Organizational learning in regional governance: A study of the Arctic Council

The study evaluates the Arctic Council's ability to function as a learning organization. It finds that while the Council successfully bridged local and global policy on persistent organic pollutants (POPs), it has struggled to reframe its role and structure to effectively address climate change and the social impacts of extractive industries. The authors argue that 'governance fit' should be viewed as an organization's capacity for learning and adaptation rather than a fixed match between the scale of a problem and the scope of the governing body.

• The Arctic Council successfully acted as a bridging organization for persistent organic pollutants (POPs) by linking Arctic-specific vulnerabilities to global policy, contributing to the 2001 Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants.
• Organizational learning regarding POPs led the Arctic Council to recognize that long-range transport was not the only source of contamination; this resulted in the 2000 Arctic Council Action Plan to Eliminate Pollution of the Arctic and the subsequent creation of the Arctic Contaminants Action Program (ACAP) in 2006 to address local sources.
• Despite the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (ACIA) integrating Indigenous Knowledge and broader expertise, the Arctic Council has struggled with 'double-loop learning' regarding climate change, continuing to frame mitigation as a global rather than a regional responsibility.
• The Arctic Council has effectively addressed the environmental risks of oil and gas, leading to the Agreement on Cooperation on Marine Oil Pollution Preparedness and Response in the Arctic, but it has largely ignored the social impacts of extractive industries and the issue of mining.
• The current organizational structure of the Arctic Council, which organizes knowledge networks within specific working groups, creates obstacles to including new perspectives and integrating natural and social sciences.
• The authors propose that the concept of 'governance fit' should be redefined as the organizational capacity for learning and adaptation to new challenges, rather than the search for an ideal spatial scale or scope of governance.

APA

Nilsson, A. E., Meek, C. L., Amundsen, H., III, F. S. C., Hovelsrud, G. K., Kofinas, G., McLennan, D., Koivurova, T., Prior, T., & Sommerkorn, M. (2016). Organizational learning in regional governance: A study of the Arctic Council. Stockholm Environment Institute. https://www.sei.org/mediamanager/documents/Publications/SEI-WP-2016-14-OrganizationalLearningArcticCouncil.pdf

Chicago

Nilsson, Annika E., Chanda L. Meek, Helene Amundsen, F. Stuart Chapin III, Grete K. Hovelsrud, Gary Kofinas, Donald McLennan, et al. Organizational learning in regional governance: A study of the Arctic Council. Stockholm Environment Institute, 2016. https://www.sei.org/mediamanager/documents/Publications/SEI-WP-2016-14-OrganizationalLearningArcticCouncil.pdf.

Wikipedia

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BibTeX

@techreport{nilsson2016organizational, author = {Nilsson, Annika E. and Meek, Chanda L. and Amundsen, Helene and III, F. Stuart Chapin and Hovelsrud, Grete K. and Kofinas, Gary and McLennan, Donald and Koivurova, Timo and Prior, Tahnee and Sommerkorn, Martin}, title = {{Organizational learning in regional governance: A study of the Arctic Council}}, institution = {Stockholm Environment Institute}, year = {2016}, month = nov, url = {https://www.sei.org/mediamanager/documents/Publications/SEI-WP-2016-14-OrganizationalLearningArcticCouncil.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }