Holsen, Hengstermann and Elvestad examine Norwegian land policy as a system caught between strong strategic ambitions and weak control over implementation. The chapter’s emblematic case, Mindemyren in Bergen, reveals how densification, transit-oriented development and car reduction become entangled in legally binding plans, sectoral requirements and developer feasibility. Its key contribution is the diagnosis of institutional dislocation: sustainability objectives are formally integrated, yet legal complexity, overlapping responsibilities, value conflicts and fragmented authority can extend the path to construction-ready planning over many years. The chapter operates conceptually through actor constellations—politicians, planners, developers and the public—while showing how each is constrained by planning legislation and sector-specific institutions. Development is therefore produced through negotiated interdependence rather than through unilateral public command. The wider intellectual bridge is to implementation studies and institutional political economy, where the decisive question is not whether a policy objective exists, but whether the institutional architecture can coordinate the actors, rights, costs and temporal sequences required to realise it.
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