Size matters: action space for sustainability transition among planners in Swedish municipalities

ABSTRACT

We analyse the action space for strategic planning and sustainability transition among planners in Swedish municipalities. We use qualitative and quantitative materials from 103 survey responses obtained from Swedish municipal planners. Our analysis shows that the size and type (e.g. population and density) of the municipality where the planners work are connected to their perceived action space, where policies for densely populated cities are less relevant for rural municipalities. Even if size matters for the action space for sustainability transition, this action space can be modified (e.g. access to resources and participation in networks) and continuously constructed.

KEYWORDS:

• Action space
• sustainability transition
• Sweden
• planners
• strategic planning
• typology of municipalities

Introduction

The possibility of a dramatic shift towards sustainability is a recurring concern in the urban planning literature (Avelino et al. 2016; Grin, Rotmans, and Schot 2010; Hodson, Marvin and Bulkeley, 2013; Ehnert et al. 2018; Rohracher 2018; Jensen, Späth and Cashmore, 2019; Hodson, Marvin, and Bulkeley 2013; Albrechts, Barbanente, and Monno 2020). Achieving sustainability requires breaking entirely with unsustainable socio-technical practices and behaviours that contribute to climate change, pollution, and inequality. These so-called ‘sustainability transitions’ represent ‘radical transformation[s] towards a sustainable society’ (Grin, Rotmans, and Schot 2010) that are accompanied by substantial uncertainty. The potential changes are myriad, including improvements in land use and infrastructure, promotion of emissions reductions, electrification of infrastructure, incorporation of new technologies, including smart grids and low-carbon energy systems, improving the resilience of built environments to climate change, etc. (Jensen and Karnøe 2018; c.f. Strengers 2016; Wilker, Rusche, and Rymsa-Fitschen 2016). It is a monumental task that demands considerable resources and political support.

Researchers who are interested in sustainability transitions view strategic planning as ways to confront challenges with ineffective urban and regional planning (Truffer et al. 2010; Albrechts, Barbanente, and Monno 2020). Local decision makers shape broader processes of urban development (Kitchin 2022) and are tasked with managing the uncertainties associated with sustainability transitions. They must sort through and implement a large number of policies and interventions intended to achieve sustainability goals (Jensen et al., 2019; Desdemoustier, Crutzen, and Giffinger 2019). In Sweden, municipalities and specifically local planning departments have long been responsible for implementing policies and goals for sustainable development, and many initiatives and policies are outlined at the municipal level (Gustafsson and Mignon 2020). Urban planning is ‘becoming intertwined with local climate ambitions, investments in urban attractiveness, and “smart city” innovation measures’ (Snodgrass and Mukhtar-Landgren 2020, p. 96; also Hedensted Lund 2018; Parks and Rohracher 2019; Kramers et al. 2014; Desdemoustier, Crutzen, and Giffinger 2019). Increasingly, the focus of research and policy-making is on how municipalities can be experimented with new and innovative technologies and practices (Bulkeley and Castán Broto 2013; Snodgrass and Mukhtar-Landgren 2020), and engage in entrepreneurial administrations and collaborations (Olausson and Svensson 2019). Yet municipalities vary widely in population size and resources. This can create inequalities in their abilities to fulfill the expectations of national planning policies.

Still, the focus in sustainability transition and planning has been on cities, which are characterized as ‘hubs of innovation, growth, and diversity’ (Akande et al. 2019). However, differences between rural areas, towns, and cities have been highlighted in both research and policy contexts. Indeed, the European Union has asked for further research on the roles and contribution of small and medium-sized towns in the transition to more sustainable, smart cities and regions (EU 2012). The geographical conditions matter for perceptions about the possibilities to implement change (e.g. Jensen et al., 2019; Desdemoustier, Crutzen, and Giffinger 2019), and the local context and size shape smart city developments (Kitchin 2022). It is of interest to explore different contexts when it comes to imagining and planning for sustainability transition.

Planners in municipalities have different ambitions for change, depending on, e.g., resources and context, when it comes to implementing goals for sustainability transition. The first step in achieving radical change is imagining the future and possible changes that would bring it about (Healey 2009; Truffer et al. 2010; Bulkeley and Castán Broto 2013; Jensen and Karnøe 2018; Jensen, Späth, and Cashmore 2019). Although transition theory recognizes that the context for transformation matters (Nielsen and Farrelly 2019), we need more knowledge about whether planners in different contexts comprehend their possibilities and obstacles to contribute to radical change involved in the sustainability transition equally (Rodriguez-Pose 2013).

The concept of action space has been used in analyses of how actors perceive their role and responsibilities in creating and solving sustainability problems, and how they motivate and justify their practices and agency considering this (Skill 2012). Studies have explored how to support behavior change by structural interventions that make sustainable transport opportunities available (Strömberg 2015), and institutional capacity among public actors for more sustainable mobility practices (Mukhtar-Landgren and Smith 2019). The physical and demographic characteristics of municipalities may either constrain or enable planner’s perceptions of what is possible, thus limiting (or enabling) sustainability transitions. In this study, we hypothesise that the size of the municipality (e.g. number of inhabitants, resources, proximity to urban centres, rural character, industry, or transport infrastructure, SALAR 2017) where the planners work matters for how they perceive their action space for sustainability transitions. Planners who perceive they have resources for strategic planning will perceive greater possibility for action. By focusing on the perceived action space, we do not investigate how the action space is actually used or how well the planners use their capacities; we analyse how their responses correlate to the population size and type of municipality where they work.

The aim of this article is to analyse the interrelations between the type of Swedish municipality and perceived action space of municipal planners for engaging in planning for a radical change. The analysis includes a focus on constraints and enabling factors (institutional, resources, material) that planners in different municipalities express regarding their institutionally provided action space. We perform a statistical analysis of how planners in municipalities of different population sizes and types answer questions about these possibilities. Previous research has focused on major cities with high population density and tax revenues and given far less attention to sparsely populated municipalities (see Desdemoustier, Crutzen, and Giffinger 2019; Jensen, Späth, and Cashmore 2019). There are studies about planning and shrinking municipalities in rural areas (c.f. Grundel and Magnusson, 2022; Syssner and Jonsson, 2020). Hence, half of European cities are shrinking, where the majority of these are small and medium-sized cities (Wolff and Wiechmann 2018). By investigating how transition is perceived among municipal planners across a variety of municipal contexts, we contribute to an increased understanding of whether one model fits all in the sustainability transition (c.f. Scoones et al., 2015; Heiberg, Binz, and Truffer, 2020). In particular, we examine under what circumstances small and medium-sized municipalities need more resources to amplify and accelerate a sustainability transition (Karic and Losacker 2021).

The outline of the paper is as follows. First, we describe the Swedish municipal and public administration context. Second, we operationalize the concept of action space in the context of our qualitative and quantitative data and analyses. Our results show how the planners perceive their action spaces: how they express what is required for a sustainability transition and what they view as constraints and institutional barriers to these transitions. Finally, we draw conclusions about how size matters for the planners’ perceived action space since it is connected to what resources they have at hand, address policy implications based on our conclusions, and outline further research.

Swedish municipalities

The Swedish Planning and Building Act (2010:900) gives municipalities the main responsibility for urban planning and substantial autonomy (Gustavsson, Elander, and Lundmark 2009; Ladner, Keuffer, and Baldersheim 2016). In particular, Swedish municipalities are responsible for matters relating to physical planning and governing land use. Municipalities have the same legal duties to deliver services to residents and fulfil national policies but have very different resources due to the number of inhabitants. This means that the way they handle and plan for climate or sustainability policies may differ significantly (Gustafsson and Mignon 2020). Municipalities can apply for funding from the Swedish Agency for Economic and Regional Growth, the Swedish Energy Agency, and platforms such as ‘Viable cities’, among others.

Municipalities are distinguished not only by the size of their population but also by their relative proximity to urban centres and the prevalence of different industries. Large municipalities are almost exclusively highly urban, while medium-sized and small municipalities have varying levels of urbanness. To make a systematic comparison and highlight how their conditions correlate to the perceived action space of the planners in different municipalities, and the resources they can draw on to contribute to the sustainability transition, we employ a typology developed by the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions (SALAR), presented in Table 1. The municipalities are divided into three main categories: (A) cities and municipalities near cities, (B) medium-sized towns and municipalities near medium-sized towns, and (C) smaller towns/urban areas and rural municipalities (SALAR 2017). These categories are further sub-divided based on distance to major cities, number of inhabitants, commuting patterns, and, lastly, whether they are rural municipalities with tourist industry (SALAR 2017). This typology recognizes that Swedish municipalities are not simply big or small, but also differ in terms of their location in relation to other urban centres. As we show later, the idea of a ‘small municipality’ is an emic concept expressed by respondents (Harris 1990).

Table 1. The number of Swedish municipalities, the number of municipalities that participated in the survey, according to SALAR (2017), and the number of ‘Climate Initiative municipalities’.

