Sweden adopted the UN's 2030 Agenda with its seventeen goals and 169 targets, and set national objectives to match. In 2019 the government's own Agenda 2030 delegation delivered its final report, SOU 2019:13, on how the country should continue. Its diagnosis is worth reading by anyone who builds things.
What the delegation found
The delegation concluded that Sweden's national objectives correspond well to the global targets. The problem is not the goals.
"In many cases, however, the national objectives have not been achieved. Therefore, action is needed in several areas to move beyond goal-setting towards achieving concrete results." (Agenda 2030-delegationen, SOU 2019:13, summary)
It also located much of the responsibility where decisions about land, schools and leisure are actually made:
"Municipalities and county councils are responsible for many of the decisions and actions needed to implement the 2030 Agenda." (SOU 2019:13, summary)
And it insisted that no sector can deliver alone:
"Implementation and follow-up of the 2030 Agenda can only be successful if all actors and sectors of society engage and collaborate." (SOU 2019:13, summary)
Goals without buildings
A goal document does not get anyone moving. A sports hall does. The gap the delegation describes, between objectives and results, is the gap a concrete, buildable project fills, which is why The Dome Sweden presents itself as implementation rather than as another statement of intent.
The project is designed with the ambition of contributing to thirteen of the seventeen goals, with a direct impact on six and a supporting impact on seven: zero hunger, good health and well-being, quality education, gender equality, decent work and economic growth, industry and infrastructure, reduced inequalities, sustainable cities and communities, responsible consumption and production, climate action, life on land, peace and justice, and partnerships. The reasoning for each is on the impact page, and the contribution will be measured and reported every year rather than claimed.
What it asks of a municipality
The delegation's point about municipalities is the practical one. A region with a thirty-year shortage of sports facilities, a growing population and a public-health bill from inactivity has the goals already. What it needs is a partner with capital, a design and a plan, and a site to put them on. That is a decision a municipality can make.
Partnership as the method
The delegation's third finding is also the project's structure: public sector, business, the sports movement, education and civil society, together. The Dome Sweden is built on that collaboration, and partnership is one of the nine goals it reports against.
