How can we build collaborative ecosystems for sustainable, resilient, and innovative cities?
This article is part of a series dedicated to exploring and documenting best practices from Romanian and Norwegian partner cities within the framework of the project “Climate-Neutral and Smart Cities: Planning, Piloting, Inspiring” (2024–2025). Supported by the EEA and Norwegian Grants under the Bilateral Relations Fund, this initiative fosters cross-border collaboration and knowledge exchange to navigate the complex pathways toward climate neutrality.
Governance as the Foundation for Climate Action
To continue showcasing best practice examples from Norwegian cities, this piece focuses on adaptive governance and gamification as engagement strategies, pivotal elements in ensuring sustainable urban transformations.
The urban transition towards climate neutrality is not just a challenge of technology and resources—it is a challenge of governance and collaboration. With the EU’s Climate Neutral Cities Mission and the Paris Agreement as guiding frameworks, cities worldwide are rethinking how they operate. Central to this transformation are two vital concepts: adaptive governance and gamification. Together, they provide a blueprint for managing urban complexities while engaging citizens and stakeholders in meaningful ways.
Adaptive governance transitions away from rigid and prescriptive systems to embrace a flexible, participatory approach, tailored to the complex and uncertain nature of modern urban challenges. It recognizes that each project and context demands unique strategies, as universal solutions fail to address the nuanced realities of diverse stakeholders and fluctuating environmental conditions. By prioritizing collaboration, continuous learning, and inclusivity, adaptive governance becomes a cornerstone in achieving climate neutrality, enabling cities to adapt dynamically while fostering resilience and inclusivity within their governance frameworks. This strategy aligns with the principles of sustainable urban transformation, ensuring that diverse and often conflicting interests converge on shared, actionable goals.
Gamification leverages game elements and mechanics to transform citizen participation into an engaging and motivational experience. Recognizing that traditional methods often fail to sustain interest or foster deep involvement, gamification introduces an interactive and rewarding framework that captivates diverse participants. From point systems and challenges to collaborative platforms, these elements foster a sense of achievement and community among citizens. In the context of climate neutrality, gamification not only enhances public engagement but also enables innovative approaches to participatory governance. By merging entertainment with civic responsibility, it empowers individuals to contribute meaningfully to transformative urban strategies, ensuring their voices are integral to sustainable change.
Trondheim’s Strategic and Collaborative Governance: Long-Term Planning with Adaptive Strategies
Adaptive Governance: The Role of the Climate Department
Trondheim’s Climate Department exemplifies how a dedicated, cross-departmental working group can drive urban sustainability transitions. Since the inception of the city’s Climate Strategy in 2008, the department h`as played a pivotal role in adapting plans to address both global imperatives and local challenges. Operating as a central hub, the Climate Department integrates inputs from diverse municipal sectors, ensuring cohesive action toward climate neutrality by 2030.
Through iterative updates of the Climate Strategy, the department employs adaptive governance frameworks to respond to emerging data and shifting priorities. This flexibility allows Trondheim to maintain alignment with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) while prioritizing resilience and equity. For example, by engaging in scenario-based planning, the city evaluates potential impacts of climate interventions, mitigating risks and leveraging opportunities for innovation.
Having a dedicated working group fosters accountability, facilitates knowledge sharing, and accelerates decision-making. As Trondheim navigates its sustainability journey, the Climate Department demonstrates the importance of institutional structures that champion adaptive, long-term strategies.
Creative Urban Regeneration as a Governance Tool
Revitalizing Cultural Identity: The Nyhavna District
In the Nyhavna district, Trondheim’s approach to urban regeneration intertwines cultural identity with governance innovation. At the heart of this transformation lies HAVET, a creative hub revitalizing a neglected harbor area through community-driven initiatives. This space serves not only as a catalyst for economic activity but also as a meeting point where residents and stakeholders co-create a vision for their city.
The success of HAVET underscores the importance of cultural identity in mobilizing public support for urban transformation. By embracing grassroots movements and fostering a sense of ownership, Trondheim cultivates trust and social cohesion. The hub functions as a microcosm of sustainable governance, integrating artistic expression with inclusive urban planning.
Moreover, the project illustrates how creative hubs can act as platforms for experimentation and collaboration. Whether hosting workshops, exhibitions, or co-design sessions, HAVET invites diverse voices into the conversation, ensuring that urban regeneration reflects community aspirations. Trondheim’s experience highlights how investing in cultural infrastructure can inspire collective action, driving sustainable change from the ground up.
Stakeholder Engagement with Participatory Tools
Fostering Collaboration Through the Impact Model Game Trondheim’s commitment to stakeholder engagement is exemplified by the NTNU-developed Impact Model Game, an innovative tool designed to align diverse actors in climate initiatives. By mapping co-benefits, the game creates a shared understanding of how different actions contribute to overarching goals, ensuring that policies and interventions reflect the needs of all stakeholders.
The Impact Model Game enables participants to visualize complex interactions between environmental, economic, and social factors, fostering a sense of collective ownership. This participatory approach encourages dialogue and cooperation, helping stakeholders identify mutually beneficial solutions and prioritize actions with the greatest potential impact.
Central to the success of the game is its ability to bridge gaps between technical experts, policymakers, and community members. By presenting scenarios in an accessible and engaging format, it democratizes decision-making processes, ensuring that all voices are heard. Trondheim’s use of the Impact Model Game highlights the importance of participatory tools in driving inclusive and effective climate governance.
Key Takeaways for Romanian Cities
1. Establish a Climate Department: Romanian cities can significantly benefit from establishing dedicated climate departments that assume a central coordinating role, similar to Trondheim’s Climate Department. By unifying efforts across different municipal sectors, these departments can drive cohesive, long-term climate strategies that are flexible, participatory, and informed by real-time data.
2. Transforming Civic Participation Through Gamification and Participatory Tools: Employing innovative, game-based platforms—such as the Impact Model Game—enables Romanian cities to engage citizens and stakeholders more deeply in shaping climate policies. These participatory tools use accessible, interactive mechanisms to elucidate complex trade-offs, highlight shared benefits, and foster a collective sense of ownership. By integrating game elements into public consultations and policy discussions, cities can draw a wider range of voices into the conversation, ensuring that climate neutrality goals are transparent, inclusive, and widely supported.
3. Embracing Cultural Identity to Drive Urban Regeneration: Urban transformations anchored in cultural identity and community involvement—like Trondheim’s Nyhavna district—offer a powerful blueprint for Romanian cities. By revitalizing neglected areas through creative hubs and bottom-up initiatives, municipalities can strengthen social cohesion, channel local values into spatial planning, and inspire broad-based participation in sustainability efforts. Fusing cultural heritage, arts, and participatory governance ultimately helps bridge the gap between ambitious climate targets and the lived realities of urban residents.
To accelerate progress toward climate neutrality, Romanian cities must focus on implementing actionable strategies drawn from best practices while addressing local challenges. Establishing centralized climate departments should be prioritized to ensure coordinated governance and adaptive capacity in response to dynamic urban needs. Simultaneously, municipalities should explore participatory tools such as serious games to deepen citizen engagement and integrate diverse perspectives into policy-making. Investments in cultural and community-driven urban regeneration initiatives will be essential to mobilize support and foster social cohesion. By initiating these steps and building multi-sector partnerships, Romanian cities can lay the groundwork for transformative, inclusive, and sustainable urban futures.
