Place Attachment and Its Consequence for Landscape-Scale Management and Readiness to Participate: Social Network Complexity in the Post-Soviet Rural Context of Latvia and Estonia

Abstract

This paper uses the tripartite place attachment framework to examine six rural parishes across Estonia and Latvia. Existing analyses/frameworks on participatory processes often neglect the complexity of relationships that rural residents have to their local environments. From a qualitative analysis of face-to-face, semi-structured interviews with case study area inhabitants (23 interviews in Estonia and 27 in Latvia), we depict varying degrees of attachment of individuals to each other and to the place in which they live and their readiness to participate in terms of willingness and ability to participate in a landscape-scale management process. Attachment to the local area was strongest where the social ties were strongest, independent of their sociogeographical features. Social ties were strong where there were good family connections or strong religious or cultural institutions. Taking individual parishes and engaging inhabitants through in-depth interviews using place attachment analysis gives an overall perspective of life in that rural location. These findings reveal important connections within the communities with the potential for planners to engage with local inhabitants and possible barriers to participation.

A synthesis on active citizenship in European nature conservation: social and environmental impacts, democratic tensions, and governance implications

“…An invitation from a neighbor or a personal experience of nature might equally be a reason to become active. Relational values and emotional bonds with the landscape can be particularly strong triggers for active citizenship (Mattijssen et al 2020), especially when a specific area to which people feel deeply connected is involved (Buta et al 2014, Storie et al 2019. Citizens also need to be able to put their motivations into action.…”

A Transdisciplinary Approach to Recovering Natural and Cultural Landscape and Place Identification: A Case Study of Can Moritz Spring (Rubí, Spain)

“…Thus, while it is important to consider landscape as a subject field, practically speaking, it can be a closed book to local people unless they can be given the means to understand it, such as through public participation and co-design processes. The tripartite model of Scannel and Gifford is a well-known approach for understanding place and has been widely used in local participation processes [ 34 , 35 ].…”

When Peace and Quiet Is Not Enough: Place-Shaping and the Role of Leaders in Sustainability and Quality of Life in Rural Estonia and Latvia

“…In rural villages, relationships typically occur through tight-knit social-ecological units, although these have been weakened as traditional land-use patterns change [10]. Rural inhabitants value the peace and quiet of the landscapes in which they live and work but suffer from distress when their landscapes will not sustain them with an adequate livelihood [11].…”

“…Adaptations require a proactive and integrated governance [18][19][20] to address these issues, and therefore sustainable development should also be rooted in the values that people hold that are connected to the specific environment and culture of each place. However, care should be taken not to over romanticise the traditional way of life as a rural idyll that has been a feature of the creation of the Estonian and Latvian national identities [11,15,21].…”

“…This has had variable results [23], as it requires leaders who are capable of networking across sectors to encourage synergies and transform the vision of the future into strategies for action [18]. Most importantly, it needs time as the necessary cooperation and trust are built; this is especially important for countries that have undergone recent intense social transformations, such as Estonia and Latvia [10,11].…”