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236 Arctic Yearbook 2015 governmental agencies (Ferlie et al 2011). Frameworks and theory of wicked problems have been applied to a diverse array of policy areas, including publicly financed dentistry (Quiñonez 2012), human tissue in medicine (Lewis 2008), and maritime security in Southeast Asia (Bateman 2011). This sampling indicates that wicked problems are found wherever there is “chronic policy failure” (Ferlie et al 2011). Wicked problems, as Dryzek implies, are often found “at the intersection of ecosystems and human social systems”, where the complexity of each system further challenges comprehension and effective management (Dryzek 2005: 9). The effects of global-scale changes like climate change or economic globalization may lead to wicked problems in which processes and actors at local scales are influenced by global-level changes beyond their control (Chapin et al 2008). Wicked problem theory has frequently been applied to human-environmental issues, including eutrophication (Thornton 2013), Alaskan wildfires (Chapin et al 2008), coral reef protection (Hughes, Huang & Young 2013), and the Yellowstone National Park (McBeth & Shanahan 2004; McBeth et al. 2010). There are several ways of unpacking the complex nature of wicked policy problems. Although frameworks differ, the underlying elements of wicked problems are repeatedly identified. Wicked problems are hard to know: information may be inadequate, problems may be continually evolving, and the problem may seem like a “black box”, without clear connections between contributing factors and resulting effects. Furthermore, the number and diversity of actors involved in wicked problems means that these problems are hard to manage: different actors may understand and define problems differently and desire different approaches. Given this complicated group of stakeholders, wicked policy problems demand careful management in order to minimize conflict and/or stalemate, and ensure that all actors are working together in a coordinated effort to manage the problem through time. The temporal aspect of wicked problems is important: since they can never be solved, creating structures to X[