Sustainable Planning and Environmental Assessment Knowledge

More specifically, the project aimed to:

• identify and analyze obstacles and deficiencies of environmental assessments in contemporary planning practice,
• identify pathways that can support spatial planning that meets the provisions of the Swedish Environmental Code regarding the promotion of environmental considerations in projects, plans and programs,
• generate proposals that could be used in developing the planning system and it's applications in strategic environmental assessment of plans and programmes and in environmental impact assessment of projects.

The following questions were addressed in the research program:

•  How is planning carried out in practice in relation to legislation?
•  Why are there descrepancies between practice and legislation?
•  What can be done about such descrepancies?
•  What can learned from planning systems in other countries?

The research team applied a critical approach towards today's practice and prevailing perceptions, so as to identify impediments and shortcomings in the application of environmental assessment which adversely affects ongoing efforts to advance towards the environmental quality objectives. This refers not only to discrepancies between the general goals of EA and the legislative framework on one hand and the contemporary practice on the other hand, but also to the existence of power relations and communities of practice which undermine the planning and decision making processes.

To cope with the inherent complexity of the research questions, different theoretical concepts were merged with a broad empirical analysis to achieve a comprehensive understanding of role and impact of environmental assessment in Swedish planning and decision making. In addition, the project contributed to the theory building by combining theories of power and communities of practice which is a novel approach to the research society within EA and planning.