What drives forest management responses to climate change and climate-induced disturbances? : An assessment of the perceptions of national-level actors in four European countries

Pezdevšek Malovrh, Špela (author), Roux, Jeanne-Lazya (author), Sotirov, Metodi (author), Nilsson, Jens (author), Niedzialkowski, Krzysztof (author), Uhan, Zala (author), Mielewczyk, Marcin (author), Renaud, Pascal (author)

Over the last decades, climate change and climate-induced disturbances have had an increasing impact on European forests. As climate change and disturbances alter the operational environment of forest management, measures need to be taken not only by practitioners on the ground, but also decision-making levels involving actors within the forest policy subsystem. This study examines how forest policy subsystem actors in Germany, Poland, Slovenia and Sweden perceive the importance of the driving factors influencing practitioners' responses to climate change and climate-induced disturbances. Based on a literature review, 28 driving factors were identified and grouped into STEEP categories. These were then discussed and evaluated in focus groups, in which the actors ranked their perceived importance. The results show considerable variation between the countries in how STEEP categories are rated. In Poland, Slovenia and Sweden, actors reported significant differences in the importance of certain STEEP categories, while in Germany perceptions were more balanced. The Technological category was ranked as least important in all countries. Six driving factors were ranked as particularly influential: ownership patterns and practitioners' values, objectives and experiences (Socio-cultural category), incentives (Economic category), increased occurrence of calamities and climate-related disturbances and successfully adapted management practice (Environmental category), and policy coherence (Political category). Socio-cultural driving factors were most frequently emphasized across all categories. Integrating structural and actor-centred perspectives can improve understanding of the complex processes shaping forest management under climate change, and provides a basis for more effective and context-sensitive policy design.

• Language: English
• Keywords: forest disturbances, climate change, driving factors, practitioners' forest management response, STEEP categories
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: BF - Biotechnical Faculty
• Publication status: Published
• Publication version: Version of Record
• Year: 2026
• Number of pages: 16 str.
• Numbering: Vol. 191, art.103897
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-187941
• UDC: 630*111.8
• ISSN on article: 1872-7050
• DOI: 10.1016/j.forpol.2026.103897
• COBISS.SI-ID: 290828803
• Publication date in RUL: 16.09.2026

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Forest Policy and Economics
• Publisher: Elsevier
• ISSN: 1872-7050
• COBISS.SI-ID: 23098885

Licences

• License: CC BY 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Description: This is the standard Creative Commons license that gives others maximum freedom to do what they want with the work as long as they credit the author.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: ujme, podnebne spremembe, gonilni dejavniki, odziv izvajalcev na področju gospodarjenja z gozdovi, kategorije STEEP