Arctic Specifics in Arctic Municipal Strategies

Abstract—: The aim of the study is to evaluate the practice of municipal strategic planning in the Russian Arctic taking into account the Arctic specifics in the texts of socioeconomic development strategies. For this, the concept of “Arctic specifics” was formalized and lists of 7 primary (remoteness, severity, vulnerability, distinctiveness, coastal adjacency, resource availability, border adjacency) and 14 derivative elements were compiled. Methods are proposed for assessing (1) the pronouncedness of elements of Arctic specifics in the territory and (2) manifestation of Arctic specifics in the text of strategic planning documents. The empirical base was 20 municipalities located in the Arctic Zone of the Russian Federation with socioeconomic development strategies. For the 20 strategies, expert assessments of the pronouncedness and manifestation of Arctic specifics were developed given the nine topics considered in the strategies. Based on the difference between the assessments of manifestation and pronouncedness, summary assessments were obtained on how a strategy adequately took into account Arctic specifics. Based on the relation of the pronouncedness of the primary elements of Arctic specifics and assessment of the adequacy of considering the Arctic specifics in the strategies, four groups of municipal strategies were identified, including those with excessive attention to Arctic specifics and problematic underestimation of Arctic factors within a strategy. © 2022, Pleiades Publishing, Ltd.