SUSTAINABILITY AND

STRATEGIC AUDIT
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 MODULE
3
STRATEGIC ENVIRONMENTAL
ANALYSIS

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Introduction
Strategic Environmental Analysis (SEAN) is a structured, participatory
process to analyse environmental problems and opportunities for
development, to identify main actors, and to define strategic goals at early stages.

Diverse applications in developing countries have refined its framework,

guidelines, tools and checklists. It has an integrative focus on linkages of
environmental and socio-economic issues of sustainability.

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Learning Objectives:

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Objectives and main characteristics of SEAN:

SEAN basically deals with the interactions between ecosystems and

human society, and aims to develop insight in these complex
interrelations and agree upon strategic goals.
SEAN can be defined as a participatory process being structured by
an analytical framework, to analyse the environmental problems
and opportunities for human development, to identify the main
actors involved, and to define strategic goals at early stages of
decision making or planning.

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SEAN has the long-term objective t o mainstream environmental issues into
development planning processes by raising the level of knowledge on the
environmental context and its interrelations with the other dimensions of
sustainable development. Short-term objectives are:
To analyse the environmental context of human development,
the opportunities and constraints;
To gain insight into the relations between environmental key issues and other
dimensions of sustainable development (social, economic, institutional issues); To
define a vision and strategic goals with relevant actors, as inputs
for planning of sustainable development strategies at early
stages of decision making;
To stimulate and provide guidance to an interactive process with
actors involved.

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 SEAN has been applied as a framework for regional planning by
decentralised government agencies, to bring together relevant actors, develop
a common vision and strategic goals for regional development, and by
environmental NGOs to develop their own strategy.

Process and Analytical Framework

SEAN consists of a participatory process of creating insights, mutual learning and making
strategic choices. This process is roughly structured by five phases which can be briefly
summarised as: preparation; scoping; detailed studies; synthesis and planning; follow-up
and monitoring (Figure 18).

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Figure 18. The Five phases of the SEAN process, and the analytical tasks to be performed in each

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The following concepts are the basis of the SEAN process and
analytical framework.

1. Multiple users and multi-functionality of environmental systems.

2. Objective and subjective value judgements.
3. Limits of acceptable environmental change.
4. Environmental problems as a normative perception.
5. Social causality of problems and opportunities.
6. Interrelationships between sustainable development components.
7. Opportunities and initiatives as strategic building blocks.
8. Strategic partnerships.
9. Micro–meso–-macro linkages.

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Particular attention is given to so-called ‘absent stakeholder’ groups,
including future generations, outside communities and critical nature
values. These ‘absent stakeholders’ need to be represented by
environmentally or socially oriented organisations.

Figure 19. SEAN as a process of rational analysis and openness to socio-political

events and opportunities

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Positioning Strategic Environmental Analysis
SEAN brings together elements from different conceptual and
methodological planning and environmental assessment
backgrounds, and is therefore difficult to position.
SEAN can easily be confused with strategic environmental
assessment (SEA).
SEAN can basically be considered as an integrated and open- ended
planning tool, but shows similarity with SEA, aimed at informing
and influencing policy making processes at early stages.

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Figure 20. Position of SEAN in relation to other environmental assessment
methods

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To work out interrelations between sustainable
development dimensions, the following final goals have
been defined:

ecological: stability and diversity;

socio-institutional: autonomy, health, security and equity;
economic: production and efficiency.

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 To achieve strong
integration between the
different components of an
integrated analysis process
(Figure 21).

Figure 21. SEAN as part of an integrated sustainability analysis,

with strong linkages between the different dimensions

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Current globalisation processes and changes to the regulatory and
institutional frameworks in many countries further complicate this task.
SEAN aims to support integrated analysis and planning, by:

being initiated early in the decision making process, similar to (spatial)

planning;
actively involving planners and decision makers in the process;
generating outputs that are useful for planners: guidelines;
criteria and norms for environmental management, strategic goals and
priorities, key actors to involve, opportunities and win–win options, tasks and
functions for institutions to fulfil, and so on.

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Experiences and Potential Application

SEAN was developed through experiences in a number of

developing countries: Zimbabwe, Ghana, Benin and Nicaragua, and
has by now been applied under different conditions, by different
organisations, including the SNV, Netherlands Directorate General for
Development Aid (DGIS), Dutch co-funding organisations, the
International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and the
World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

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Potential Applications and Users
The SEAN process and analytical framework has most potential to
support and provide inputs in early phases of policy making or
planning processes that are relatively open-ended and have a broad,
holistic sustainable development perspective.
SEAN has so far been applied both as an informal and
as a formal planning process.
As a formal process, SEAN has been used to
support
decentralised development planning.
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SEAN can be applied to different (administrative or planning) areas, to
sectors or to single steps in the planning process.
SEAN particularly addresses micro-meso-macro dynamics, and brings
together actors from various institutional levels (vertical integration)
during a participatory process (Bass et al, 1995).
The meso-scale is suitable for application because it meets the
requirement of stakeholders being able to perceive concrete issues in their
environment and express themselves, and the requirement of policy
makers being sufficiently informed and able to negotiate with stakeholders
(Hoefsloot and van den Berg, 1998).

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Time and budget requirements mainly
depend on:
the required level of detail and the existence and availability of
relevant data and information (for instance, environmental action plans,
rapid rural assessments, land-use surveys);
experience and expertise of the core SEAN team responsible for
execution of the tasks;
level of application, complexity of the situation and occurrence of
sensitive issues;
effectiveness of local co-ordination and clarity of ownership.

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SEAN Analysis and Planning Process

1. Preparation
2. Scoping
3. Detailed studies
4.Synthesis and planning 5.
Follow-up and monitoring
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Figure 22. Summary of task 3: impacts of priority environmental trends on key issues for
stakeholders (each signed based on documented evidence)

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 Figure 23. Result of task 6:
simplified actor’s network, with
some examples, showing linkages
between actors, obtained through
insight into underlying factors that
influence options and motivations of
actors

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Figure 24. Linking SEAN outputs with results of an institutional analysis to define desirable institutional
reform

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Conclusions and Challenges
It appears that SEAN meets a demand by development organisations to support:

taking into consideration environmental issues early in decision-making

processes;
looking at the environment in a proactive and positive way, for development
purposes;
integrating environmental issues with results from social and economic
analyses, with a holistic sustainable development perspective;
defining key actors that must be addressed and involved to move forward

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Establishing effective monitoring systems for
adaptive management
Defining a common vision and strategic goals is important as
livelihood and environmental management systems are becoming more
complex and more uncertainties are involved. It raises the question of
how to conceive the plan, which contents are necessary and how to
‘manage’ the plan, in order to be functional in an unpredictable and
dynamic context.

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