Collaborative experiences of community-based initiatives and municipalities: A case study of community gardening in Tampere, Finland

Abstract

In times of rising awareness of the need for climate change adaptation and, more so, a need for our societies to undergo a fundamental sustainability transition, polycentric governance, i.e., the practice of involving various actors and different spheres of society in policy making and implementation, has gained momentum. Community-based initiatives (CBIs) are receiving increased attention since they constitute a bottom-up approach to climate change adaptation and sustainability. However, CBIs’ relationships with local governments and municipalities have been known to be burdened by a variety of factors. A type of CBI which contributes to sustainability transitions in cities in manifold ways is urban community gardening. Like CBIs generally, urban community gardeners’ relations with local public authorities may take any form between collaborative and mutually opposing.

This thesis features a case study on the collaborative relationship between community gardening initiatives in Tampere, Finland and the municipal administration, the City of Tampere. Based on literature on cross-sector collaboration in the Public Administration as well as literature on CBIs’ experiences in collaborating with public authorities, the relationship between urban community gardens and the City of Tampere is explored guided by the following criteria: accountability, legitimacy, trust, power, shared vision/goals, joint responsibility and support & motivation. Data was generated through semi-structured in-depth interviews with seven (7) community gardeners from five (5) subcases (urban community gardens in Tampere), an additional e-mail interview with a community gardener, four (4) e-mail interviews with individuals involved in the governance of urban community gardens from the municipality’s side, four (4) municipal policy documents and four (4) related websites. Code-based qualitative content analysis was employed to analyse the data according to previously identified criteria for success in public-sector - CBI collaboration.

The findings of this study display a diversity of experiences and views among community gardeners with respect to the City of Tampere. Despite great variety in the data, community gardeners and the city administration alike favour collaboration with each other. However, the former are subject to challenges common to urban community gardeners. A vital shortcoming of the present collaborations is the lack of continuous long-term relations. This causes, for instance, uncertainties about gardening on temporarily accessible municipal land. This thesis contributes to the broad literature on CBIs for climate change adaptation and sustainability, as well as the body of knowledge on urban community gardens. It depicts the multi-faceted relationship between a local urban CBI-niche and its municipality and reveals barriers to collaboration which are potentially unknown to the City of Tampere. Lastly, drawing from citizen hybrid governance research in the Finnish context, this thesis provides recommendations for the City of Tampere to embrace CBIs and especially urban community gardens in public service delivery regarding urban sustainability.