The Swedish Response

In Swedish government there's a local level, there are regional or state governments, there's a national government. How does one achieve the cooperation between these levels of government? Is that part of the challenge? You're suggesting that people have to change the way they live at the local level. What is the synergy between these different levels of government?

First of all, all people are living on the local level, which means that the local level is a political level: you have elections to the local level. You need to you have connections in policy between the local level, the regional level (which is the state level), and the national level, which is also a state level. We don't have so much discussion on the local level in Sweden, in general -- if [we did] we couldn't do it, [and] everyone thinks it's an important thing.

We look on other environmental problems [as a comparison]. It's much more simple for me to say to the authorities that "You have to do something about that plant because it's noisy," but [with climate change] you have to do something with my way of living. And that is, of course, something new. [I] cannot, as a single person, ask the government or different authorities on different levels to do anything against me. I have to do something myself. That is the challenge.

So, there's a subtle quality to the elements of this problem that transcend what we're used to: "Okay, we'll make a regulation, we'll say that we have to control what comes out of the smokestack of the industrial plant," and so on. This goes back to what you were saying earlier, that consensus is very important. There has to be an agreement across parties, which presumably is reflected in their constituencies, that things have to change.

It's extremely important that you have consensus in the whole society. You have it also, all these different stakeholders, [like] the business community. There has to be consensus with them, so the message is clear and people understand why, for example, the price of petrol is increasing.

What is the typical Swedish citizen like in this regard? Are they resistant or do they come on board with this process? The case of the United States is that they're resistant until they have effective leadership, and maybe that isn't enough. Are the citizens of Europe easier to convince on these issues than -- I won't ask you to attack the United States, but other countries in other parts of the world?

It's difficult. For Sweden, my EPA has done some studies since we were asked to run a public climate campaign. We used the Gallup Institutes, and we found that about 20 percent of the people know very well about this problem [and] 20 percent don't care. It's interesting, because we can see in other studies of this kind that [the latter] 20 percent is dominated by fairly young male. Of those [20 percent] who take care of the questions and think it's important, it's dominated by women, high educated, forty-plus. Then we have about 60 percent who we say are potential activists if we can awaken them. That's what we're trying to do in our campaign, to wake them up.

I don't know if you have the same figures here or in other countries, but it was very clear that 20 percent of the population, dominated by young men, it's more or less hopeless to try to take them into this business.

Whereas the women constituency might be educable, if they're not already there -- or are they already there?

They are already there.

I see. So, what is the dynamics of the large group, that we would call the swing on this issue? Have you identified the elements of what might move them in the direction of seeing the problem and wanting to change their lifestyle?

Our task was only to tell them that climate change will have an impact on you, but you also have an impact on climate change. Just get out that message. And we managed. In fact, we increased, about doubled the knowledge among this group, about 50 percent to 60 percent of the Swedish population, which means that they know and they are interested. We know that they are asking [the right questions], for example, buying cars in Sweden -- always very much focused on cars going on different type of biofuels, and such things. So, obviously there is a potential in this group. If they know that there is a problem and they have an impact on the problem, they can do something good. I think it's a very important group, the "sleeping activists."

What about children? I guess that would seem to be an important part of any kind of program, actually, to put this in the young people's minds, even in the early grades of school.

Yeah. Of course, we have a different type [of educational system]. They start [learning about this] in school when they are six; even before, in kindergarten, there are all sorts of programs running, especially in some municipalities. They are trained in and learning many things. But we are not sure if they take what they [have learned]. I mean, they can be activists up to 10, 13 years, but we can't say that [when] they follow after that period, when they become 15-16 years, that they really have the same attitude as they had earlier. And that is rather strange. There are several studies looking at that. Of course they know about environmental problems, but the interests of doing something, as small children are very interested in school, up to 10 to 13 years, we don't see that so much when they become 16-17 years old. But this doesn't mean that they're not going to have an education about these issues in schools.

Is that because of consumerism? That it's part of this global society where one wants the products of capitalism?

In fact, I don't know. My feeling is that they are very much individualists, they became that, on one side. But on the other side, they have feelings for the global community. So, it's a new pattern you can see. It's not [about] going into organizations, like I did during the sixties, for environment. [Organizations] are not growing in Sweden; there are other ways for young people to communicate, and so on. They use the Internet and such things.

This may be a stereotype, but I always think of Scandinavian countries as having a longer tradition of being concerned about the environment. Is that correct?

Absolutely, yes.

So, to a certain extent, politicians should be able to use this as a resource, that you're probably starting at a baseline that's much higher than that in the United States.

Oh, yeah. I think this happens in the Nordic countries, especially, yes.

Now let's talk a little about the role of NGOs in building support for these policies. For a number of years, actually, you were involved with the Nature Conservancy in Sweden. Is that correct?

Svenska Naturskyddsföreningen [SNF], Swedish Society for Nature Conservation.

So, how do they further the process? Is it that they are attuned to the academic research on these problems? These are presumably the activists that you talked about, that 20 percent that is already there and needs very little mobilization.

Yeah. I think you'll find many of them. SNF is the biggest environmental NGO in Sweden. The reason I was asked if I could go into that NGO was that they are working very much with facts in close contact with the scientific community. But they are an NGO. From my position now, I think that it is extremely important when you are a government person and running an EPA, as I am, that you have an NGO a little bit ahead of you. You need that so you can challenge the organization and challenge the government, and so on, if you have an NGO ahead of you.

I think the NGOs in Sweden have changed role a lot since we've entered the European Union, because the twenty-five countries in the European Union have different type of problems. Environment is not always on the A list, sometimes not even on the B list.

So, there's a synergy between these nongovernmental organizations and the Swedish government.Is there a synergy between these nongovernmental organizations and similar organizations throughout the EU, or is there such variation in the situation in different countries that that doesn't happen?

They are working. They have a European [Environmental Bureau] -- EEB is the name of it. All the environmental NGOs in the European Union have their own organization in Brussels, and they are looking very closely at what's happening in the European parliament and European Commission. I think it's very important, because as we have talked about, the opinion of the Swedish government and the Swedish parliament about the environment can be very different if you compare to other parliaments outside the European Union in Europe, and you see that in European parliament when they are trying to discuss and take position about different environmental issues.

So, let's look at this relationship with the European Union. It would appear that sometimes, just as you said, the NGOs were ahead of the government. Is there a similar kind of synergy between the European Commission, the European Union, that all European institutions and the governmental institutions in Sweden, so that Europe is sometimes leading Europe, or is it more often the case that Sweden is trying to lead Europe on these issues?

Oh, no, we are not trying to do that. It depends. For example, our prime minister and Tony Blair are working closely together about these climate change issues and environmental technology. And same for other issues, you find other partners. But the Nordic countries are probably those who rank environment highest in Europe. That's my personal feeling.

I think it's interesting, because in middle and especially southern Europe there is a problem with the economic growth, and often the prime ministers and the politicians in middle and south Europe say that it depends on environmental regulations. But the Nordic countries have had a long tradition of environmental regulation, we have a fairly clean environment, but at the same time, our economy is running best -- the Nordic countries' economy is running best in the European Union. So, I think that the environmental regulations is not a constraint for [economic] growth. In fact, there is no empirical support for such a statement.

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