Collaboration to secure relevance and quality in a study of EIA practise in extractive industries in the Arctic

• Main Authors: Larsen, Sanne Vammen, Hansen, Anne Merrild
• Other Authors: Merrild Hansen, Anne, Ren, Carina
• Format: Book Part
• Language: English
• Published: Routledge 2020
• Subjects: Arctic; Greenland
• Online Access: https://vbn.aau.dk/da/publications/1f3aa833-6bb3-4c4e-9faf-9eb62b2ed70c; https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003030843-6

This chapter introduces stakeholder participation in a research project on the environmental assessment of offshore carbon activities. The project combines traditional research methods, namely document analysis and interviews and collaborative methods in the form of local stakeholder involvement in workshops. The collaborative methods helped to secure the relevance of the analysis and recommendations and created room for mutual exchange and learning, thus enabling local knowledge to inform the project. Collaborative methods also proved valuable in anchoring results locally and supporting a debate on the topics raised. The use of collaborative methods also offers challenges in terms of picking the “right” participants, creating a safe space for collaboration and engaging participants/making them willing to spend precious time. While these challenges are universal for collaborative methods, this chapter discusses their specific manifestation in the context of Greenland and the Arctic.