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The ecosystem service (ES) concept has increasingly been applied in environmental planning, while there are several decades of experience in applying multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) in complex planning situations. The aim of this article is to assess how the ES concept has been used in water management projects together with MCDA and to examine the experiences gained and make recommendations to overcome any identified challenges. Our conclusions are based on a systematic analysis of 23 articles that were selected among 206 articles focused on water-related studies using, for example, the terms multi-criteria and ecosystem services in the title, abstract or keywords. Here, we explore (i) at what level of detail ESs are included in the decision hierarchy, (ii) the pros and cons of the complementary use of the two approaches, and (iii) how the potential challenges related to the use of MCDA, such as the large number of criteria, double-counting, or assigning criteria weights, are addressed in the selected cases. The results reveal large differences between the case studies. It is shown that only a few case studies used ES categories to classify criteria in the decision hierarchy, that these cases included different numbers of ES criteria and non-ES criteria, and that most case studies elicited stakeholder preferences in MCDA. Although the paper focuses on water management projects, the conclusions regarding the advantages and pitfalls of the complementary use of the methods, as well as our recommendations, are also applicable to other environmental management contexts.

Luontopohjaiset ratkaisut ovat monihyötyisiä yhteiskunnallisten haasteiden ratkaisuja, jotka perustuvat luonnon prosessien luomiin mahdollisuuksiin ja ottavat mallia ekosysteemien toiminnasta. Ne vastaavat laaja-alaisiin, kytkeytyneisiin haasteisiin tarjoamalla tavanomaisille, teknistä näkökulmaa painottaville ratkaisuille vaihtoehdon, joka tähtää ekologisesti, sosiaalisesti ja taloudellisesti kestäviin kokonaisratkaisuihin. Luontopohjaiset ratkaisut ovat nousseet valokeilaan viime vuosina niin Euroopan komission, Kansainvälisen luonnonsuojeluliiton (IUCN), tiedeyhteisön, kuin lukuisten kansallisten toimijoidenkin kannanotoissa, arvioinneissa ja ratkaisumalleissa erilaisiin kestävyyshaasteisiin. Tarkastelemme kirjallisuuden kautta, miten luontopohjaisten ratkaisujen konseptia on käsitteellistetty erityisesti monihyötyisyyden näkökulmasta. Käsittelemme myös yleisellä tasolla toimijoiden näkemyksiä luontopohjaisten ratkaisujen toimeenpanon edistämiskeinoista Suomessa asiantuntijatyöpajassa kerätyn aineiston pohjalta.

Resilience management aims to increase the ability of the system to respond to adverse events. In this study, we develop and apply a structured framework for assessing the resilience of the decision-making process related to reservoir (or lake) regulation with the resilience matrix approach. Our study area is Finland, where the initiatives for the regulation have typically been hydro power production or flood prevention, but nowadays recreational and environmental issues are also increasingly considered. The main objectives of this study are twofold. First, it aims to provide support for reservoir operators and supervisors of the water course regulation projects in their work for identifying the possible threats and actions to diminish their consequences. Second, it studies the applicability of the resilience matrix approach in a quite specifically defined operational process, as most of the earlier applications have focused on a more general context. Our resilience matrix was developed in close co-operation with reservoir operators and supervisors of regulation by means of two workshops and a survey. For the practical application of the matrix, we created an evaluation form for assessing the resilience of a single dam operation process and for evaluating the cost efficiency of the actions identified to improve the resilience. The approach was tested on a dam controlling the water level of a middle-sized lake, where it proved to be a competent way to systematically assess resilience.

