Atle Midttun is a professor at the Norwegian Business School, the Department of Innovation and Economic Organisation. He is a co-director of two of the school's research centres: The Centre for Energy and Environment, and The Centre for Corporate Responsibility. Prior to his work at The Norwegian Business School, Atle Midttun was a researcher at the Resource Studies Group, under the Norwegian Research Council for Technical and Natural Sciences (1982-85), a research assistant at the Institute for Social studies (1981-82) and at the Institute of Sociology at the University of Oslo (1979-81).
Atle Midttun has had visiting professorships at Standford University, Woods Institute for the Environment; Université Paris Sud, Faculté Jean Monet; the University of Michigan, Business School/School of Natural Resources. He has been a visiting Scholar at the Univeristy of California, Berkeley, Haas School of Business, the Max Planck Institute for Social Science in Köln, and the University of Aalborg.
Atle Midttun is a member of the editorial committees in European Management Review, the Energy & Environment Journal; Corporate Governance: The International Journal of Business in Society; and Energy Policy (1995-2014).
This article analyses the European petroleum industry's climate engagement over the two first decades of this century. It studies strategic visions and business models, alongside revenue streams and investment patterns, in the five largest European petroleum companies. The analysis shows how the European petroleum majors, starting from ‘climate negligence’, gradually moved into ‘clean petroleum’ and ended up with visions of ‘net zero’ transition out of oil and gas, while revenue streams remained almost exclusively petroleum-based. It displays how the gap between economic realities and professed climate strategy responds to contradictory signals from politics and markets. While European politicians stepped up expectations for radical CO 2 reduction, markets supported petroleum. Companies therefore adjusted climate-strategic visions to political pressure for legitimacy, while adapting commercial practice to profits from oil & gas markets. Finally, our study demonstrates how policy and markets could be better realigned. For example, the EU's Green Deal, in tune with declining costs of renewables and rapidly increasing CO 2 prices, presents interesting paths towards profitable greening. Early moves from pioneering petroleum companies demonstrate that it can be done. However, greening European energy production is not enough. Climate effects will only come if consumption follows suit.
Midttun, Atle (2022)
Governance and business models for sustainable capitalism
Routledge.
Governance and Business Models for Sustainable Capitalism touches upon many of the central themes of today’s debate on business and society. In particular, it brings attention to a recurrent tension between efficiency, innovation, and productivity on the one hand, and fairness, equity, and sustainability on the other. The book argues that we need radical rethinking of business models and economic governance, beyond the classical doctrine, which sees social and ecological responsibility as lying with public-policy regulation of purely profit-seeking firms. In spite of the popular CSR agenda, business – as we know it today – is both too transient and too limited in its motivation to carry the regulatory burden. We need to adopt a much wider concept of 'partnered governance', where advanced states and pioneering companies work together to raise the social and environmental bar. The book suggests that civil engagements based on moral rather than formal rights, and amplified through the media, may provide a healthy challenge both to autocratic planning and to solely profit-centered commercialization. The book also proposes a triple cycle theory of innovation for sustainability: a novel framing of the efficacy of green and prosocial entrepreneurship as intertwined with political visions and supportive institutions. In addition, the book offers reflections on the ways in which further digital robotizaton may enable transition to an ‘Agora Economy’ where productive efficiency is combined with expanded civic freedoms. Aimed primarily at researchers, academics, and students in the fields of political economy, business and society, corporate governance, business ethics, corporate social responsibility, and sustainability, the book will additionally be of value to practitioners, supplying them with information regarding the challenges associated with the shaping of sustainable or ‘civilised’ market capitalism for a better world.
