Policy for Sociotechnical Transition: Implications from Swedish Historical Case Studies

Abstract

In this paper we analyse past sociotechnical transitions, and based on that we discuss the prospects for the central state in promoting radical transitions towards improved sustainability today. The case studies include the sociotechnical systems in Sweden providing for: (a) urban housing; (b) passenger cars as a favoured mode of transport; and (c) piped water/wastewater, all fundamentally transformed over the first seven decades of the twentieth century and especially in the 1940s up until the 1960s. The core lesson from the case studies is that the central state, by taking an active role and by coordinating the roles of different stakeholders, values and knowledge as well as different policy areas and instruments, can accomplish a coherent and effective management of such transition processes. Also in contemporary network governance settings the central state is well suited to accomplish such an active and coordinative role based on its legitimate power to design and implement different public policy instruments.

Keywords:

• Sociotechnical transition
• central state
• Sweden
• twentieth century

Notes

1. The sociotechnical systems that were established in the beginning and mid-twentieth century are now mature and there is an inertia built into them, often hindering and restraining their change (Hughes, 1986). The re-design of the systems is thus a complicated and generally slow process.

2. This article among other things illustrates how the transition from cesspools to sewers in the Netherlands was influenced by the central state through health-related acts and laws, parliamentary inquiries and a general democratization process.

3. These ideas include motoring as a massive force of nature that society has to plan for, as well as the advantages of a distinct division of the modern city.

4. On the passenger car as a structural requirement, see, for example, Jackson and Marks (1999) and Jackson and Papathanasopoulou (2008).

5. The average amount of fuel required for a new passenger car was 26% lower in 2005 compared to 1978. When it comes to the year average price for 95-octane, it was a little bit over SEK 9 in both 1981 and 2003 (in 2003 monetary value), although this period also witnessed substantial price slumps (e.g. in the late 1980s) and price peaks (e.g. during the first few years of the twenty-first century) (SCB, 2003, Figure 403).

6. From less than one million registered passenger cars in 1958 to almost three million registered passenger cars in 1978 (SCB, 2008, Figure 248).

7. Lundin (2008) shows how the Swedish road and planning technical experts of the physical alignment of cities and towns to the car in the 1950s and 1960s tended to equal motoring as an evolving force of nature.

8. The SCAFT standards (‘guidelines for town planning whilst considering traffic safety’) were, for example, published by the Swedish National Planning Agency in cooperation with the Swedish National Road Association in 1968. Six years later, in 1974, the same organizations together with the Swedish National Road Safety Office published a document, ‘Trafiksanering’ (‘Traffic reorganization’), on town planning for traffic safety in central and semi-central parts of the town. Furthermore, in 1982, the same organizations together with the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency published the report ‘TRÅD: Allmänna råd för planering av stadens trafiknät' (‘general advice in planning for the urban traffic network'). A revised version, TRÅD -92, was published a few years later by the same organizations together with the Swedish Association of Local Governments.

9. The neighbourhood unit primarily consisted of multi-story buildings to reach the necessary density. Everyone should live within walking distance from the community centre where schools, child care facilities, shops and assembly halls were situated. In reality, however, commerce early on tended to dominate the public area of the neighbourhood unit at the expense of, for instance, public assembly halls. A central idea of the neighbourhood unit was further that it would strengthen a sense of solidarity among the inhabitants.

10. In comparison with other national systems, the Swedish local planning monopoly has a strong tradition which was strengthened further all the way into the 1980s. The final decision right over land use was granted to Swedish municipalities through the Planning and Building Act of 1987. This is clearly mirrored in a central wording of the law: ‘it is a municipal concern to plan the use of land and water' (first chapter, 2 §, author's translation; see also Strömberg, 2001).

11. Wholesale pricing and establishing control were abolished through ‘the Act of 1953 on countervailing certain cases of restraint of competition' (1953-års lag om motverkande av vissa fall av konkurrensbegränsning, Competition restriction act, KBL) (Franzén & Sandstedt, 1981, p. 251).

