Adaptive mechanisms in a continuing landscape: assessing biocultural diversity as a form of resilience

Abstract

PurposeThis paper investigates the adaptive capacity expressed by an agricultural region in response to changing conditions as a mean to address the future of cultural landscapes in a time of extreme uncertainty. Through the conceptual framework of biocultural diversity, the work assesses regimes shifts and persistence as a dialectic between natural and anthropogenic components of the landscape.Design/methodology/approachSpecifically, the mechanisms of progressive landscape adaptation are explored by using an integrated method to align manifestations of biological and cultural diversity. Through a multidimensional approach applied to spatial analysis, the study determines a relationship between the footprint of past and modern landscape regimes and contemporary rural management practices in McLaren Vale, South Australia.FindingsThe biological and cultural diversity patterns along riparian corridors, or “biocultural corridors” are indicators of past and current adaptive capacity, which are able to convey novel trajectories of sustainable management in the landscape system.Originality/valueUnderstanding the positive feedback loops between nature and human interactions as represented by their interrelationships in the landscape can inform planning decisions for sustainable agricultural development and enable effective regional long-term trajectories of resilience.

Territories of life as key to global environmental sustainability

“…Territories of life are also key in sustaining cultural practices, such as ceremony, language, and Indigenous technologies and knowledge systems [12]; [47]; [13]. Many Indigenous peoples and local communities consider wellbeing, mental and physical health and good living to be a community issue rather than an individual effort [48]; [49].…”

“…Governance institutions embedded in such territories are distinctive, time and place based, and generally guided by the holistic values of respect, reciprocity, relationality and responsibility [3]; [7]; [8]; [9]. In fact, the cultural grounding and deep connection of Indigenous peoples and local communities with their territories and ecosystems has proved to equip them with an array of resilience strategies in the face of social and environmental change [10]; [11]; [12]; [13].…”

“…Extractive industries threaten many resource-rich territories of life, including on Arctic pastoral ecosystems, tropical forests in South America and Africa and highly productive coral reef systems [43]; [71]; [72]. Competing land use pressures and expropriation from both industrial and conservation sectors have made large parts of territories of life functionally unavailable to their custodians, stemming in large part from lack of or insufficient recognition of their collective and individual rights 13 [73]. Entire territories of life or large parts of them are under the increasing threat of irreversible natural and cultural degradation, for example, industrial agriculture encroaching on the wintering grounds of the Shahsevan Nomadic Tribal Confederacy in Iran and reindeer herders in Sámi territory, intensive ranching in the Brazilian Amazon, or industrial logging encroaching on the territories in Gabon [68] [74]; [75]; [76]; [71].…”

The science of rural human settlements: a comprehensive overview

“…This journal mainly focuses on cultural heritage management and the sustainable development of cultural heritage (Emerald publishing, 2023). Relevant research includes providing design principles for developing building heritage (Hasgul et al, 2021); exploration on rural areas' response to the adaptive capacity of future extreme uncertainty (Palazzo and Bardsley, 2022) and so on.…”