Jåstad, Eirik Ogner; Bolkesjø, Torjus Folsland, Rørstad, Per Kr., Midttun, Atle, Sandquist, Judit & Trømborg, Erik (2021)
The future role of forest-based biofuels: Industrial impacts in the Nordic countries
This study applies a partial equilibrium forest sector model to analyse the impacts of biofuel deployment for road transport in the Nordic countries, when alternative use of the biomass resources and transport sector electrification are considered. We foresee a strong electrification of the transport sector, resulting in a demand for biofuels of approximately 2.5 billion L in 2035 and 1 billion L in 2050 in a 100% fossil-free base scenario. The simultaneous increase in demand from pulping industries and biofuel will cause an overall increase in wood use, of which the biofuels share will constitute approximately 20–25%. The utilization of harvest residues will increase more than 300% compared to the current level, since biofuel production will reallocate some of the current raw material used in district heating. Biofuel consumption in road transport will likely reduce after 2040 due to increasing electrification, but it is plausible that the declining domestic demand will be replaced by increasing demand from international biofuel markets in aviation and shipping. The main uncertainties in the scenarios are the future costs and profitability of forest-based biofuel technologies and the public acceptance of the close to 100 TWh of new renewable electricity production needed for the electrification of Nordic road transport
Midttun, Atle & Witoszek, Nina (2019)
The Competitive Advantage of Collaboration – Throwing New Light on The Nordic Model
In one of the most influential contributions to modern political economy, Hall and Soskice have launched a distinction between ‘liberal’ and ‘coordinated’ market economies, placing the Nordic countries firmly in the latter category. We argue that, while the H&S distinction may serve classificatory purposes, seeing the Nordic model in terms of ‘coordinated capitalism’ blurs the distinctive features of the Nordic countries’ success as productive and fair economies. We contend that the central formula behind this success lies in what we call the Nordic model’s ambidexterity – the capacity to combine collaborative and competitive elements and skilfully navigate between them. Using an interdisciplinary perspective (inspired by organisation theory, cultural semiotics and evolutionary analysis), we provide a conceptual basis for reinterpreting the Nordic Model as an ambidextrous combination of culturally rooted, collaborative strategies that are subsequently competitively exposed. The article illustrates the workings of this ambidexterity in three societal domains: work life (including female participation), resource management – illustrated by the Norwegian petro-economy – and international business management and regulation with a focus on CSR. In each case we will show how collaboration is intertwined with pragmatic competitive exposure, yielding high productivity, high welfare, as well as fair income and wealth distribution.
The article explores the interplay between policy, technological innovation and market dynamics. It highlights the challenges of combining biofuel policies for ‘greening’ transport with reviving the Nordic forestry industry. We find that strong policy initiatives have triggered a transition to biofuel in the three Nordic countries but have so far given little stimulus to forest-industrial revival. Instead, biofuel has created dynamic change in the petroleum sector, where retailers and refineries have adopted cheap imported biofuel to diversify out of an exclusive reliance on petroleum, leaving forest-based biofuel unable to compete. However, this does not mean that the forestry industry has remained stagnant. We find that parts of the Nordic forestry industry have staged an impressive revival, though one based predominantly on high value products, such as hygiene products and labels, and not on biofuel. We conclude that, while public policy may influence commercial conditions, it does not—in a market economy—dictate the industrial strategy, which is hard to predict, especially when it moves beyond existing sector-boundaries. However, the recent adjustment in biofuel policy, in part a response to ecological critique, may represent a more promising opportunity for forest-industrial participation in the future.
Midttun, Atle (2018)
Staging Pathways Towards Ecomodernity
Martinelli, Alberto & He, Chuanqi (red.). Global Modernization Review (II):Modernity and Diversity in New Era
Witoszek, Nina & Midttun, Atle (2018)
Sustainable modernity and the architecture of the 'well-being society': interdisciplinary perspectives
Witoszek, Nina & Midttun, Atle (red.). Sustainable Modernity: The Nordic Model and Beyond
Midttun, Atle & Olsson, Lennart (2018)
Eco-modernity Nordic style: the challenge of aligning ecological and socioednomid sustainability
Witoszek, Nina & Midttun, Atle (red.). Sustainable Modernity: The Nordic Model and Beyond
Midttun, Atle (2018)
Civilising global capitalism: aligning CSR and the welfare state
Witoszek, Nina & Midttun, Atle (red.). Sustainable Modernity: The Nordic Model and Beyond
Midttun, Atle (2018)
Challenges to the Nordic work model in the age of globalied digitaliation
Witoszek, Nina & Midttun, Atle (red.). Sustainable Modernity: The Nordic Model and Beyond
Recent years have seen major political crises throughout the world, and foreign policy analysts nearly universally expect to see rising tensions within (and between) countries in the next 5–20 years. Being able to predict future crises and to assess the resilience of different countries to various shocks is of foremost importance in averting the potentially huge human costs of state collapse and civil war. The premise of this paper is that a transdisciplinary approach to forecasting social breakdown, recovery, and resilience is entirely feasible, as a result of recent breakthroughs in statistical analysis of large-scale historical data, the qualitative insights of historical and semiotic investigations, and agent-based models that translate between micro-dynamics of interacting individuals and the collective macro-level events emerging from these interactions. Our goal is to construct a series of probabilistic scenarios of social breakdown and recovery, based on historical crises and outcomes, which can aid the analysis of potential outcomes of future crises. We call this approach—similar in spirit to ensemble forecasting in weather prediction—multipath forecasting (MPF). This paper aims to set out the methodological premises and basic stages envisaged to realize this goal within a transdisciplinary research collaboration: first, the statistical analysis of a massive database of past instances of crisis to determine how actual outcomes (the severity of disruption and violence, the speed of resolution) depend on inputs (economic, political, and cultural factors); second, the encoding of these analytical insights into probabilistic, empirically informed computational models of societal breakdown and recovery—the MPF engine; third, testing the MPF engine to “predict” the trajectories and outcomes of another set of past social upheavals, which were not used in building the model. This “historical retrodiction” is an innovation that will allow us to further refine the MPF technology. Ultimately our vision is to use MPF to help write what we call “a history of possible futures,” in which the near- and medium-term paths of societies are probabilistically forecast.