Building a well-structured objectives hierarchy is central to multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA). However, in the absence of a systematic methodology to support the process, this task has been described as “more art than science”. Objectives hierarchies often tend to become large and constraining the size of a hierarchy can be challenging. This paper proposes and illustrates the use of a set of methods to support the simplification of the hierarchies in contexts that are “data rich” and characterised by many objectives. The aim of using the proposed approach is to support decision analysts in developing an appropriately concise decision model for the further interactions with the stakeholders. Using data from two completed environmental cases we show retrospectively how qualitative (means-ends networks), semi-quantitative (relevancy analysis) and quantitative (correlation analysis, principal component analysis, local sensitivity analysis of weights) methods, used alone or in combination, can inform hierarchy development. We evaluate the potential benefits and challenges of each method and discuss the advantages and disadvantages of the simplification of an objectives hierarchy. Questionnaire-based relevancy analysis can be a useful method to identify and communicate important objectives in the early phases of an MCDA process with stakeholders, while correlation analysis can help to identify overlapping objectives, particularly in cases having many objectives and alternatives. It is intended that the methods support a facilitator in developing a clear understanding of the problem and also prompt deeper thinking about and discussion of the appropriate structure and content of an objectives hierarchy with the stakeholders involved.

Environmental monitoring covers many different management domains. They range from biodiversity conservation to water protection, natural hazard prevention, impact assessment, resource use, or environmental restoration. The need for clear objectives has long been emphasized in the management literature, but has often received only little attention in monitoring design. This is partly due to the lack of systematic approaches for setting objectives. In this paper, we present a formal approach based on Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA), namely relevancy analysis, to prioritize management objectives. We demonstrate its use for a river restoration monitoring program in Switzerland comprising 35 physical and biological objectives. The relevancy of an objective is based on two main components, the general importance of the objective, and the problem-specific impact range. The general importance of an objective is used to identify the most important management objectives from a hierarchy within the national program (i.e. objectives to be monitored). The impact range is used to understand which management objectives are more important to monitor for different river restoration measures (i.e. sub-selection of the objectives specifically for the restoration measure). The general importance of a management objective was determined based on the frequency an objective is mentioned in selected policy documents, and the legislative power and temporal persistency of each document. The impact ranges were identified from a questionnaire involving 15 Swiss river restoration professionals. Hereby, we assumed that the impact range increases as the anticipated impact of the restoration measure on a specific management objective increases, and as the uncertainty to anticipate this impact increases. For simplicity, we applied the approach only to one restoration measure, namely river widening. Six management objectives scored high in relevancy in terms of both impact range and general importance – channel structure and diversity, structure and diversity of the banks and floodplains, sediment dynamics, longitudinal connectivity, lateral connectivity, and vertical connectivity. Hence, these objectives are both important national objectives for river monitoring (according to the legislation) and are objectives that are potentially highly impacted by a river widening project. We performed sensitivity analyses related to the calculation of the general importance, the impact range, and the relevancy of the objectives. The practice-oriented approach can be transferred to a broad diversity of decision situations where there is a need for systematic evaluation of the importance of objectives. It could be a useful tool for social learning and finding group consensus about the priority of the objectives.

The Ecosystem Service concept is a widely used framework to examine the links between the functioning of ecosystems and human well-being. There is a broad range of ecosystem services, which are often classified hierarchically as provisioning, regulating and cultural services. Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA), an approach for analyzing complex problems that involve trade-offs between multiple objectives, has increasingly been applied in the ecosystem service context. In MCDA, a problem is typically represented hierarchically as a value tree, which resembles the hierarchical structure of the ecosystem service classifications. However, in practice, there are several potential pitfalls that could distort the analysis, if some commonly used ecosystems service classification was directly used as the basis of an MCDA value tree. In this paper, we discuss these potential pitfalls and how to avoid them. Our discussion is illustrated with experience from a case study focusing on the ecosystem services provided by the peatlands in Finland.

