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Leader: The bold grip

Over the past week, Erik Solheim has shown that environment and development are connected. But can this be a political winner?




(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)

[11. July] While central Norwegian politicians have obviously taken an early or long summer holiday, possibly both, the remaining active ones become more apparent.

Not least, Minister of the Environment and Development Erik Solheim has shown this. On Tuesday he was in Lofoten to both get the place on UNESCO's World Heritage list, while at the same time he has to stave off oil drilling comrades Ap-Sp in his own government coalition and thus keep his promises to the environmental movement.

On Wednesday he went to Sløvåg in Gulen municipality in Sogn, as the first minister, to meet those affected after an explosion in two oil tanks a year ago. Solheim, on behalf of the government, criticized the lack of follow-up of the 250 people who suffered after the accident. He even admitted that the authorities' reaction would have been better and faster if the explosion had occurred in Inner Oslofjord. And then promised a thorough health check to the residents.

On Thursday, Solheim was to meet Barack Obama's climate adviser Jason Grumet, who is also head of the Washington Bipartisan Policy Center. A number of US politicians are heading to Svalbard to look at climate change with their own eyes. While Solheim is staying in Oslo for Friday morning to have breakfast meeting with Brazil's Planning Minister Roberto Unger, before meeting other European Development Ministers in Amsterdam in the afternoon.

In addition, Solheim is just back from China. On July 1, he signed a cooperation agreement with China's Environment Minister Zhou Shengxian, making Norway the first country to enter into an agreement with China's new Ministry of Environmental Protection. Norway and China will now exchange experiences. Or as Solheim states: “China has achieved a reduction in sulfur emissions despite economic growth. However, this shows that China is on the right track. Environment and economic growth are now becoming parallel goals and it is a very important milestone. ”

Solheim also paid a visit to China's largest coal province, Shanxi, before he also got to visit South Korea on his way back to Norway.

System Criticism

In sum, this not only outlines the framework for a very energetic minister, but it is also suggested that in practice we have also got a kind of Minister of the Environment. Or a developing Minister of the Environment if you will. If Solheim continues in this way – and it is worth noting that he in the tabloid newspapers before the summer received good dice and criticism from both commentators and the people – the environment and development can possibly be a good election campaign issue for the government next year. And it will be needed.

It was not a good starting point for Solheim when he went last year from being Minister of Development to also getting the environment in his portfolio. And there is still good reason to ask critical questions about this distinctive link, which quickly gives the impression that the Government is making the climate issue a foreign and developing country issue, as NTNU researcher Espen Moe pointed out in Ny tid 13 June. The ministry was then unable to respond to the criticism, since "the question is wide-ranging, and primarily revolves around how Norway is organized politically".

Exactly. And therein lies the whole core of the schizophrenic rhetoric we see in today's Norwegian politics: the contradiction between Norwegian oil and environmental policy, between so-called domestic and foreign policy considerations. As if there was a contradiction, it is true that those who now have ministry structures that just maintain the oil lobby's power over the Norwegian state apparatus.

But aside from that, it is well worth noting the results Solheim has already, despite all odds, gained in its newly created combination position in the environment and development. It also seems that he has managed to better communicate a more equal and dialogue-oriented approach to other countries' perspectives, which is now easier to come to terms with the global environmental challenge in mind.

Whether the Government will then be able to resell its environmental and development policy as its winner in the future will be different. Also, whether voters appreciate efforts beyond national borders. But if nothing else, the bold political combo from last fall until now has been one of the red-green Government's most successful projects.

Dag Herbjørnsrud
Dag Herbjørnsrud
Former editor of MODERN TIMES. Now head of the Center for Global and Comparative History of Ideas.

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