The advocacy coalition framework: application to the policy process for the development of forest certification in Sweden

The advocacy coalition framework (ACF) has been developed to study complex public policy processes involving multiple actors. In this article it is applied to the 'private policy process' of the development of a forest certification programme in Sweden, in which the main actors were large forest companies, private forest owners and non-governmental conservation organizations. The case study provides support for several ACF hypotheses and confirms its validity as a framework for studying a private policy process which was heavily influenced by international events external to the Swedish forestry subsystem. It also provides an example of the modification of coalition membership which is not predicted in the ACF. Accordingly, a new hypothesis on this topic is proposed.