MOST Circumpolar Coping Processes Projects

Current research project 2004-2007: 'Globalization from Below? Localized Transformations in a Northern Perspective'

The network
The network of researchers MOST Circumpolar Coping Processes Projects (MOST CCPP) have been cooperating since 1996 within different research projects. Participants represent research institutions in Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Greenland, the Faroese Islands, Canada and Russia.

Scientific focus: Coping strategies in the face of marginalization
The aim of the network is to investigate how some local communities, more than others, in the Arctic periphery seem to cope with economical, technological and environmental changes, often part of global processes. The approach is cross-disiplinary. Themes studied are:

· Natural resource management
· Knowledge and communication
· Socio-cultural changes and differentiation
· Political integration
· Transregional cooperation

In the areas under study, stretching from Northeast Canada, via Greenland and the Nordic countries to Northwest Russia, communities and regions are facing potential marginalization. Within the research, coping processes are identified and analysed, especially processes developing within a "bottom-up" strategy, involving joint efforts of local authorities, civil society actors and enterprise networks. The methodology is based on a comparative case approach, in which the central-local aspects are covered.

The current state of research has provided us with concepts like civil societies, empowerment, networking, governance, local knowledge, embeddedness. The concepts are based on theories of a dynamic interplay between local actors and external institutions, an understanding that may enhance the potential of overcoming development problems. The investigations of the problem - coping strategies in the face of marginalization - is carried out by implying tools and theories from the disciplines of sociology, social anthropology, political science and human geography.

Within the process of globalisation, the ambiguous consequences of radical modernity might be more apparent in the Northern regions of Canada, Russia and the Nordic countries, than anywhere else. This overall circumpolar region is an extremely modernised periphery, dependant upon natural resources that have involved international trade for centuries. Social transformations in these regions have long involved the integration of local economies into world markets and transnational investments as well as threats to specific modes of life and cultural identities. Hence, the social transformation of the Northern regions enhances local and regional participation in transnational economic transactions as well as in the articulation of local and regional values and symbols in global media.