Ett bakslag för klimatet, eller för en hållbar utveckling?

Sammanfattning: Climate change is becoming increasingly present and the individual responsibility of states, as well as global corporations, are emphasized as absolutely necessary in order to be able to achieve sustainable development for future generations. This essay is a descriptive discourse analysis about Norway's oil extraction in the vulnerable Arctic region. The goal of this essay is to examine how the Norwegian oil- and energy department, and Norway's current prime minister are justifying their actions and how they represent the problem to be. More specifically, to see how they justify their decisions in the light of their current climate policies and in the context of the global climate debate, something that can be seen as a paradox. The framework of the analysis is based on the poststructuralist and constructivist discourse theory of Carol Bacchi and the concept of Nordic Exceptionalism. The methodology chosen is Carol Bacchi's WPR-text analysis, based on three questions; focusing on the problematization, what underlies the representation of the ‘problem’ and what is left unproblematic. The analysis shows that the actor's representation of the problem is based on assumptions in line with Nordic Exceptionalism. By doing so, other important aspects of the problem are excluded, such as the rights of indigenous peoples and consequences on the climate crisis itself.