Flood risk management (FRM) is moving towards more proactive and collaborative direction to enable adaptation to changing conditions. We present a case study on collaborative planning process, which contributed to the development of adaptive FRM in one of the largest river basins in Finland. The focus was on the possibility and acceptability of using large regulated lakes as storage for flood water in an extreme flood event to decrease flood damage at the downstream riverside towns. We defined an extreme flood event that would cause dramatic flood damage and developed tools for simulating the event with alternative regulation strategies using Watershed Simulation and Forecasting System (WSFS). We organized a stakeholder event to demonstrate the alternative lake regulation strategies, their socio-economic consequences, and to discuss their acceptability. We found that storing flood water in the lakes above the regulation limits and preparing for winter floods in advance by lowering the lakes in the autumn can minimize the total damage in the target area. The majority of stakeholders considered these actions acceptable in an extreme flood event, regardless of deliberately induced flooding of areas where no floods have occurred for over 50 years. However, lowering the lakes in the autumn on annual basis gained less support. We emphasize the importance of deliberations on the FRM procedures and responsibilities in extreme flood events with the stakeholders in advance to increase adaptive capacity and legitimacy of decisions.

Severe droughts cause substantial damage to different socio-economic sectors, and even Finland with abundant water resources is not immune to their impacts. To assess the implications of a severe drought in Finland, we carried out a national scale drought impact analysis. First, we simulated water levels and discharges during the severe drought of 1939&ndash, 1942 (the reference drought) in present-day Finland with a hydrological model. Second, we estimated how climate change would alter droughts. Thirdly, we assessed the impact of drought on key water use sectors, with a focus on hydropower and water supply. The results indicate that the long-lasting reference drought causes the discharges to decrease at most by 80% compared to average annual minimum discharges. The water levels generally fall to the lowest levels in the largest lakes in Central and South-Eastern Finland. Climate change scenarios project on average a small decrease in the lowest water levels during droughts. Severe drought would have a significant impact on water-related sectors, reducing water supply, and hydropower production. In this way drought is a risk multiplier for the water&ndash, energy&ndash, food security nexus. We suggest that the resilience to droughts could be improved with region-specific drought management plans and by including drought on existing regional preparedness exercises.

Severe droughts can affect water security even in countries with ample water resources. In addition, droughts are estimated to become more frequent in several regions due to changing climate. Drought affects many socio-economic sectors (e.g., agriculture, water supply, and industry), as it did in 2018 in Finland. Understanding the basin-wide picture is crucial in drought management planning. To identify vulnerable and water stressed areas in Finland, a water use-to-availability analysis was executed with a reference drought. Water stress was analyzed with the Water Depletion Index WDI. The analysis was executed using national water permits and databases. To represent a severe but realistic drought event, we modelled discharges and runoffs from the worst drought of the last century in Finland (1939&ndash, 1942). The potential for performing similar analyses in data scarce contexts was also tested using estimates from global models as a screening tool. The results show that the South and Southwest of Finland would have problems with water availability during a severe drought. The most vulnerable areas would benefit from drought mitigation measures and management plans. These measures could be incorporated into the EU River Basin Management Plans.

Water security demands guaranteeing economic, social and environmental sustainability and simultaneously addressing the diversity of risks and threats related to water. Various frameworks have been suggested to support water security assessment. They are typically based on indexes enabling national comparisons, these may, however, oversimplify complex and often contested water issues. We developed a structured and systemic way to assess water security and its future trends via a participatory process. The framework establishes a criteria hierarchy for water security, consisting of four main themes: the state of the water environment, human health and well-being, the sustainability of livelihoods, and the stability, functions and responsibility of society. The framework further enables the analysis of relationships between the water security criteria as well as between water, energy and food security. The framework was applied to a national water security assessment of Finland in 2018 and 2030. Our experience indicates that using the framework collaboratively with stakeholders provides a meaningful way to improve understanding and to facilitate discussion about the state of water security and the actions needed for its improvement.