Municipal categories	Total No. of municipalities per category A-C, in Sweden	No of municipalities responding the survey [No. of Climate Initiative municipalities among respondents]
A. Municipalities with cities and near cities
A1. Cities, with a population of at least 200 000 inhabitants	3	1 [0]
A2. Municipalities near cities, where more than 40% of the working population commute to work in a large city	43	10 [3]
B. Municiplaities with medium-sized towns and municipalities near medium-sized towns
B3. Medium-sized towns, with a population of at least 50 000 inhabitants and at least 40 000 inhabitants in the largest urban area.	21	13 [9]
B4. Municipalities near medium-sized towns, where more than 40% of the working population commute to work in a medium-sized town.	52	16 [0]
B5. Municipalities with a low commuting rate near medium-sized towns.	35	12 [1]
C. Municipalities with smaller towns and rural municipalities
C6. Small towns, with a population of at least 15 000 and less than 40 000 inhabitants in the largest urban area.	29	10 [3]
C7. Municipalities near small towns, where more than 30% of the working population commute to work in a small town.	52	17 [0]
C8. Rural municipalities, with a population of less than 15 000 inhabitants in the closest town, very low commuting rate (less than 30%).	40	16 [1]
C9. Rural municipalities with tourism industry.	15	8 [0]
Total	290	103 [17]

Sustainable transitions are influenced by inter- and intra-municipal policy dynamics. These include those between urban and rural areas and urban centres and peripheries (see Desdemoustier, Crutzen, and Giffinger 2019). While local autonomy sometimes implies that municipalities invent solutions on their own, they collaborate in other circumstances (Feiock and Tavares 2017). In Sweden, there are several networks for learning and exchange of experiences between municipalities. One example salient to sustainability transitions is the consortium of Climate Initiative municipalities (Klimatkommuner), which is an organisation for municipalities and regions engaged in local Climate Initiatives against global climate change. They are detailed in Table 1. In all of Sweden, there are 44 Climate Initiative municipalities (15% of 290 municipalities), of which 17 responded to our survey (17% of N = 103). Most Climate Initiative municipalities are medium-sized or adjacent to large or medium-sized municipalities, 13 of the 52 respondents in category A and B (25%), and 4 of the 51 respondents in category C (8%).

The analytical framework: analysing planners’ action space for sustainability transition

The concept of action space can help us understand planners’ ideas and practices and thereby how they shape planning activities and what they believe they can do for a sustainable transition. Hence, planners’ action space regards strategic planning in municipalities. Importantly, ‘the roles of public actors are intertwined with their perceived action spaces. … [it] is affected by how organisations and actors understand and perceive a given situation.’ (Mukhtar-Landgren and Smith 2019, 2).

In regional planning, the action space encompasses not only the physical space of buildings and infrastructures but also the social space of relations, norms, and institutions. However, depending on the disciplinary context, action space has been used in different ways (c.f. Fenton 2016). Our analytical underpinning for action space mainly emanates from structuration theory (Giddens 1989). But we also include institutional capacity where institutions are viewed as ‘rules and practices, embedded in structures of resources that make action possible’ (Mukhtar-Landgren and Smith 2019, quoting March & Olsen 1989). Action space addresses the intimate interactions between the structuring properties of social and material systems that enable or constrain actions of individuals (Giddens 1989; Skill 2012). Constraints are factors that limit the available options since resources are, or are perceived to be, limited or limiting the action space of individuals. Available resources, such as knowledge, networks, or technology, affect the activities humans perceive they can do and can therefore enable actions that contribute to sustainability transition (Fenton 2016; Skill 2012; Strömberg 2015; Mukhtar-Landgren and Smith 2019). In empirical studies, Mukhtar-Landgren and Smith (2019) showed that lack of coordination and cooperation can be perceived as an institutional constraint for sustainable innovation.

We define the actual action space as ‘the area within which persons can undertake activity’ (Dijst 1999, 163), while perceived action space is the area or context within which persons conceive and frame that they can undertake activity. We take an interdisciplinary approach to analyses of actual and perceived action space for sustainability transition, which we argue should address the social, material, and institutional aspects (Giddens 1989; Skill 2012; Mukhtar-Landgren and Smith 2019).

Actual and perceived action space are operationalized as institutional and organizational factors (norms, networks, collaborations, strategies, etc.), resources (competence, financial, technological), material factors where we include the geographical context of the municipality (distance to urban centres, population density, SALAR 2017). By situating planners in their municipal context with certain physical and organisational resources, we identify the relevant constraining and enabling factors that allow planners to perceive radical alternatives that can trigger sustainability transitions (Truffer et al. 2010). In other words, we examine how local context is associated with the imaginative capacity needed to envision new ways of managing municipal responsibilities for sustainable transitions.

The actual action space is composed of the geographical territory and the type of municipality (e.g. the SALAR typology), as well as institutions, norms, and national laws. Long-term strategic planning for sustainable development represents the commitment of a municipality to a sustainability transition, including collaborations to make gradual changes (Meadowcroft 2009). Ongoing projects can create opportunities for planners to build networks and practice collaboration and can enable planners to engage in future innovative projects (Salet 2008; Wolfram, Borgström, and Farrelly 2019) for sustainability transition, and thus the planners’ action space. However, projects require time and effort from planners too. Access to experts and knowledge at universities may help planners to make decisions for future urban developments and enable them to identify and analyse possibilities for leading transition processes (Keeler et al. 2019).

Methods, material, and analysis

Data collection, sample, and data analysis

We analyse data from a survey – including both closed- and open-ended questions – that was sent to all 275 Swedish municipal planning departments during November 2019. This is less than the total number of Swedish municipalities (290) because some sparsely populated municipalities have joint planning departments. The survey was sent by e-mail to prospective respondents, identified as heads of the planning department, and responses were collected through the online platform Survey & Report. The e-mail was followed up by a phone call at one occasion. 103 municipal planners responded to the survey. This represents a response rate of 37%. Out of the respondents in the survey, 19 work in municipalities that are so-called ‘Climate Initiative municipalities’ (klimatkommuner), which, as previously noted, tend to be larger or located near larger urban centres.

The survey asked respondents about long-term strategic initiatives in the municipalities, and attitudes among urban municipal planners regarding transportation, energy transformation, emerging technologies, digitalisation, and collaborations in networks. The survey had 23 questions of which 10 allowed for open-ended responses.

Analysing perceived action space in a mixed methods study

The study is based on statistical analysis and qualitative coding of survey data (Hesse-Biber 2010). To analyse the data and the material, we first categorised the different municipalities according to the SALAR (2017) typologies, and the Climate Initiative municipalities in a next step, when searching for statistically significant correlations to respond to the survey questions regarding transition, emerging technologies, and networks. The open answers were analysed using the concepts of constraints and enabling factors to explore how the planners perceive their action space for sustainability transition.

The qualitative material has been coded in a thematic network by Attride-Stirling (2001), with a focus on planners’ argumentation in their open-ended responses that focused on the framing of action space in different municipalities. The respondents argue for why they act or not in relation to the character of the municipality where they work. Since we talk about size and character of urban areas, it is worth mentioning that in Swedish the word for cities and towns is the same (stad), and character is expressed by adding big or small, depending on the total amount of inhabitants, i.e. it is not a geographical question. The survey questions contained the generic term ‘stad’.

Our quantitative analysis considers the relationship between the size of the municipality and being a ‘Climate Initiative municipality’, and between the size of the municipality and perceived sustainability transition action spaces. All analyses were peformed using the SPSS statistical software (IBM Corp 2020). We first use a Pearson’s chi-square test of association for analysing the relationship between two variables: (1) Municaplities’ three-category SALAR classification and (2) being a Climate Initiative municipality. We find a significant relationship between the two variables, X² (1, N = 103) = 7.362, p = 0.025. Small, less urban municipalities – i.e. those in SALAR category C – are less likely to be Climate Initiative municipalities in comparison to the larger and medium-sized municipalities in category A and B (see Tables S1 and S2).

In the next step, we use a Mann–Whitney U’s Kruskal–Wallis test to assess the relationship between municipal size and perceived action space (Tables S4 and S5). The null hypothesis is that size is not related to perceived action spaces. We perform a separate test for each quantitative survey response. The null hypotheses that were rejected are marked with an X in Table 2.

Table 2. The results of the Mann–Whitney U’s Kruskal–Wallis test of the null hypotheses, the character of the municipalities, and the action space of municipal planners.

Variables	Null hypothesis rejected (size matters) = x	Variable content (all questions had the alternatives ‘to a very high degree,’ ‘to a high degree,’ ‘to some extent,’ and ‘not at all’)
F1		Changes connected to climate change and digitalisation of the energy system and transportation (like smart grids, autonomous cars, sharing economy) will lead to radical changes of our cities and regions in 20–30 years
F2	x	Is there any long-term (approximately 20–30 years) strategic planning in your municipality at the moment (like adaptation of the infrastructure for challenges like climate change, digitalisation or resource exploitation)?
F3	x	New technologies in the transport system will affect the planning of our cities and regions through autonomous and connected cars
F4a		Technological changes will affect the planning of smart and sustainable cities and regions – The ‘sensor city’
F4b		– eGovernance (new forms of citizen participation)
F4c		– New adapted ways of construction (compact cities, garden cities, mixed cities)
F5		The municipality is part of a network that regards sustainable regional planning – sustainable mobility
F6		The municipality applies for funds from national programs to manage challenges that regard digitalisation and climate transition (like development and innovation projects)
F7	x	There are ongoing projects regarding climate transition or digitalisation which involve the planning processes in the municipality
F8a	x	We get new information within the municipal administration about new technologies and challenges related to climate change in society – Via experts within the municipality
F8b	x	– Via collaboration with the university
F8c	x	– Via collaboration with consultants
F8d		– Via public reports from the government, the parliament, or the EU
F8e	x	– Via social media such as blogs, podcasts, networking services

Among the 23 questions in the survey, we have analysed 8 questions, and sub-questions that regard planning for sustainability transition: opinion about the emergence of new technologies (F1), the existence of strategic long-term planning (F2), planner’s technological imaginaries (F3 and F4a–c), working in a municipality that is part of sustainable mobility network (F5), active involvement of municipality for financing innovative projects through funding applications (F6), existence of ongoing climate transition projects (F7), channels through which the municipal planner receives information about new technologies and innovative solutions for climate change (F8a–e).

Results

Statistical results concerning action space for sustainability transition among Swedish planners

This section presents the statistical findings on the action space for sustainability transition among Swedish municipal planners. A statistically significant relationship between the response to these questions and the size of the municipality was observed when one or more null hypotheses were rejected for a given variable. Statistical analyses were conducted to understand the relationship between the type of municipalities in terms of population size, density, relation to urban centres, and how they deal with climate change, new technologies, etc., and the action space of municipal planners identified in the factors F1-F9. The factors are related to perceived and actual action space, such as access to resources and innovations, which we will discuss in detail in our subsequent analysis.

As stated above, we operationalised the perceived action space for the quantitative material as follows: the lower levels ‘to some extent’ and ‘not at all’ were categorised as indicating limited action space.

Among municipalities in categories A1–B3 (N = 24), 50% of the respondents reported that their municipalities have long-term strategic planning to a large extent, suggesting that planners in these municipalities perceive a greater action space. 65% of the municipalities within the categories B4–C9 (N = 79), on the other hand, said that to some extent they have long-term strategic planning, and 80% of the municipalities that did not have any long-term strategic planning at all belonged to categories C6–C9 (N = 51). Lack of long-term planning can be identified as a factor that limits the work on sustainability transition and the action spaces of planners working in municipalities characterised as C. Long-term planning provides a strategic framework for addressing complex challenges associated with sustainable development (Trygg and Wenander 2022), including how to allocate resources and prioritize initiatives. Consequently, planners in category C municipalities may face constraints in their ability to contribute to sustainability transition due to the absence of comprehensive and forward-looking guidance. By definition, municipalities that are ‘Climate Initiative municipalities’ work strategically. The 10 municipalities that had no long-term strategic planning at the time of the survey were among those that were not a Climate Initiative municipality.

A correlation was observed between the type of the municipality and planner’s perception that autonomous cars (F3) will impact urban planning. This suggests that planners from different types of municipalities may have varying expectations about the role of autonomous cars in shaping the future of urban environments. However, no correlation was observed between the type of the municipality and the expectation that ‘sensor cities’ (F4a), eGovernment (F4b), or adapted ways of construction (F4c) will influence planning. It is important to note that the survey questions did not provide definitions for concepts and models, such as sensor cities and eGovernment, which may have influenced respondents’ understanding and interpretation of these terms. Apart from the fact that lack of clarity could have led to different interpretations and expectations among planners, it is possible that the relevance of these concepts is not directly linked to the type of the municipality. In this case, the lack of correlation could indicate that these innovations are universally applicable and not influenced by factors such as size.

Inquiries about ongoing projects to deal with climate change or digitalisation revealed that only 40% of the municipalities in categories C6–C9 (N = 51) had such projects, while more than 80% of the municipalities in categories A1, A2, and B3 (N = 24) had projects for dealing with these issues. Participating in projects and networks is part of the action space for contributing to sustainability transition (Salet 2008). Around 80% of the respondents from municipalities in A1-B3 (N = 24) said they get information about new technologies and climate change from the experts within their municipalities. The data show that they are also in close relationship with universities and consultants for getting new information on these issues. Most of the respondents from the municipalities in C6-C9 (N = 51) said that they rely mainly on experts within their municipalities. In contrast to municipalities in A and B, they do not get much information from universities or consultants. On average 75% of the respondents from municipalities in category C6–C9 (N = 51) said that they do not get any information from these three channels. There is no significant relationship between the character of the municipality and getting information about new technologies and challenges related to climate change in society from public reports (F8d), which may mean that they are accessible for all and do not require special resources.

To apply for funds requires organisational capacity and the perception of this as part of one’s action space. All municipalities in A apply for national funds to manage challenges related to digitalisation and climate change, while only 50% of municipalities in C apply for these funds. Among the municipalities in B, a majority of the climate municipalities (70%) and only 35% of not Climate Initiative municipality apply for funding from national authorities. Planners who work in Climate Initiative municipalities are more engaged than other municipal planners in sustainability transition projects. As we will show below, planners may consider that their time is consumed by everyday requirements. Ongoing projects can create possibilities for networking with think tanks, private businesses, universities, and other organizations, which may affect planners perceived action space (see Keeler et al. 2019). All 11 municipalities in category A and 80% of the Climate Initiative municipalities in B (N = 10) have ongoing projects related to climate change or digitalisation, respectively, while 50% of the Climate Initiative municipalities in C (N = 51) have ongoing projects (Table S4). For municipalities that were not Climate Initiative municipalities, there was no connection between their size and having ongoing projects. There is a significant relationship between being a Climate Initiative municipality and having ongoing projects regarding climate transition or digitalisation that involve the planning process in the municipality. This is not surprising. Planners mention that they are digitalising detailed and comprehensive development plans, implementing digital permit granting processes and e-services, mapping work processes for case management, digital twin city. The municipalities describe how they are participating in projects, from the regional and national level to EU level like projects for fossil fuel–free municipalities, the localization of biogas stations, and projects for wetlands, green cities for stormwater management, climate transition, and a digital citizen dialogue process.

The results show that the perceived action space of planners in rural municipalities is influenced by the lack of long-term planning, ongoing projects to deal with issues such as climate change and digitalisation, and contact with universities. Moreover, the results indicate that planners at Climate Initiative municipalities tend to have more networking opportunities, which may enhance their action space. The phrasing of the question regarding novel technologies and innovations, such as autonomous and connected vehicles referred specifically to cities. This phrasing could be interpreted that these innovations are more relevant to larger and densely populated areas. Consequently, rural planners may perceive such technologies as less applicable to their work.

Qualitative results from the open-ended answers

In the following, we describe the results from the open-ended answers in the survey. We categorise them as institutional and organisational aspects, resources, and material aspects that enable or constrain action for sustainable transition. The three are intimately related. For example, a low number of inhabitants imply low tax revenues that affect financial resources, which in turn may contribute to a situation where resources are that are useful to work on sustainability transition (networking outside of the municipality, getting engaged in projects and applying for funds, etc.) are perceived as limited. The relationship between municipal size and planners’ perceived action space emerged from our reading of the open-ended survey responses.

Institutional and organisational factors, and resources

Several planners indicated that a sustainability transition and strategic planning were not for them since they work in what they called ‘small municipalities’. This is interesting since all Swedish municipalities have the same responsibilities and competencies to work with sustainability and energy transitions (Grin, Rotmans, and Schot 2010). The answers indicated that planners subscribed to a rationale that only ‘big municipalities’ can plan for radical urban change or sustainability transition since they have the resources to do so. Some examples were as follows:

In our small municipality lack of required resources like time and expertise imply that we need to hire consultants for support, and this in turn implies higher costs, which there are none, and we need to use funding from the existing budget. (Planner type type B5, municiplaity 2019, our emphasis)

In small municipalities we need considerably more help with resources. We are overloaded with burning everyday issues. (Planner type type C8 municipality, 2019, our emphasis)

The planners direct the attention to the perception of their action space, including their resources, to contribute to sustainability transition in municipalities of different types.

Planners identified coordination among different actors as important. Sustainable transitions affect not only planning departments but also many other municipal units and departments. This means collaboration is a necessity. Furthermore, planners need to collaborate with private actors. Collaborations between municipalities can also be necessary, since there is seldom support from national authorities, according to the planners.

Novel forms of organisation and networking across administrative boundaries – like joining forces in procuring and managing IT or logistics – are additional examples of how to work for sustainability transition in municipalities and thus create action space. The planners mention networks and partnerships as an enabling resource for transition when mapping the risk of landslides and flooding and planning green structures.

Planning for a sustainability transition is often focused on influencing citizens’ travel patterns towards more commuting and use of mass transit. One planner cautioned that autonomous vehicles and electrification will not automatically imply decreased transit or more compact development. ‘We must make it more attractive to travel by public means of transportation.’ (Planner, type A1 municipality). The statement shows that citizens’ travel patterns can be a constraint for sustainability transition, where planning is used to convince the citizens to change behaviour. The action space of planners is situated between national and local policies and the preferences of municipal residents. Residents who do not want to change their travel modes constrain the possibility for sustainability transitions. Planners talked about alternative fuels as part of the sustainability transition, but ‘people are hesitant to the transition since they do not know “if it will last in the long run.”/ … /that it is not “just hype”.’ (Planner, type C7 municipality).

Another general institutional barrier is the lack of political support and visions. At the end of the survey, some mentioned again that their action space for sustainable transition is obstructed by political decisions that do not support sustainable transition. This was expressed as ‘We have several established collaborations, but it does not help if there is no political will and ambition.’ (Planner, type C6 municipality).

Resources for sustainability transition

Sustainability transitions will require the efforts of many actors and yet, as we have pointed out, planners in small municipalities perceive that their action space is limited, due to resources like staff and expertise. Furthermore, sustainability transition is perceived as an add-on to required work to maintain services and business in traditional areas. Many planners in small municipalities identified size as a major constraint: ‘There is a general problem with resources for physical planning in smaller municipalities’ (Planner, type B5 municipality); ‘We do not have earmarked resources. It is always difficult to manage cross-boundary issues, especially in a small municipality as ours, and no specific staff who work with these questions’ (Planner, type B5 municipality); ‘It is difficult to have all the necessary experts that we would need since we are a small municipality’ (Planner, type C7 municipality); ‘We do not have enough competence nor resources.’ (Planner, type C8 municipality). They express that they lack resources and thus action space.

Urban planners identify expertises and resources, such as staff and funding as enabling factors for sustainability transitions. They determine whether there is capacity in the municipality to realize or implement ambitions and policies. The respondents were asked if they think that the planning system (routines, tools, strategies) that they use today is efficient enough to manage the challenges that regard digitalisation and climate transition in their municipalities. The planners highlighted that they have more capacity for climate transition than digitalisation. Some lament this since digital tools can be useful for making scenarios and for visualising the need for transition for politicians, or as decision-making support.

As illustrated above in the statistical analysis, there was a significant correlation between the type of municipalities and the way the respondents answered regarding if they apply for funding of projects, i.e. resources. The respondents have given examples of both authorities where they apply for funding and networks they collaborate with. Some look for support in matters like water and sewage management, from the Swedish authority for innovation, Vinnova, for sustainable mobility and Viable Cities, or the Energy Authority regarding ‘zero parking’ and ‘spatial equality’.

It is very difficult in small municipalities concerning resources. And there are many of us. The median Swedish municipality has less than 15 000 inhabitants. Unfortunately, a lot [of the work on transition] regards the 30 largest municipalities (Planner, type C7 municipality).

Small municipalities have less resources, including to apply for funding, which in turn affects the possibilities to work on sustainability transition.

Material and geographical aspects

The open-ended answers directed attention to both specific constraints in small municipalities and general issues that all planners, regardless of municipal size, deal with. There were three general constraints that planners in all types of municipalities identified: existing built infrastructure, mobility norms among residents, and political will.

Existing infrastructure is described as a constraint for all types of municipalities. Since the planners describe that it is difficult to modify existing infrastructure, the municipalities mainly must address transition in areas that have yet to be constructed. The planners comment that it takes time to transform built infrastructure. ‘A lot of our physical structures are permanent. We do not see that any revolutionary changes will affect that. New technology will be adapted to existing physical structures’ (Planner, type A2 municipality, 2019).

Planners from the municipalities in cities and big towns mentioned that initiatives for transition are under way, like testing autonomous trucks, or planning for extended bicycle lanes and trams as more sustainable transportation.

When it comes to energy supply, we are already making a transition. We govern and plan so that energy demanding industries are not established, but we also have to plan for stations for charging electric buses. (Planner, type A1 municipality, 2019 our emphasis)

Simultaneously as describing and giving examples of what they do concerning climate transition and digitalisation, planners state that they have both capacity and expertise. Some other examples the planners described as already under way and implemented in their municipalities, were mobility-as-service, or combinations of mobility solutions like rental bikes and public transport. Planners can be policy entrepreneurs and design testbeds, labs, and projects if they perceive the possibility. We acknowledge that the requirements for planning in a municipality with high urbanisation pressure are obviously different from a municipality with shrinking number of residents, aging populations, and shrinking tax base where few new buildings are planned and constructed.

Working in ‘a small municipality’ was percieved as a constraining factor for sustainability transition. As was mentioned previously, being ‘a small municipality’ is an emic concept (Harris 1990) that appears in relation to the suggestions in the survey for the sustainability transition. In the qualitative material, we have observed respondents expressing that radical changes are of low priority in ‘small municipalities’. They pointed out that sharing economy solutions and carpools, for example, require a critical mass of people (called agglomeration benefits in the literature, Scoones et al., 2015), which implies that it is difficult or impossible to achieve the needed numbers in small municipalities, and thus, these suggestions are not seen as relevant solutions for them. Being small and lacking critical mass becomes a perceived constraint preventing a sustainability transition. The survey asked planners about what new technologies in the transport system they believe will affect the planning of cities/towns and regions. The respondents mentioned bicycles and autonomous vehicles, biogas fuel, and sharing solutions for private cars. But autonomous vehicles and sharing solutions (which are often hailed in sustainability transitions) are perceived as relevant for urban municipalities.

Being a ‘small municipality’ appeared across the open-ended questions as implying lack of possibilities and action space.

Mobility is key in small rural municipalities with long distances for commuting. If we do not manage to create infrastructure for this, we will not reach our sustainability goals. A lot of the planning take densified cities as a point of departure, and you measure the distance to the closest bus stop. What does it matter to live next by a bus stop if there are only one or two buses a day? People living in the countryside usually must have two cars. And if you do not trust that there is a possibility to fill your car at a biogas station nearby, you will have two cars that run on petrol or diesel. At the same time, we need to get more people to live in the countryside to keep the areas open, to have small scale food production and to live sustainably in other ways. And transport issues are key. It [transition] cannot be a question only for major cities (Planner, type C7 municipality, 2019)

The respondents call for adapting sustainable transition policies and goals to smaller municipalities, not just larger cities. This was especially the case for resource allocation. Densification in urban areas is not perceived as relevant for towns. The respondents used cases of how rural people who feel excluded by climate policies, such as fuel tax and protest.

To sum up, the municipalities in the categories A–B3 described what they do, while the municipalities in the B4-C9 municipalities explain why they do not act on sustainability transition. It is explained as due to being small and lacking resources.

Conclusions

The aim of this paper has been to analyse the action space (Mukhtar-Landgren and Smith 2019; Strömberg 2015; Skill 2012) among planners in different types of Swedish municipalities regarding sustainable transitions. We call this action space for sustainability transition. We have analysed qualitative and quantitative evidence obtained using a survey of Swedish municipal planning departments. Our analysis focuses attention on municipal-level, contextual factors that enable or constrain the ability of municipal planners to achieve sustainability transitions. The typology used (SALAR 2017) regards distance to major cities, resources, number of inhabitants and demographic composition, industry, and density that influence their action space.

When it comes to ‘small municipalities’ we have shown how planners perceive different capacities to act on sustainability transition related to the type of municipality they work in. The participation in the network of Climate Initiative municipalities proved to be correlated to the type of the municipalities. Some specific constraints that are related to the character of the municipality were identified. We conclude that the size and type according to the nine categories of municipal typology (SALAR 2017) matter for how planners describe and explain their action space to work toward sustainability transitions, and the enabling and constraining factors that affect what the planners imagine as possible regarding radical change in their municipalities. We identified three general factors that influence the action space of planners disregarding the type and size of the municipality: political will (c.f. Fenton 2016), citizens’ mobility patterns, and existing built infrastructure. The latter makes them focus on sustainability transition in new development, where they have greater capacity to influence, i.e. greater space for action, as they perceive their hands are tied when it comes to existing infrastructure. Planners from small municipalities identified a lack of resources to apply for funding, lower levels of participation in collaborative projects and networks, and a lack of access to expertise from universities as constraints impeding sustainability transitions. The lack of critical mass among the inhabitants in small municipalities is a specific aspect of working with sharing solutions and reduced transit and emissions, perceived to emanate from sustainability transition projects. Our study confirms findings from Desdemoustier et al. (2019) that size and type matter when it comes to the perceived action space for imagining and realising sustainability transitions. The efforts to work on sustainability transition is mainly voluntary, and planners in Swedish municipalities are expected to contribute disregarding the type of the administration. The policy implications of our study show that one size does not fit all, and ambitions for sustainability transformation policies are not necessarily perceived to be suitable for the many ‘small’ and rural municipalities. It is thus reasonable to advocate for a more dynamic approach to national policy-making, which better addresses the needs of all municipalities.

Further statistical studies of sustainability transitions in municipalities and smart cities can preferably use the typology presented by SALAR to explore how local governments, planners, and other stakeholders perceive their possibilities to contribute to the sustainability transition, and whether differentiated expectations can be outlined for different municipalities.

Another thing that was not explored in this study but which can be explored further is the question of whether there is greater scope for informal practices or experimentation in smaller municipalities.

Acknowledgements

This study was performed with funding from the Swedish Energy Agency, grant number 46278-1. We are grateful for the valuable feedback on the manuscript from Sara Farhangi, Ben Jarvis who was commissioned to correct grammar and spelling, and the anonymous reviewers.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Supplemental data

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/17535069.2023.2209554.

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the The Swedish Energy Agency [46278-1].