Policy coherence analysis enables government to prevent unplanned duplication, reduce conflict, and assess whether policies are working towards the same objective. There are two ways to analyse policy coherence: horizontally (relations between policies) and vertically (within policies, across objectives).

Focusing on goals derived from Scottish Government policy commitments related to land use transformation – such as limiting global temperature rise, restoring and regenerating habitats, addressing climate adaption pressures, maintaining or increasing economic prosperity, and promoting distributional justice in land use – our colleague Graciela Martinez collaborated with scientists at JHI and SRUC to identify and select sixty-six policies for coherency analysis. Each policy was classified according to a topic group (Climate Change, Socio-economic Land use, or Environmental and Agriculture/Forestry Land Use) and a policy mechanism (Steering Strategies or Primary Legislation and Instruments). The data were then converted into an adjacency matrix for data visualisation. A total of 169 connections between policies were identified, with only 13 reciprocal relationships. An in-depth analysis was also conducted on connections involving 11 agricultural policies with 78 links between a total of 42 policy documents. 

The analysis uncovered a robust basis for policy coherence by demonstrating many connections between policies and across topic groups, especially in the dense links identified between agricultural and environmental policies. The in-depth analysis of agricultural policies highlighted the lack of non-environmental policies in their relationships. This was identified as an opportunity to enhance policy coherence. 

Figure: Diagram of vertical and horizontal policy coherence relationships.

The full findings of the study were published in the journal of Environmental Management and are accessible at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2024.123927.

The study was performed in collaboration with Dr. Hebe Nicholson, Dr. Kirsty Blackstock, Dr. Sam Poskitt, Alba Juarez-Bourke, Dr. Keith Matthews, Dr. Jean Boucher, Dr. James Glendinning, Dr. Alexa Green, Dr. Ian Merrell, Dr. Steven Thomson.

This work was funded under the Underpinning National Capacity element of the Scottish Government's Strategic Research Programme for Environment, Agriculture and Food.