based Management Plans outlined in the next section.

3.2 Localizing at the National Level-Integrated Ecosystem-Based Management Ocean Plans in Norway

Norway has jurisdiction and management responsibility for one of the world’s most productive coastal and oceanic ecosystems. The Ecosystem-Based Management (EBM) Ocean Plans were officially established to safeguard marine ecosystems and long-term value creation, to ensure that activities in the area do not threaten natural resources or opportunities for future value creation (Ministry of the Environment, 2014–2015). Goals were set for biological diversity, economic value creation, pollution, seafood safety, and acute oil pollution risk (Olsen et al., 2007). An underlying aim was to reconcile petroleum development with environmental concerns and fisheries (Olsen et al., 2016).

The strength of the Norwegian EBM Ocean Plans are the cross-sectoral committees, offering communication and direct discussions between scientists and managers from a wide range of agencies (Hoel & Olsen, 2010). Each meeting includes scientific presentations improving holistic understanding of social-ecological complexity. But the EBM Ocean Plans have no legislative standing (Hoel & Olsen, 2010). The laws regulating human activities are split between sectors (petroleum, fisheries, environment, shipping). Keeping the regulations within each sector allows for efficiently implementing regulations but counteract inter-related considerations (Hoel & Olsen, 2010). Each agency makes decisions that are not always in line with the ecosystem-based approach. The SDGs were briefly introduced, but not integrated, in the EBM Ocean Plan 2020 update.

3.3 Localizing at the Regional Level, Svalbard and Raet National Park

The Management Plan of Central Spitsbergen builds on the main goal of conservation of Svalbard’s distinctive Arctic wilderness nature through the Norwegian Svalbard policy, cf. No. 32 (2015–2016). The Governor emphasizes that the precautionary principle outlined in the Nature Diversity Act of Norway (2009) is used as a basis for administration of the management plan. At the same time, the government of Svalbard wants to open up for Innovation Norway and the Research Council of Norway to be able to support new establishments and development of projects in Longyearbyen to a greater extent. However, neither the SDGs, nor Coastal zone management planning is addressed in these overall documents, although holistic planning is the main goal.Footnote 9 The EEA agreement does not apply for Svalbard, and the Water Framework Directive is thus not implemented.

An example of localization of the SDGs through regional processes is the development of Raet National Park along the southeast coast of Norway, in Agder County. Raet coastal area was first established as a landscape protected area regulated in the overall spatial plan in Arendal Municipality. In 2013, the Governor of Agder County (the state’s representative in local counties, responsible for monitoring the decisions set out by the Storting and government) and the mayors in the adjacent municipalities agreed to start the process of regulating it as an intermunicipal national park. More than 60 organizations, business actors, landowners, and farmers participated in the process. In November 2016, Raet National Park was regulated according to the Norwegian Biodiversity Act. Raet is also anchored in coordinated municipal spatial plans, and further managed according to the establishment of the “Blue Growth Agder”Footnote 10 collaboration. Innovation and business opportunities are addressed through a holistic and knowledge-based approach, building on co-creation with the Institute of Marine Research, the Norwegian Institute for Water Research (NIVA), Grid Arendal and the University of Agder, guiding and motivating entrepreneurs to development and innovation for greater utilization of marine resources in a way that reduces the risk of negative environmental consequences. Arendal is now being certified as a sustainable tourist destination according to Innovation Norway and UN indicator regulations.

These sites and analyses demonstrate that the Norwegian municipalities in Raet National Park have underscored the importance of co-production of resource management plans across multiple sectors and multiple knowledge holders (classified as Users, in Fig. 27.3) when it comes to localizing the SDGs. Even though the planning work that took place in Central Spitsbergen could have addressed ways to act on the SDGs the actual work started later. The Local Council in Longyearbyen started the implementation of the UN’s sustainability goals through adopting “From global goals to local action in Longyearbyen” into the “Planning Strategy 2020–2023”. Participation from the local community and the Longyearbyen local council enabled the preparation of strategies for achieving the SDGs and implementation of concrete measures that support the goals.Footnote 11

