Governance

The Stockholm Environment Institute is governed by a Board whose composition is international and its members are appointed by the Swedish Government. SEI is led by the Executive Director, who is responsible for implementing and following up on decisions of the Board. The Science Advisory Council (SAC) is an advisory body to the Board to provide strategic advice on research priorities and reviewing SEI’s substantive achievements.

The governance site includes an overview of the primary objective of SEI and how it is organized and governed around the world.

As described by the Statutes of the Foundation:

Operational organization and processes are detailed in the Internal Administrative Regulations and Rules of Procedure. These give an overview of how SEI is organized and governed, and where and how decisions are made in the organization at different levels and functions. They detail the division of roles and responsibilities between the Board, the Executive Director, SEI centres and other governance structures in SEI; and processes for internal planning, steering and reporting.

The Board and Executive Director control funding, administrative and programme work undertaken by all foundation centres. For other centres, the relationship is laid down in their respective Statutes and in bilateral centre agreements. The delegation of decision-making in the SEI Foundation is regulated in the Rules of Authority (Delegationsordning). Decisions can also be delegated by the Executive Director.

Executive Director

SEI’s Executive Director (ED), Måns Nilsson, leads and delegates all work at SEI.

SEI Foundation

The SEI Foundation in Sweden (Stiftelsen The Stockholm Environment Institute) consists of SEI Headquarters, SEI Asia, SEI Africa, SEI Latin America and SEI Oxford.

In Sweden, the foundation’s organization number is 802014-0763 and the VAT number is SE802014076301. Since 1988, the foundation has produced annual audited financial reports.

Associated centres

SEI Tallinn, SEI US and SEI York are separate administrative entities within SEI.

• SEI Tallinn is a non-profit research organization incorporated in Estonia as a foundation. The SEI Executive Director chairs the SEI Tallinn Board. SEI Tallinn’s annual reports with financial details are provided on the SEI Tallinn page.
• SEI York is a unit in the Department of Environment and Geography at the University of York. It is governed by a formal agreement between SEI and University of York, and co-chaired by the SEI Executive Director and the University of York’s Dean of the Faculty for Science through a board.
• SEI US is a non-profit research organization with 501c (3) status in the United States. The SEI Executive Director chairs the SEI US Board. SEI US’s annual reports with financial details are provided on the SEI US page.

Steering documents

SEI’s operations are governed through three levels of internal steering documents. These express procedures, principles, accountabilities, instructions and routines of work at SEI following organizational goals and legal and other requirements.

Instructions

Instructions are detailed and operational. They can either be SEI-wide or centre-specific.

Instructions may include: finance and administrative procedures, travel instructions, project management instructions, position and promotion procedures, procurement instructions, anti-harassment complaint procedures and work environment instructions.