Witoszek, Nina & Midttun, Atle (2018)
Sustainable Modernity: The Nordic Model and Beyond
CSR, Innovation and Value Creation in Rapidly Growing SMEs
Midttun, Atle (red.). CSR and beyond: A Nordic perspective
Midttun, Atle (2013)
CSR and beyond: A Nordic perspective
Cappelen Damm Akademisk.
Midttun, Atle & Ørjasæter, Nils-Otto (2012)
Multiplikasjonseffekter ved innovasjon i leverandørnettverk: Norsk offshorepetroleumssektor som innovasjonsarena
Magma forskning og viten, 15(7), s. 41- 51.
Norsk petroleumssektor har vært en storstilt arena for innovasjon. Næringen har gått løs på en kontinuerlig strøm av utfordringer; fra utvikling av felt i grunne farvann med lett tilgjengelig olje og gass, til kompliserte reservoarer, langt fra land i dype havområder, og med store klimatiske utfordringer. Utfordringene har vært løst gjennom et omfattende samarbeid mellom operatørselskap (store petroleumsselskap), deres leverandører og underleverandører. Keynes påviste i sin tid muligheter for å utnytte positive ringvirkninger av offentlige investeringer og forbruk for å få fart på økonomien (Keynes 1936). Effekten var langt større enn den offentlige innsatsen skulle tilsi, takket være omfattende ringvirkninger eller den såkalte 'multiplikatoreffekten'. Vi argumenterer for at det kan skapes en tilsvarende multiplikatoreffekt for innovasjon som ikke bare utløser leverandørbedriftenes kreativitet, men også høster erfaringer fra nyskapning i egne utallige øvrige nettverk og kunderelasjoner. Denne effekten er illustrert gjennom tre case, nemlig utviklingen av den ubemannede og tråløse undervannsfarkosten, HUGIN, havbunnsgravemaskinen SPIDER og et havbunns-gasskomperasjonsanlegg. Casene illustrerer også operatørselskapenes evne til å mobilisere og koordinere sitt leverandørnettverk. Med deres sterke ressursbase og betydelige insentiver, klarer de å forene behovet for samarbeid, mot behovet for konkurranse. Petroleumselskapene konkurrerer med hverandre om å få operatøransvaret for nye felt (lisenser). Straks lisensen er utdelt, samarbeider de om utbygging og drift av det samme feltet. De mobiliserer så sitt leverandørnettverk i en åpen invasjonsarena. Premien for leverandørene er kompetanseoppbygging og utvikling av nye immaterielle verdier, som igjen kan brukes for å erobre nye prosjekter og kunder.
Midttun, Atle (2012)
The greening of European electricity industry: A battle of modernities
Europe has played the role of a green hegemon on the global arena for several decades. By exploring its green transition in the electricity industry, the article discusses whether Europe is on track with regard to delivering sustainable development in a core sector at home. The article finds that the greening of European electricity industry has been highly dynamic and can best be represented in terms of competing modernities; where carbon, nuclear, renewables and demand side management challenge each other in the race for sustainable energy solutions. The article describes the Greening European electricity industry as a complex institutional game which resembles a relay race where various factors have driven innovation at different stages. Change may be initially have been politically driven, while the baton is later taken by markets, technology or civic mobilization. The article shows how strong greening policies may lead to blockage, whereas softer and less confrontational policies with triggering effects may have a better chance of success. The article also argues that a central factor in the apparent European success in greening electricity has been an advantageous blend of technology push and market pull approaches, which has merged out of national rivalry rather than coordinated planning.
