This paper explores religious perceptions of disasters and their implications for post-disaster processes of religious and cultural change. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in post-tsunami Samoa, this study investigates how people in two tsunami-affected villages make sense of the tsunami, its causes and impact based on different Christian understandings: the tsunami as divine punishment or as a sign of the Second Coming. I argue that these different perceptions of the tsunami are used in bringing about or opposing religious and cultural change based on different ideals of continuity and change.

Svalbard’s cultural heritage sites are important remnants of an international history in the High North. Cultural heritage in the Arctic is being impacted by climate and environmental change as well as increased human activity. Tourism is a potential cause of transformation in cultural heritage sites, such as increased wear and tear, creation of paths and traces as people walk through cultural environments. Cultural heritage management is therefore an increasingly challenging endeavor as management authorities must take under consideration multiple impacts and threats to cultural heritage sites in a changing environment. Based on research conducted in Svalbard from 2014 to 2016 on methods for long-term systematic cultural heritage monitoring, this paper will discuss dilemmas for a sustainable use and management of vulnerable cultural heritage sites in the Arctic.

Knowledge of hunter attitudes toward goose management is essential for the involvement of hunters in adaptive harvest management. Our study provides insight into processes of stakeholder involvement in adaptive harvest management, as demonstrated by the case of implementing the International Species Management Plan for the Svalbard-breeding pink-footed goose (Anser brachyrhynchus). We conducted an online survey among goose hunters in Norway in the main autumn staging area of this species, Nord-Trøndelag, which is also the area in which most geese are harvested nationally. Our results demonstrated that a majority of these hunters see themselves as active participants in management. These hunters expressed a willingness to support management objectives through the delivery of daily harvest reports and by complying with regulations, as defined by national wildlife authorities and the international management plan.

Indigenous leadership in salmon governance is associated with values and principles such as recognition of Indigenous rights and jurisdictions by states, meaningful involvement and participation of Indigenous knowledge holders in the knowledge basis for management, and respectful and reciprocal relations between humans and salmon. Inspired by examples of Indigenous leadership in salmon governance in North America and in Finland, the authors of this chapter seek to identify a constructive role for Sami leadership in Nordic state wild salmon governance. Even though the Nordic countries, in principle, recognize Indigenous resource rights, there are few examples of Indigenous leadership in watershed governance. An especially thorny issue is the cross‐border salmon management on the Deatnu/Tana River as a border river between Norway and Finland. A nearby example of Skolt Sami leadership in co-management of the Njâuddam/Näätämö River in Finland is, however, a relevant and hopeful example of the possibility of Sami leadership and inclusion of Indigenous knowledge in salmon governance and river restoration. In this article, we present the Njâuddam/Näätämö and the Deatnu watershed governance arrangements as two examples at opposite ends of a scale of Indigenous leadership in salmon management in the Nordic countries. We compare and discuss the two cases along the dimensions of participation in governance and in knowledge production, addressing key points that need to be resolved for Indigenous leadership to play a constructive role in interaction with state salmon governance and knowledge production systems. In conclusion, we consider the possible lessons to be learned and discuss challenges and opportunities for Indigenous empowerment and for increasing the sustainability of salmon governance at large.