Monitoring and assessment in the context of governance of nature-based solutions. Shared challenges and opportunities in CELAC and EU cities

Abstract

The concept of Nature-based Solutions (NbS) has gained interest as an approach to make significant contributions to the transformation towards more liveable, sustainable, and climate-resilient cities. However, the uptake of NbS into urban development practice is hindered by knowledge and governance barriers. Knowledge plays an essential role in evidence-based decision-making processes and in building the capacity to co-design sustainable pathways. In turn, governance processes can greatly support the acquisition, dissemination and application of knowledge. However, little is known about how these interactions between governance and knowledge manifest in practice. Therefore, we aim to understand the interplay between governance and monitoring & assessment (M&A) and the associated challenges and opportunities for NbS implementation in European and Latin American cities. Considering different socio-economic and cultural contexts allows us to draw from a wider range of practitioners’ experiences in different governance settings. We conducted an explorative qualitative content analysis on ten semi-structured expert interviews with thirteen city experts from local governments and academia based in seven cities: Bogota (CO), Buenos Aires (AR), Santiago (CL), São Paulo (BR), Barcelona (ES), Lisbon (PT) and Turin (IT). Our findings show that M&A provides agency for individual, institutional actors to steer political commitment and can support integrated working. The potential of collaborative M&A with non-governmental actors is still largely untapped, which requires acknowledgement of the capacities of non-governmental actors to contribute to M&A and raise awareness of the value of M&A to civil society. Furthermore, we recommend integrating more reflective learning opportunities in M&A processes, paying more attention to data sharing, and considering of more feasible M&A processes.