MCDA is increasingly used to support participatory and collaborative processes. In this paper, we describe and evaluate four real-life environmental planning projects where MCDA was used in different ways to evaluate the alternatives and to support stakeholder involvement. Based on our experience, we present five approaches for eliciting preferences or criteria weights of stakeholders, which vary from an expert-driven to a personal interview approach. We compare the pros and cons of these approaches, and give recommendations regarding their use. We believe that better awareness of different approaches and their applicability would enable MCDA experts to design more effective, meaningful and practical participatory processes. Our cases are from environmental planning, but the framework and conclusions are generic and thus applicable to other fields as well.

Structuring problems for Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) has attracted increasing attention over the past 20 years from both a conceptual and a practical perspective. This is reflected in a significant growth in the number of published applications which use a formal approach to problem structuring in combination with an analytic method for multi-criteria analysis. The problem structuring approaches (PSMs) include general methodologies such as Checkland's Soft Systems Method (SSM), Eden and Ackermann's Strategic Options Design and Analysis (SODA) and other methods that focus on a particular aspect. We carried out a literature review that covers eight PSMs (Cognitive and Causal Maps, DPSIR, Scenario Planning, SSM, Stakeholder Analysis, Strategic Choice Approach, SODA and SWOT) and seven MCDA methods (AHP, ANP, ELECTRE, MAUT, MAVT, PROMETHEE and TOPSIS). We first identified and analysed 333 articles published during 2000-2015, then selected 68 articles covering all PSM-MCDA combinations, which were studied in detail to understand the associated processes, benefits and challenges. The three PSMs most commonly combined with MCDA are SWOT, Scenario Planning and DPSIR. AHP was by far the most commonly applied MCDA method. Combining PSMs with MCDA produces a richer view of the decision situation and enables more effective support for different phases of the decision-making process. Some limitations and challenges in combining PSMs and MCDA are also identified, most importantly relating to building a value tree and assigning criteria weights.

Multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA), also termed as multi-criteria assessment (MCA), is a powerful policy appraisal tool but as Stirling (2006) has suggested, it can be used both for opening up and closing down policy discourses. Our analysis of MCA in addressing a conflict between state forestry and indigenous Sami reindeer herding in Upper Lapland, Finland, illustrates MCA's potential in promoting open discussion about policy alternatives and their consequences, and also its limitations in highly controversial policy processes. The key features of the MCA process that served to open up policy discourse were the plural and conditional conclusions, which illustrated the diversity of viewpoints bearing on the Upper Lapland resource management conflict. The main risk of MCA to close down policy processes is to hide the scoring process and let the participants to focus only on the weighing stage. In the article, we present a novel approach to “interrogate uncertainties” and open up the information base. The Upper Lapland case study also illustrates the limits of MCA in the face of fundamental questions of ethical principle. MCA was helpful in addressing the problem situation that was formulated in terms of two competing livelihoods, forestry and reindeer herding, but unhelpful when the problem situation was formulated in terms of indigenous Sami people struggle for land rights.

Analytic–deliberative techniques have been suggested as a promising approach to ecosystem service (ES) valuation but are still at an experimental stage. This paper contributes to the development of ES valuation in the environmental impact assessment (EIA) procedure by introducing an analytic–deliberative approach to assessing restoration options for a regulated river in Finland. Multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) with a value-focused approach was applied and compared with a desktop application of the ES-focused MCDA approach. We found out that the concept of ES could bring added value to the assessment process by: 1) enabling the framing and valuing especially of provisioning services — final ecosystem services, such as salmon catch in a more understandable way for the stakeholders, and 2) taking into account ecosystem processes and supporting services more precisely. However, some potential dangers of using the ES-based approach could include ES's appearing as a distant mode of thinking to affected groups and other stakeholders, and neglect of the trade-offs between ES and other relevant value and impact categories. Thus, although the ES framework is promising, it should not form a rigid ‘checklist’ way of making assessments but should rather be used to widen perspectives about potential issues in linking ecosystem properties to human benefits and values. It is argued that by combining the ES framework with the interactive MCDA approach, we can form a comprehensive and integrated approach to incorporating ESs into EIA.

Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA) methods has been promoted as an alternative approach to monetary economic valuation of ecosystem services in Cost-Benefit Analysis framework (CBA). We discuss the potential of MCDA in providing a framework for integrated valuation of ecosystem services. We conclude that MCDA does in general perform better than CBA and associated monetary valuation techniques in several aspects that are essential in ecosystem service valuation. These include the ability of a valuation method to account for multiple dimensions of well-being, including ecological and economic as well as cultural and moral aspects of a policy or management problem and to facilitate open and transparent public debate on the pros and cons of alternative courses of action, including the distribution of gains and losses across beneficiaries of ecosystem services. The capacity of MCDA to articulate values related to ecosystem services depends on individual methods used in the MCDA process. More importantly, it depends of the ways in which the process is organized and facilitated. However, MCDA cannot provide representative information of the values of wider population. Further empirical and theoretical research is needed on the potential of hybrid methodologies to combine monetary valuation and MCDA in fruitful ways. Ecosystem services Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis Cost-Benefit Analysis Integrated valuation Non-monetary valuation

The European Union Water Framework Directive (WFD) has created a demand for comparing the benefits and costs of the remedial measures. A major part of the benefits from improved water quality relate to the increased recreational value. However, there is a lack of easily operative and widely applicable quantitative methods to assess the benefits of improved water quality for recreational use. We present a new model to link physical indicators of water quality, water feasibility indicators for different recreational uses, individuals’ perceptions concerning the current feasibility of water for recreational purposes and monetary measures of water-related recreation benefits. The model has been applied to nine lakes, three rivers and one large coastal area in Finland. In this paper, we present the principles of the method and the results from one case study. In Finland, the method has been applied for the economic analysis required in the WFD.

Controversy between alternative uses of forests in Finnish Upper Lapland has been going on for decades, and in recent years it has been escalated to a serious conflict. The core of the conflict is the adverse impacts of forestry on old forests which are important grazing areas for reindeer and which are regarded as intact nature and wilderness areas. This paper describes the experiences of applying multi-criteria decision analysis interview approach on this conflict. The approach provides tools for structuring the problem and preferences of the stakeholders as well as for analyzing the effects of different alternatives in a common framework. We focus on the practical experiences gained from the application of this approach in this context. Multi-criteria decision analysis was found to be a useful approach to evaluate the economic, ecological and cultural aspects of this intense conflict. The obtained experiences also support the view that the approach works best when tightly integrated into the planning process.

Multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) is a generic term for approaches supporting the systematic evaluation of alternatives in problems involving multiple criteria and stakeholders. One of the most challenging tasks is to gather preference information from stakeholders in a way that both reflects their true opinions and meets the theoretical requirements of the applied MCDA approach. Various techniques have been used in practice, including interviews and decision conferences. In this paper, we present a new cost-efficient approach in which an analyst generates weight profiles for various stakeholder groups. That is, instead of personally asking specific trade-off questions from the stakeholders, weight profiles are developed on the basis of more general preference information collected from the stakeholders. The potential advantages of this approach are: (i) the collection of the preferences using surveys is less laborious than personal interviews or decision conferences and (ii) the risk of cognitive biases in the weight elicitation can be reduced, because the most challenging task of MCDA — assigning weights to the criteria — is left to the analyst, who should be aware of typical biases and how to avoid them. We developed and tested the approach in a contested public decision-making situation related to the development of a new residential area. We utilised the data gathered from the participants of the workshops (21) as well as the data from a web survey including 177 responds via a randomly sampled closed survey, in addition to 484 responds via an open survey. Four preference profiles each having specific weight distributions to criteria were developed, using a multi-stage procedure. Four development alternatives were compared as based on the developed preference profiles. We were able to realise the MCDA process within a very tight time schedule, create plausible preference profiles and summarise each alternative’s pros and cons from different perspectives. However, we also identified several issues which have to be paid more attention in future cases or require further research.

The impacts of climate change on hydrology and water resources in the Vuoksi watershed in eastern Finland were studied in order to assess the possibilities to adapt lake regulation to the projected changes. A conceptual watershed model and several climate scenarios were used to estimate the effects of climate change on three lakes in the Vuoksi watershed for 2010-2039, 2040-2069 and 2070-2099. The adaptation possibilities were studied by using alternative regulation strategies. In Lake Pielinen the impacts of these water level changes on social, economic and ecological indicators were assessed with two different outflow strategies. According to the results, climate change will alter snow accumulation and melt and therefore cause large seasonal changes in runoff and water levels. Runoff and water levels will decrease during late spring and summer and increase during late autumn and winter. In some lakes current calendar-based regulation practices and limits, which have been developed based on past hydrology, may not be appropriate in the future. Modifying the regulation practices and limits is a necessary and effective way to adapt to climate change.

Public involvement is a process that involves the public in the decision making of an organization, for example a municipality or a corporation. It has developed into a widely accepted and recommended policy in environment altering projects. The EU Water Framework Directive (WFD) took force in 2000 and stresses the importance of public involvement in composing river basin management plans. Therefore, the need to develop public involvement methods for different situations and circumstances is evident. This paper describes how various public involvement methods have been applied in a development project involving the most heavily regulated lake in Finland. The objective of the project was to assess the positive and negative impacts of regulation and to find possibilities for alleviating the adverse impacts on recreational use and the aquatic ecosystem. An exceptional effort was made towards public involvement, which was closely connected to planning and decision making. The applied methods were (1) steering group work, (2) survey, (3) dialogue, (4) theme interviews, (5) public meeting and (6) workshops. The information gathered using these methods was utilized in different stages of the project, e.g., in identifying the regulation impacts, comparing alternatives and compiling the recommendations for regulation development. After describing our case and the results from the applied public involvement methods, we will discuss our experiences and the feedback from the public. We will also critically evaluate our own success in coping with public involvement challenges. In addition to that, we present general recommendations for dealing with these problematic issues based on our experiences, which provide new insights for applying various public involvement methods in multi-objective decision making projects.

Summary: Multicriteria decision analysis methods have been recently applied in many multifaceted and complex environmental problems. Major aims have been to structure and to analyse the complex problems, to compare incommensurable impacts and to clarify the preference order of alternatives. Most of the MCDM tools concentrate on describing the choice among the alternatives. The choice often occurs at the end of the decision-making process, but the process can be assisted with MCDM tools also earlier. The regulation development project of the Pirkanmaa region was a very complex one. There are four large regulated lakes which are connected to each other and a large constructed river downstream. The goal of the lake regulation development project of Pirkanmaa was to create new more sustainable regulation strategies for these lakes. The aim of this study was to clarify the objectives of various stakeholders and to analyse how the differences in their opinions affect target water levels. To structure the regulation development problem a new value-tree based Excel spreadsheet model (REGAIM) was developed. In the model the ecological, social and economic impacts of water levels fluctuation were combined with subjective preferences related to the importance of various impacts. The goal was to support generation of a regulation practice which would satisfy the objectives of the respondent. All in all 36 face to face computer aided interviews with the REGAIM model were undertaken. In this article we present how decision analysis interviews were applied in the first phase of the project. We also analyse the general applicability of this approach to regulation development projects.

Environmental decision making typically concerns several stakeholders with conflicting views. Multicriteria decision analysis provides transparent ways to elicit and communicate individual preferences. When the stakeholders clearly understand each other’s views, a consensus can be reached more easily. Computer software provides a substantial enhancement to support participatory decision making processes, for example, in the preference elicitation and in the analysis of the results. In this paper, we describe the first web-based multicriteria decision support software called Web-HIPRE, and the use of it in participatory environmental modelling. The world wide web provides new possibilities to support the process, for example, by allowing distributed decision support. The stakeholders can be located in different geographical areas, especially in environmental problems. We illustrate the

In this paper we describe a framework for multicriteria modeling and support of multi-stakeholder decision processes. We report on its testing in the development of a new water level management policy for a regulated lake-river system in Finland. In the framework the stakeholders are involved in the decision process from the problem structuring stage to the group consensus seeking stage followed by a stage of seeking public acceptance for the policy. The framework aims at creating an evolutionary learning process. In this paper we also focus on the use of a new interactive method for finding and identifying Pareto-optimal alternatives. Role playing experiments with students are used to test the practical applicability of a negotiation support procedure called the method of improving directions. We also describe the preference programming approach for the aggregation of the stakeholder opinions in the final evaluation of alternatives and consensus seeking.

The decision analysis interview-method is presented and experiences in applying it to the assessment of the environmental impacts of two water development projects are reported. The aim of the interviews was to clarify the opinions of different stakeholders and to increase public participation in planning. There were 59 personal and computer aided interviews. The computer program HIPRE 3 + used for the value-tree analysis is simple and flexible to use. It gives the possibility to combine different prioritization methods and the results can easily be presented in graphic form. Our case studies proved that decision analysis interviews can well be used in assessing the importance of environment impacts. It is a useful way of improving stakeholders' participation in environmental decision making and it provides a systematic way of dealing with conflicting opinions.

The proliferation of the Internet has opened new opportunities to support communication in participatory decision making. We now also have tools to support decision analytical approaches. These opportunities are of special interest in environmental policy problems, which typically include multiple objectives and stakeholders who are geographically distributed. However, we still have very limited experiences on the exploitation of these opportunities. In this chapter, we describe some web-based decision analytical tools and a framework for their use. We also discuss the ways and requirements to apply these tools and web support in environmental planning processes. The framework is reflected with experiences from four lake regulation projects in Finland. Our conclusions include that technology push does not work, but a culture of web-based participation develops through well-designed and documented case projects. Only then can we expect public stakeholders and authorities to accept this approach.

Regulation of water flow constitutes the most important hydromorphological burden to Finnish lakes. The total area of regulated lakes is nearly 11,000 km2, equalling one-third of the total area of Finnish inland waters. Extensive research projects have been carried out since the end of the 1980s to find out opportunities to mitigate harmful effects of the regulation of watercourses. A water-level fluctuation analysis tool, known as Regcel, has been developed to study water level data and to identify the most significant impacts. Results of the Regcel analysis give an overall picture of the impact of lake regulation in northern climate. The model is based on relationships between the water-level fluctuation and factors related to environmental, social and economical effects. Regcel has been used in 12 Lake Regulation Development Projects in Finland. In this article, we show how the Regcel model was applied in two cases.

There are always conflicting goals in the management of large water courses. However, by involving stakeholders actively in the planning and decision-making processes, it is possible to work together toward commonly acceptable solutions. In this article, we describe how we applied interactive multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA) in a collaborative process which aimed at an ecologically, socially, and economically sustainable water course regulation policy. The stakeholders’ opinions about the alternative regulation schemes and the relative importance of their impacts were elicited with the HIPRE software. Altogether, 20 personal interactive decision analysis interviews (DAIs) were carried out with the stakeholders. Our experience suggests that the DAIs can considerably improve the quality and efficiency of the collaborative planning process. By improving communication and understanding of the decision situation in the steering group, the approach helped to develop a consensus solution in a case having strong conflicts of interest. In order to gain the full benefits of the MCDA approach, interactive preference elicitation is vital. It is also essential to integrate the approach tightly into the planning and decision-making process. The project’s home pages are available to the public at http://www.paijanne.hut.fi/.

We applied the adaptive management approach to analyze the demand and feasibility of adaptive management of fish stocks in a large regulated lake, Oulujärvi, in northern Finland. The process consisted of four phases: (1) analysis of the current state of the fisheries system (fishers, related markets and industry, fisheries researches and authorities, related organizations, etc.); (2) analysis of the objectives of different stakeholders; (3) the composition of alternative management strategies and assessment of their impacts; and (4) recommendations for future management. We used catch statistics from the period 1973-1995 to analyze fish stocks and fishing. Fish species involved were brown trout (Salmo trutta L.), whitefish [Coregonus lavaretus (L.) sl.], vendace (Coregonus albula L.); and pikeperch (Stizostedion lucioperca L.). Questionnaires and interviews were applied to ascertain the opinions of different groups of fishermen. Several models and cost-benefit analysis were used to assess the ecological, economic, and social impacts of three alternative management strategies. The results emphasize that when determining stocking levels and fishing regulations, the system should be considered as a whole, and impacts on major fish species and different groups of fishermen should be assessed. The stocking policy and fishing regulations should also be flexible to accommodate changing biotic and societal conditions. The key questions in applying the adaptive management process in Oulujärvi fisheries are how to determine clear objectives for fisheries management, find a fisheries management structure that provides workable interactions between different stakeholders, and arrange cost-effective monitoring. The lessons learned from the Oulujärvi experience and recommendations for fisheries management are relevant to other lakes with conflicting objectives of different stakeholders.

Water level regulation due to hydropower production has caused notable changes in the littoral zones of regulated lakes and rivers. Heavy geomorphological changes have taken place in lakes with a raised water level, and a lowering of the ice cover during the winter causes rapid changes in the littoral benthos and vegetation. The scale of the harmful effects depends on both the range of regulated water level fluctuations and the water quality; clear water lakes are more resistant to water level regulation than humic lakes. The regulated lakes in northern Finland were subjected to intensive ecological research during the 1980s. Most of the studies were conducted by the water authorities and power companies. As a result of these studies, the principles of so‐called ecologically based regulation practices (ERP) have been applied to several lakes under hydropower production. This procedure is based on under water light climate and water level fluctuation data, which make it possible to calculate the proportion of the frozen littoral to the total littoral area. Another procedure calculates the biomass of the benthic fauna from data on water level fluctuation and Secchi depth. The ERP offers a simple way to illustrate to the regulation‐permit owners differences between various regulation practices. In the first case study on Lake Kostonjärvi, the new regulation practice was developed in 1991. The new practice included a higher water level target during the winter and a well‐defined target for the spring flood water level. During the open water period, high water levels should be avoided. The ERP was successfully put into effect with the exception of 1994, although the annual mean loss for hydropower production was US $0.14 million. In the second case study on Lake Oulujärvi, interest was focused on the higher summertime water level, which should prevent the spread of emergent vegetation. Owing to the high costs of the ERP (US $5 million) a new plan with a lower summertime water level target (122.5 m) and other complementary rehabilitation methods, including removal of shore vegetation, was applied in Oulujärvi.

Democratic societies’ emphasis on individual rights and freedoms inevitably opens them up to political disputes. Conflict management should thus be seen as an integral part of democratic institutional design. The evolution and management of policy disputes concerning the use of different natural resources in Finland is analysed by using the theoretical models of frame analysis and strategic interaction. The studied disputes include lake fisheries, watercourse regulation, reindeer herding, and forestry. The institutional design in the case studies varies. Despite the differences, many common features are identified that could explain their successes or difficulties in achieving sustainable and cooperative use of the resources. Among these are problems involving complex and uncertain knowledge, differences in frames held by multiple users of a resource, and distrust between the users and other parties. The analysis concludes with preliminary conclusions on how various disputes related to sustainable resource use could be managed. These include addressing the knowledge and frame problems in order to initiate a learning process; establishing sub-processes in which mutual trust between the parties – including a managing authority or a third party – can emerge; giving explicit roles and a clear division of entitlement to the parties; and providing a credible alternative for co-operation that affects the parties’ payoff assessments during the process. Finally, the conflict management process shouldn’t be regarded as a distinct phase of dispute resolution, but as an essential aspect of ongoing co-management practices of resource use.