Reindeer Herding in Norway: Cyclicality and Permanent Change vs. Governmental Rigidities

Reindeer herding is a complex, highly mobile, and environmentally adaptive form of livestock management, and a traditional way of life, practiced by indigenous peoples across the circumpolar Arctic. Given its distinctive characteristics, appropriate economic governance and regulation of the practice demands a clear understanding of its social, cultural, and environmental characteristics. In the following, we outline some of these and discuss their implications for economic management of the practice, with reference to the case of Norway in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. In closing, we identify some key current threats and challenges that confront reindeer herding and present some suggestions for enhancing its economic viability and resilience, based on a strategy of revitalizing core economic and social mechanisms.