Midttun, Atle & Rafael, Riedel (2011)
Wewnętrzna różnorodność Unii Europejskiej a prawo Ashby’ego – wymiar klimatyczno-energetyczny
What Motivates Managers to Pursue Corporate Responsibility? A Survey among Key Stakeholders
Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, 18(1), s. 25- 38. Doi: 10.1002/csr.237
Midttun, Atle & Ørjasæter, Nils-Otto (2010)
The Firm as a Nexus of Product Cycles: Organizing Entrepreneurship in the Innovative Firm
Arentsen, Maarten J; Rossum, Wouter von & Steenge, Albert E (red.). Governance of Innovation: Firms, Clusters and Institutions in a Changing Setting
Midttun, Atle (2010)
Montesquieu for the twenty-first century: factoring civil society and business into global governance
Corporate Governance : The international journal of business in society, 10(1), s. 97- 109.
Martinelli, Alberto & Midttun, Atle (2010)
Globalization and governance for sustainability
Corporate Governance : The international journal of business in society, 10(1), s. 6- 17.
Midttun, Atle (2008)
Samfunnsansvar som innovasjonsstrategi
Magma forskning og viten, 11(5), s. 75- 86.
Midttun, Atle (2008)
Partnered governance: aligning corporate responsibility and public policy in the global economy
Corporate Governance : The international journal of business in society, 8(4), s. 406- 418.
Midttun, Atle (2008)
Corporate (Social) Responsibility as an Arena for Partnered Governance: From the Business to the Public Policy Case
Helena Flam and Marcus Carson (eds), Rule Systems Theory. Applications and Explorations
Midttun, Atle & Gautesen, Kristian (2007)
Feed in or certificates, competition or complementarity? Combining a static efficiency and a dynamic innovation perspective on the greening of the energy industry
Energy Policy, 35(3), s. 1419- 1422.
Midttun, Atle (2007)
Towards a dynamic reinterpretation of C(S)R: are corporate responsibility and innovation compatible or contradictory?
Corporate Governance : The international journal of business in society, 7(4), s. 401- 413.
Midttun, Atle & Ørjasæter, Nils-Otto (2007)
Selskapet som et knippe produktsykluser: organisering av intraprenørskap i det innovative foretak
Innovasjonsprosesser: Om Innovasjoners Odysée, Hernes og Koefoed (red)
Gundersen, Mari Hegg; Koefoed, Anne Louise & Midttun, Atle (2007)
Greening of European Electricity Industry: The Challenges of Policy Integration Across Cognitive and Administrative Specialisation
Green Power Markets: Support Schemes, Case Studies and Perspectives, Lutz Mez (ed)
Midttun, Atle (2007)
CSR eller bedriftens samfunnsansvar en megatrend vokser fram
Integrating corporate social responsibility and other strategic foci in a distributed production system: a transaction cost perspective on the North Sea offshore petroleum industry
Corporate Governance : The international journal of business in society, 7(2), s. 194- 208.
Midttun, Atle (2006)
Deregulation: Design, Learning and Legitimacy
Kunneke et al, Institutional Reform, Regulation And Privatization: Process And Outcomes in Infrastructure Industries
Midttun, Atle & Gautesen, Kristian (2006)
Innmatingsretter eller sertifikater, konkurranse eller komplementaritet i energinæringen?
Magma forskning og viten
Midttun, Atle & Koefoed, Anne Louise (2005)
Green Innovation in Nordic Energy Industry: Institutional Pluralism under Competitive Rivalry
Matthias Weber & Jens Hemmelskamp (eds): Innovation, sustainability and policy
Midttun, Atle (2005)
Deregulation: Design, Learning and Legitimacy
Jan Gronewegen and Rolf Kunneke (eds) :Reform of infrastructure industries
Midttun, Atle (2005)
CSR: Realigning Roles and Boundaries between Government, Business and Civil Society
?, 5(3)
Midttun, Atle & Koefoed, Anne Louise (2004)
Green Innovation in Nordic Energy Industry: InstitutionalPluralism under Competitive Rivalry
Jens Hemmelskamp(ed): Innovation, sustainability and policy
Finon, Dominique; Johnsen, Tor Arnt & Midttun, Atle (2004)
Challenges when electricity markets face the investment phase
Energy Policy, 32(12), s. 1355- 1362.
Midttun, Atle; Gundersen, Mari Hegg & Koefoed, Anne Louise (2004)
Greening of Nordic Electricity industry: Policy Convergence and Diversity
?, 15(4), s. 633- 656.
