Conceptual Clarity, Scientific Rigour and ‘The Stories We Are’: Engaging with Two Challenges to the Objectivity of Invasion Biology

The progress of interdisciplinarity in invasion science

“…To reduce the ecological-environmental focus of invasion science and pave the way for higher cross-fertilisation with the social sciences and humanities, we suggest that framing problems, methods, and applications in invasion research needs to be rethought (also following Larson 2007; Kueffer and Hirsch Hadorn 2008;Hattingh 2011). The examples discussed above provide a range of entry points for initiating the reframing research questions in invasion science as a social-ecological challenge with the aim of overcoming the rooting of the field in a purely ecological perspective.…”

“…The pivotal role of (interdisciplinary) social-ecological approaches in invasion science has already been recognised (Kueffer and Hirsch Hadorn 2008;Richardson 2011a;Estévez et al 2014;Courchamp et al 2017), specifically by economists, geographers, historians, philosophers, politicians, and sociologists (e.g. Larson 2005;Carruthers et al 2011;Hattingh 2011;Kull et al 2011;Rotherham and Lambert 2011;. Contributions from these scholars call for the elucidation of feedbacks between ecological and social drivers (Kueffer 2013;Matzek et al 2013), and the valuation of invasion effects which are co-produced by society, scientific facts, and cultural norms (McNeely 2001;Hattingh 2011;Kull et al 2011;Estévez et al 2014;Jeschke et al 2014;Tassin and Kull 2015;Essl et al 2017;Kueffer and Kull 2017).…”

“…Larson 2005;Carruthers et al 2011;Hattingh 2011;Kull et al 2011;Rotherham and Lambert 2011;. Contributions from these scholars call for the elucidation of feedbacks between ecological and social drivers (Kueffer 2013;Matzek et al 2013), and the valuation of invasion effects which are co-produced by society, scientific facts, and cultural norms (McNeely 2001;Hattingh 2011;Kull et al 2011;Estévez et al 2014;Jeschke et al 2014;Tassin and Kull 2015;Essl et al 2017;Kueffer and Kull 2017). Other scholars have also focused on the role of societal beliefs, perceptions, memory, and cultural aspects related to non-native and invasive species that shape human attitudes, and therefore decisions relating to these species management (e.g.…”

Metaphors in Invasion Biology: Implications for Risk Assessment and Management of Non-Native Species

“…two relevant perspectives on the use of metaphors in invasion biology were developed by Larson (2011) and Hattingh (2001Hattingh ( , 2011. According to Larson (2011), ecologists often have the tendency to overlook the value-dimension of the terms they use (p. ix), and invasion biology is presented as a rather extreme example.…”

“…Rather than trying to rid ecology of metaphors and value-laden language, however, Larson (2011) argues that we should become more aware of this dimension, so that we can make responsible metaphoric choices both from a scientific and from a societal and policy point of view. Hattingh (2001Hattingh ( , 2011 argues that conceptual oppositions frequently used in the debate on invasive species (such as native versus non-native, natural versus unnatural, and pristine versus disrupted) quickly lose their meaning in a postmodern society that is characterized by globalization and mobility. In policy debates, as well as in science, multiple narratives are interacting with one another and Hattingh (2001) argues that we cannot escape the narrative dimension of these concepts.…”