It is striking that the EBM Ocean Plans do not include integration of the SDGs. But at the national level in Norway, the different ministries have divided the SDGs among themselves and according to their specific mandates. Thus, there is a lack of cross-sectoral understanding of the goals at the national level (Lundberg et al., 2020) which is evident in the EBM plans. The EBM Ocean Plans are developed in uneven cyclic phases. Systematic delay may not explain the lack of inclusion of SDGs, as they are still not part of the preparations for the next EBM Ocean Plan revision. Otherwise, we recognize that the temporalities of the Governance System affect localization: municipalities in Norway plan in cycles of four years12 which could cause delays in implementing new values and policy goals. The last local election was in 2019, making 2020 the year for developing new planning strategies in the municipalities. Already in 2019, we saw some of the SDGs reflected in national planning guidelines (required under the Land-Use Planning Act Section 6-1), guidelines for the years 2019–2023 (Ministry of Local Government and Modernization, 2019). But due to the time lags of local election and planning strategy processes, we see an urgent role for academic interactions. (Fig. 27.4). This observation is also shared by the Norwegian status report of SDG localization (Lundberg et al., 2020) and Leal Filho et al. (2020). This leads us to our last site, Andøy Municipality where members of the author team are testing academic interaction as means for fueling localizing SDGs.

Fig. 27.4
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The local SES framework (shown in white boxes with light grey arrows, see Fig. 27.1) contextualized with the local Andøy Muncipality case of sustainable coastal development. The academic interaction of Dankel et al. (Sect. 27.4, this chapter) and its outcomes indicated in the grey boxes and the solid black arrows indicate interactions that resulted from these

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4 Localizing the SDGs at the Local Level with an Academic Interaction Within Andøy Municipality

4.1 Background

The cases of marine and coastal planning management in Sect. 27.3 show that the SDGs are of national concern in Norway but that little is happening at lower scales of governance. In this section, we focus on field data from Andøy Municipality to begin to explore how broader localization can occur.

In a project funded by the Research Council of Norway,Footnote 12 an interdisciplinary interest in localizing the SDGs in the ecological-cultural heritage sites of Lofoten, Vesterålen and Senja led to the unique case of Andøy Municipality (Andøy Kommune). The municipality of Andøy is located in the archipelago in Nordland county in the north of Norway (population 4588 personsFootnote 13). The region is known for its role in the traditional Northeast Arctic cod fishery, an annual million-dollar industry, and for its whale and sea bird safaris that attract international tourism. The Andøya military Air Station also has had an important presence in the community since 1957, as well as the Andøya Space rocket range since 1962.

4.2 New Developments for Andøya

In 2018, the Andøya Space started planning for an expansion to their facility, which is designed to be Europe’s first launch base for commercial satellites. Another significant development in the island municipality is the innovation-based salmon producer Andfjord Salmon AS, which is building a large-scale recirculation aquation system for a land-based production of approximately 10,000 tons of Norwegian salmon per year. Traditionally, the production in Norway has been sea-based, but environmental challenges, particularly in relation to seal lice contamination to wild salmon, hinders further growth in sea-based salmon production. And lastly, to promote education-based tourism on the island, the municipality is building a world-class museum and cultural centre called “The Whale”, which is scheduled for completion in 2023.

These three ambitious development plans for the small area of Andøya coincide with a closure of the military Air Station. In 2016, it was decided to relocate the Andøya military Air Station, a civilian and military airport that is the workplace for more than 300 people on the island. The loss of the military workplace, and the national trend of population emigration from the rural districts of Norway to larger cities (Leknes & Løkken, 2020), has created a challenging situation for Andøy Municipality. The socio-economic predictions for the municipality are population loss of 87 persons by 2030 and 253 persons by 2050 (Statistics Norway, Leknes & Løkken, 2020). As a result, these three projects have the potential to add to the reverse of this trend with their projected growth being around 500 new employees.