12. The all-new Swedish energy policy of the 1970s and 1980s focused on residential heating.

13. HIKP is the coordination of different European measurements for the consumer price index.

14. See also SCB (2005), Table 1.1.1.

15. See also Ivre and Lundevall (1978), Table 34, 6:5 and 6:6.

16. Construction numbers thereafter decreased, but were still relatively high in the 1980s, that is, between 20,000 and 30,000 per year. In the mid-1990s construction numbers decreased significantly due to the financial crisis (and equalled about 3000 per year). Over the first few years of the twenty-first century, the number started to increase again, to about 12,000 houses a year (Lind, 2003; SCB, 2010, Table 1.1.2).

17. The Swedish state had in part communicated a social housing policy through the own-one's-own-home policy already in the first decades of the twentieth century (Almqvist, 2004).

18. The degree of participation in the construction process varied with the size and skills of the public housing company and with the contract form chosen. The larger of the public housing companies, however, typically had their own architectural office and carried through the construction themselves as well as had their own ‘element factories' (see below) (Ramberg, 2000).

19. Arbetsmarknadsstyrelsen—Råneå municipality 17 November 1952 (Luleå municipality, Råneå municipal board, Tekniska nämndens protokoll, VA-anläggningar 1950–1960, F 2:4, Luleå city archive).

20. Public funds for purification works came to an end in the later 1970s with the so-called Government bill of savings (1978–1979, p. 95).

21. The Law on real property in the city (Lag om fastighetsbildning i stad, 1917) stated that property should be developed taking road and water-transport systems into account, and the Act on expropriation (Lag om expropriation, 1917) stated that property may be claimed by expropriation to provide a city with water or to prevent pollution of water mains. Moreover, the WSS was legally reinforced by the Act on the right to lay water mains for household consumption over the land of others (Lag om rätt att över annans mark framdraga ledning för vatten till husbehovsförbrukning, 1918), and, not the least, the Building Act and Building regulations of 1947. The latter explicitly stated that particular attention must be paid to the water and sewage issue, and furthermore, that dense settlements should be prevented from arising in areas which with regards to, for instance, water and sewage issues may be considered unsuitable for such development. There was also the Healthcare Acts of 1919 and 1958, respectively (SFS 1919, p. 566 and SFS 1958, p. 663). In the Healthcare Act of 1919, the tasks of the local health committees were expanded relative to the previous Healthcare Act, and they were now to work for the (preferably public) establishment of WSS in densely populated areas. There is also the Water Act of 1941 (Vattenlagen, section 8:5–7), stating that the construction or alteration of roads, railways, tramways, etc. should take the present, or in future expected, needs of pipes through the road etc. into account. Yet another section in the Water Act of 1941 (section 8:9–16) focuses on compulsory participation in sewer systems, where a community or a property had the right to require: (a) to get connected to the sewer system of a nearby community/property; and (b) that a nearby community/property became connected to one's own sewer system.

22. Other examples include the Regulation for the control of tapped water (Förordningen om kontroll av vatten-ledningsvatten, 1941), which stated that the water origin from a public WSS and used for drinking, cooking or other from hygienic point of view comparable purposes should undergo frequent testing and examination. In the Announcement of the preliminary investigation regarding actions against water pollution (Kungörelse om förprövning rörande åtgärder till motverkande av vattenförorening, No. 684, 1946) it was also made clear that for sewers intended for more than 100 households, barracks, hotels or comparable institutions calculated for 300 people, the Fishery Board and its inspection department were to be notified.

23. The fact that the Swedish central state in this way effectively coordinated between different sources of information serve as counter-argument to the Hayekian thesis that problems of coordination inevitable follows governmental intervention (see, e.g. Hayek, 1948; for a wider debate on the Hayekian thesis in connection to sociotechnical transitions, see Greenwood, 2012; Meadowcroft, 1999).