Deforestation and forest degradation remain huge global environmental challenges. Over the last decades, various forest governance initiatives and institutions have evolved in global response to interlinked topics such as climate change mitigation, biodiversity conservation, indigenous rights, and trade impacts – accompanied by various levels of academic attention. Using a Delphi methodology that draws on both policy and academic insights, we assess the currently perceived state of play in global forest governance and identify possible future directions. Results indicate that state actors are seen to be key in providing supportive regulatory frameworks, yet interviewees do not believe these will be established at the global scale. Rather, respondents point to issue-specific, regional and inter-regional coalitions of the willing, involving the private sector, to innovate global forest governance. Linking forest issues with high politics may hold promise, as demonstrated by initiatives regarding illegal logging and timber trade. Confident rule-setting in support of the public good as well as responsible investments are seen as further avenues. New forest governance “hypes”, if used strategically, can provide leverage points and resources to ensure sustainability effects on the ground. At the same time, informal markets are often crucial for governance outcomes and need consideration. As such, clarifying tenure in sovereignty-sensitive ways is important, as are innovative ways for inclusive “glocal” decision-making. Lastly, new technologies, big data and citizens’ capacities are identified as potent innovation opportunities, for making global dependencies between consumption, production and deforestation visible and holding players accountable across the value chains.

森林砍伐和森林退化仍然是巨大的全球环境挑战。在过去的几十年里，各种森林治理倡议和机构在全球对气候变化减缓、生物多样性保护、土著权利和贸易影响等相互关联的主题的响应中不断发展——伴随着不同层次的学术关注。使用借鉴政策和学术见解的德尔福方法，我们评估当前全球森林治理中的作用状态并确定可能的未来方向。结果表明，国家行为者被视为提供支持性监管框架的关键，但受访者认为这些不会在全球范围内建立。相反，受访者指的是特定问题、区域和区域间的自愿联盟，让私营部门参与，以创新全球森林治理。正如有关非法采伐和木材贸易的举措所证明的那样，将森林问题与高层政治联系起来可能会有希望。支持公共利益和负责任投资的自信规则制定被视为进一步的途径。如果战略性地使用新的森林治理“炒作”，可以提供杠杆点和资源，以确保在实地产生可持续性影响。与此同时，非正式市场往往对治理结果至关重要，需要考虑。因此，以对主权敏感的方式澄清权属很重要，包容性“全球本地”决策的创新方式也很重要。最后，新技术、大数据和公民的能力被确定为有效的创新机会，