Overview

Land use policies by themselves can be undermined and will contribute less to the community if they are disconnected from each other and from a broader embedding strategy. At the same time, such strategy will achieve less if it is disconnected from what people in the community believe their current and future community to be. Understanding how long-term perspectives have emerged, how they are linked to strategy, and in turn, how land use tools are embedded (or not) in strategy requires a close examination of a community’s governance path — how governance has evolved in a particular context. For the Alberta communities studied, the differences were greater than the similarities. The diversity in governance paths or the development of their governance systems allowed us to discern key features which were enabling or problematic in the formation of strategy, in moving in a particular direction, and in the coupling of strategy, long-term perspectives, and land use tools.