Unwinding Coalitions. An analysis of discourse coalitions for offshore windfarm development in Katwijk

Abstract

There has been controversy regarding the plan to install offshore windfarms in the 12-mile zone, an area in which the windmills are visible, in Dutch coastal villages, among which Katwijk. Local government, economy and population claim setbacks regarding their economy, harm to wildlife and visual pollution. This has resulted in protests and lawsuits, which delayed the installation of the windfarms. Meanwhile the different stakeholders kept up varying storylines, coming from varying social constructs, called discourses. As stakeholders combined their forces and storylines, they are called discourse coalitions. The influences of given coalitions on policy has not been researched. Therefore, this thesis researches the influence of discourse coalitions in the policy for offshore windfarms in the 12-mile zone in Katwijk. By gathering data from newspaper articles and social media outings, arguments and storylines made by stakeholders could be bundled. The statements were coded through Discourse Network Analyzer. From this the individual discourses were assessed, and the DNA presented visualizations of the discourse coalitions that are in place. This resulted in two coalitions: the proponents (National government, NGOs, and Pro-local population) and the opponents (Local government, Local economy, Protest groups and Con-local population). The main differences that were raised, were the differences in prioritization – renewable energy or local livelihood were respectively thought to be highest priority – and differences in created knowledge – whether the windmills can be seen from the coast, whether local economy will suffer and whether wildlife will be harmed. The debates between the coalitions revolved around these two disagreements. The influences of the discourse coalitions were measured through structuration (dominance in national news coverage) and institutionalization (dominance in policies) (Hajer, 2002). By analyzing the most read papers of the Netherlands, both discourses seemed subject to structuration, but only the proponents were dominant in the policies, which means that they had greatest influence. The research shows hostility between the coalitions and in that sense confirms earlier researches (Wolsink, 2010; Devine-Wright, 2011; Van Ernst et al, 2014) that say that timelier public participation is very important in cases that involve renewable energy projects, as local disadvantages may be experienced as sacrifices to national benefits, and this creates controversies.