4.3 How Can Sustainable Development Be Localized for Andøy Muncipality?

The first part of a so-called academic interaction consisted of a series of qualitative interviews with representatives of local businesses starting in January 2020. Through these interviews, it became clear that these businesses struggled to understand the full implications of the SDGs, beyond using them in a superficial way:

You can say sustainable as much as you like and you can have the SDG pictures, it’s a nice downloadable file so you can put it basically anywhere and just say…of course we’re going to be sustainable. But if you don’t really mean it then it’s just advertising. (Interviewee 5, Stakeholder Interview, 3:39, 2020-11-23, Zoom)

This problem is compounded by the fact Norwegian businesses do not have any clear strategic plan from the government on how the SDGs could, and should, be incorporated into businesses. Much like how the struggle of implementation rests with individual countries for the SDGs themselves, businesses are expected to find their own way of incorporating the SDGs. Given the complex and, at times, contradictory nature of the SDGs, this can stop efforts before they even begin:

I think because for many businesses, they struggle to understand how to work with sustainability and how to incorporate it in their business. (Interviewee 1, Stakeholder Interview, 2020-11-16, Zoom)

These results point to the need for clear and comprehensive guidelines for local businesses to begin exploring what the SDGs might look like in their business plans. Andøy municipality recently established a restructuring programme (SAMSKAP) that grants funding to innovation-based projects and businesses in the municipality. The general aim of the programme is to encourage social and economic growth on the island, but it has also adopted an unofficial role of integrating the SDGs into local businesses. For instance, the application for funding from SAMSKAP requires applicants to describe which specific SDGs their businesses relate to or will help achieve. While this is not a major factor for bringing the SDGs to Andøya, it does illustrate a certain awareness of the municipality on the SDGs and an attempt on their part to influence local development to be more in line with the SDGs.

4.4 Next Steps Towards Localization of the SDGs: Example from Andøya

Cross-sectoral localization of the SDGs is the focus of the next stages of the academic interaction in Andøya. Detailed mapping of the social-ecological system of Andøya, further refined with a social network analysis of key actors on the island, feeds into the development of a method called “SDG Target Relevance-Tracing” which we have prototyped with the three actors involved in major development projects on the island of Andøya. To achieve this, first a meeting was held with each representative User to determine which of the 169 SDG targets were relevant for each business. A map where the common targets across these three Users was shared. Finally, a multi-stakeholder workshop was moderated to discuss local synergies among the identified common goals that could be put into play at the municipal level. It was clear that this academic interaction on localizing the SDGs was a necessary step; the multi-stakeholder workshop was the first meeting of these local representatives. The result of the workshop was an understanding of the clear commonalities of SDG Targets each of these unique businesses have. The stakeholders agreed that speaking with one voice, instead of three separate voices, in regards to preferences in prioritization of municipal decisions based on the SDG Targets is a wise strategy. And finally, the stakeholders acknowledged their new awareness of not just their own relevant sustainability targets, but also how much overlap these relevant, localized, SDG Targets among the other stakeholders there is. This gives a solid foundation for further interactions at the local level.

5 Conclusion: Steps Forward for Systems Thinking and Localizing the SDGs

In this chapter, we have reviewed how a selection of marine and coastal landscapes of Norway, illustrated by four cases, grapple with the realisation of global sustainability as put forward in the SDGs. Marine coastlines are under growing pressure from increased human activity and exemplify the relevance of all the 17 SDGs. Sector-based and divisive management approaches in Norway have implications for SDG localization. Divisive management approaches will only keep affecting small pieces of the SES system. Further, the lack of national drivers for localizing SDGs, in combination with inherent time lags in the management system, makes localizing progressing slowly.

From a local-to-global approach we need mechanisms that help bridge sectors in order to become truly holistic. Without a common strategy for all sectors at all governance scales (national, regional, and local), sustainability efforts for each of the 17 goals will remain fragmented with minimal impact. Putting this in terms of Ostrom’s framework, sectorisation among the Users and Resource units and lack of holistic perspectives highlights a general problem for management within the Governance system.Footnote 14We find that using Ostrom’s Social-Ecological Systems framework allowed us to identify important social and ecological interrelations that shape the process of localization of the SDGs in these four examples. The case of Raet National Park illustrates that the Norwegian management system is flexible enough to facilitate localization of the SDGs through co-production of resource management plans across multiple sectors and multiple knowledge holders. Localizing with academic interactions in Andøya is work in progress, but has already proven as a complementary way forward.

These experiences of localizing SDGs are also relevant in other parts of the world, although the impacts of national, regional and local governance systems always need to be contextualised. As pointed out by several international reports, the need for strengthened localization process frameworks in order to reach the SDGs are increasing rapidly.Footnote 15 But considering the ever-shortening timeline of Agenda 2030 and the earliest systematic local planning not expected until after the Norwegian local elections in 2023, localization of the SDGs might turn out as a venture both urgent and overdue.