In search of the missing governance object:Climate adaption in Norwegian Aquaculture

Norway is a modern welfare state with a strong institutional structure and well-functioning public service delivery apparatus and scores high in factors that determine adaptive capacity. Nevertheless, several studies indicate a lack of systematic and thorough focus on climate change adaption. The municipal level is considered to have the main responsibility for early and cost-effective climate adaption. However, studies reveal that the adaption activities and climate focus in the municipalities are rather low.Being the world largest salmon producer, it is relevant to ask about the situation in the Norwegian aquaculture industry when it comes to climate adaption. Interestingly, the municipalities play an important role in Norwegian aquaculture, as they are the managers and allocators of new production sites, the main natural resource in marine, cage-based aquaculture. A relevant question is thus; how, and to what extent is climate change relevant knowledge incorporated and translated into the local and national aquaculture policy context?This paper addresses the problems related to the construction of an institutional set up for reception and translation of climate change knowledge into measures relevant for the aquaculture industry. This regime of practice or governmentality, meaning the logics behind a particular way of governing, necessitates a system aimed at including both relevant actors and stakeholders as well as knowledge producers. However, the knowledge related to climate change could be construed as abstract and vague and does not easily lend itself to linear and technical forms of knowledge transfer and utilization in aquaculture.At the national as well as at the local level it is difficult to identify any bounded, certain, and undisputed governance objects related to aquaculture. The climate adaption policy field is poorly institutionalized and lacks the institutional and measurement mechanisms that can supply the policy field with a distinct policy object.

Til publikasjon: https://hdl.handle.net/11250/5069632 | Publiseringsår: 2016 | Tidsskrift: