Local Agenda 21 encourages local societies to develop an environmental action-plan for the 21st century together with relevant social groups in the local community. The process of Local Agenda 21 is in this thesis studied through interviews with actors in four Norwegian municipalities; Fredrikstad, Hurum, Hole and Nittedal. One of the main questions in this thesis is whether the process of Local Agenda 21 has contributed to changes in the social and technological spheres. As this thesis is based on a constructivistic consumption, society and technology are viewed as intertwined, constructed through negotiation between different social actors, groups or worlds. The thesis looks at challenges and hindrances the Norwegian municipalities are facing in the understanding, implementation and organisation of Local Agenda 21. During the process of Local Agenda 21 changes of different sort have happened, still they are rather small, but possibilities for major changes are visible in the future. The research and especially the introductory chapters give also a more general presentation of the process of Local Agenda 21.

My reason for writing a thesis about Local Agenda 21 is firstly that I have worked with participation of children in decision-making processes in YWCA-YMCA and regard this as a great value. Secondly, I am interested in environmental questions and especially how this planet shall be able to survive. A lot of people have helped and supported me during this writing process. Everybody has contributed in different ways:

• Thanks to my supervisor Marc Audetat for many hours of discussion and help in finding literature and direction for the thesis and for encouraging words.
• Thanks to the informants from the municipalities for interesting interviews, for sending me material and for lots of lots of involvement in Local Agenda 21.
• Thanks to officials on different levels for answering obscure questions and sending me useful information.
• Thanks to my colleagues Lies, Lina, Dixi, Jon-Are and Espen for advice and discussions, excursions and a lot of fun.
• Thanks to Johannes for coming with me to Switzerland, for support and comfort.
• Thanks to Hilde and Kim for being my "living dictionaries".

Abbreviations *

Introduction *

PART I: SETTING THE AGENDA *

PART II: STORIES FROM NORWAY *

PART III : ANALYSIS OF THE Local Agenda 21-PROCESS IN FOUR NORWEGIAN MUNICIPALITIES *

PART IV: CONCLUSIVE REMARKS *

Bibliography *

Appendix 1: Letters to the municipalities

Appendix 2: Table of the interviews

Appendix 3: An example of an interview guideline

Appendix 4: Political and administrative organisational map

A21 Agenda 21

GRIP Green Management Programme

ICLEI International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives

IULA The International Union of Local Authorities

LA21 Local Agenda 21

MIK Environmental Protection in the Municipalities

MIR Environmental Information for Romerike

NGO Non-Governmental Organisation

SCOT Social Constructivism of Technology

SLC-project The Sustainable Local Community Project

STS Society, Technology and Science

UNCED United Nations Conference on Environment and Development

UNEP United Nations Environmental Programme

The object of study in the thesis is the process of Local Agenda 21 with special emphasis on sociotechnical change, with the assumption that changes here can have a positive effect on the environment. Local Agenda 21 encourages local societies to develop an environmental agenda for the 21st century. The process of Local Agenda 21 is studied through interviews with actors in four Norwegian municipalities; Fredrikstad, Hurum, Hole and Nittedal. In that way, it is possible to gain an overall a picture of the process from different angles.

It seems, as it is a broad consensus of the statement from United Nation Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), called the Earth Summit, in Rio de Janeiro 1992, that participation in decision-making is a fruitful way to go when it comes to solving serious environmental problems. However, as often in public planning and politics there is a lot of talk and less action. This is why the thesis analyses whether the process of Local Agenda 21 has contributed to changes in the technical and social spheres, or as called by Bijker "the sociotechnical sphere". More specifically is the thesis trying to answer the following questions:

• What has happened during the process of Local Agenda 21 in general and in the research municipalities?
• Has the process of Local Agenda 21 contributed to changes in the social and technological spheres? If so, how and what kind of changes?

It is not an intention to assess the Local Agenda 21 process and to characterise what was good and what was bad. The intention is to look at what has been done and to analyse the process in the light of Science, Society and Technology (STS) theories to get an understanding of how local communities work and think about Local Agenda 21. To answer these questions it is important to explore what Local Agenda 21 is. Some historical lines are drawn to see the process of Local Agenda 21 in its context as a part of Agenda 21. This is outlined in part I, together with an understanding of the challenges in the implementation of Local Agenda 21. The last chapter in part I is a theoretical and methodological chapter. The framework and analytical tools that are used directly and actively in the main section, part III, are outlined here and it is pointed to relevant social groups or actors involved in the implementation of Local Agenda 21. The scope is narrower in part II where Norway and the stories of the four municipalities are in the focus. Part III is devoted to the analysis of the process of Local Agenda 21 in the four research municipalities. The focus is on issues and cases from the other parts of the thesis. At the end of part III obstacles for change and the reasons for this are examined.

Local Agenda 21 can, will and does influence many sides of modern society. When the message is a call for a sustainable society, all the sides of humanity must be concerned with the environmental problems and how to solve them. The use of STS in this setting can show how society and technology are intertwined and that they must be regarded in connection with each other, in order to gain a more holistic view of the situation.