Midttun, Atle; Micola, Augusto R. & Omland, Terje (2003)
Path dependent national systems or European convergence? The case of European electricity markets
Marie-Laure Djelic and Sigrid Quack (eds.): Globalization and Institutions
Over the last four or five years the world has seen a dramatic change in the international climate negotiations, from an upbeat vision of an agreement on emission reduction targets and burden sharing launched on Bali in 2007, followed by a search for new strategies to ensure more success in Rio in 2012. One of the emerging outcomes has been a 'green growth' strategy which seems more likely to succeed as a central climate mitigation approach, insofar as it can more easily be aligned with aspirations across national divides. Against the backdrop of the financial and sovereign debt crises, there are great hopes that green innovation and industrial engagement, triggered by innovative policies, can save the climate at the same time as boosting sluggish economies. A separate and parallel development is a move from international climate negotiations towards multilevel engagements by national governments. In spite of failures in reaching international climate consensus, both informal and formalized networks and coalitions have been formed between cities, regions and states take climate action nevertheless. And there is a growing awareness that environmental governance, in order to be effective, not only needs a multi-level but also multi-actor through the engagement of civil society alongside the state and market.
Carbon capture – from waste to energy: a stylized case from a pioneering initiative at Klemetsrud, Oslo. Report to the CLIMIT – demo project 618215: Potential for financing and pricing Carbon Capture in Waste-to Energy Installations in cities
[Report]. Handelshøyskolen BI.
Oslo has recently been given the European Environmental Capital award for 2019, following its adoption of an ambitious green strategy of reducing CO2 emissions by 50% by 2022, and by 95% by 2030. A core premise for Oslo reaching its goals is, however, that the city’s waste to energy plant installs carbon capture for sequestration (CCS). With 400,000 tons of CO2 emissions per year (Fortum 2019), Oslo’s Klemetsrud waste to energy plant is the largest single point carbon emitter in the city, and with these emissions it will be impossible for Oslo to reach its CO2 targets. However, carbon capture at Klemetsrud also carries significance in a wider global climate perspective. Global climate models are increasingly reverting to CCS in order to arrive at scenarios that are compatible with the Paris Agreement . This has created new pressure for CCS implementation, and Klemetsrud – if successful – could be an important trigger for CCS in Europe. This report is a styilized business case study of the Klemetsrud CCS project in light of four different regulatory scenarios.
Midttun, Atle (2018)
Hykleri på vei mot en bedre verden
[Article in business/trade/industry journal]. BI Business Review
Midttun, Atle & Witoszek, Nina (2018)
Hvor robust er den nordiske modellen?
[Article in business/trade/industry journal]. BI Business Review
Midttun, Atle & Witoszek, Nina (2016)
“Fostering Prosociality in a Competitive World”. The "Norwegian Model in the Age of Globalization".
[Academic lecture]. The Third WINIR Conference on Institutions and Human Behaviour 2-5 September 2016, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
Midttun, Atle & Witoszek, Nina (2016)
"Staging Pathways towards Ecomodernity"
[Academic lecture]. The 2nd International Modernization Forum, China Center for Modernization Research, Bejing 20-22 May 2016.
Deregulering og industriell reorganisering i nordisk el- og infrastrukturindustri
[Article in business/trade/industry journal]. ?, 6(1)
Midttun, Atle (2001)
Energy industry business strategies
[Scientific book]. Elsevier Science.
Midttun, Atle & Svindland, Eirik (2001)
Approaches to and dilemmas of economic regulation
[Scientific book]. Palgrave.
Midttun, Atle & Kamfjord, Svein (1998)
Deregulation and the Environment: Perceptions and Perspectives of National Decision-Makers on Environmental Concersn in the Integrated Nordic Energy Market
[Report]. Senter for elektrisitetsstudier, Handelshøyskolen Bi.
Midttun, Atle & Kamfjord, Svein (1998)
Energy and Environmental Governance under Ecological Modernisation and Functional Convergence under Institutional Diversity: A Comparative Analysis of Nordic Regimes
[Report]. Senter for elektrisitetsstudier, Handelshøyskolen BI.
Academic Degrees
Year
Academic Department
Degree
1987
University of Uppsala
Ph.D Dr. Philos.
Work Experience
Year
Employer
Job Title
1998 - Present
BI Norwegian Business School
Professor
2010 - 2010
Stanford University
Visiting Professor
2003 - 2004
Univeristy of California, Haas School of Business
Visiting Scholar
2002 - 2002
Université Paris-Sud, Faculté Jean Monet
Visiting Professor
2000 - 2001
University of Michigan, Business School
Visiting Professor
1987 - 1998
BI Norwegian Business School
Associate Professor
1995 - 1995
Aalborg University
Guest Researcher
1988 - 1988
Max Planck Institut für Gesellschafts¬forscung, Köln
Visiting Scholar
1985 - 1987
BI Norwegian Business School
Researcher
1982 - 1985
Group for Resource Studies under the National Research Council