Green transition in Lejre: from a vision and narrative to a collaborative project

Green transition cannot be achieved without the involvement of actors, institutions and processes at all governance levels from local to global. This paper investigates how in addressing green transition and climate change, a vision and narrative developed into a collaborative project in a small geographical in Denmark, specifically in Lejre Municipality. Based on a public documents and a series of interviews, the study specifically, shows how public and private actors developed partnerships and collaborations which turned a vision into specific practices at the local level. These collaborations among local actors represent social innovations that enable and sustainable technological and policy solutions that combine economic (jobs), social (community building) and environmental (healthy and climate friendly food production and consumption) dimensions. However, this process is not always straightforward and often requires the engagement of certain actors who act as facilitators and boundary spanners, at least at the initial stages.

Theoretically the paper combines collaborative governance and transition theory. Collaborative Governance provides the necessary analytical tools to understand the type of actors and institutions involved in the steering process and their interactions as well as the collaborative practices in order to achieve effective outcomes. Transition theory complements this analysis by enabling to unfold the link between the steering process (top-down, horizontal and bottom-up) with the socio-technical innovations and ‘cognitive routines in a community’ as well as patterns of technological trajectories’ that connect societal aspects (e.g. gender and social inclusion) to technology led solutions.

The paper adopts a single case study research design and thus it does not aim to lead to generalisations. However, it enables us to go in depth and identify the challenges involved in green transition responses at the local level, as not all actors have the same resources and interests (e.g. organic vs conventional farmers). Moreover, this study helps us develop hypotheses in order to test relevant theoretical concepts in other contexts and cases.