governance

Governance is a multilevel and multidimensional concept. It brings together regulations, practices, institutions and goals such as sustainability. It includes both public and private governance. It encompasses government hierarchies, networks and governmentality. It is a dynamic notion, an object in constant flux. That is clearly visible in the Arctic, a region undergoing profound environmental, economic and social change, where new actors are coming to the fore and new regulatory frameworks are emerging. No single researcher or a single study can give justice to this richness encompassed within the concept of “Arctic governance”.

Photo: Jouni Porsanger / Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland.

The idea of the Arctic Centre’s Arctic Governance Research Group is to bring together an interdisciplinary and international team of scholars who are researching diverse dimensions of governance in the Arctic. Arctic governance is a multidimensional research object and the interdisciplinary nature of the research group reflects the need for a holistic approach to the research of Arctic governance. Embedded in the overall work of the Arctic Centre, the University of Lapland and of the Lapland University Consortium, the research group aims to generate knowledge that has the potential to provide practical benefits for the people who live in the circumpolar Arctic, but also beyond. Our aim is to render complexity of Arctic governance more transparent and provide policy-makers, scholars and other actors with a more holistic knowledge-base to make better informed and more responsible decisions.

Members of the research group focus on a broad diversity of aspects of governance: international law, Arctic regional cooperation, science-policy interface, Arctic policies, sustainable development, indigenous rights and politics, local and national regulations, as well as private governance. Focus of individual studies is on the Arctic Council, environmental Law, environmental impact assessments, Arctic migration, Arctic tourism, corporate social responsibility and social license to operate, external actors in the Arctic and the European Union in the Arctic.

The research group is led by Prof. Stefan Kirchner.