The human ecosystem Part I: The human ecosystem as an organizing concept in ecosystem management

Machlis, Gary E.; Force, Jo Ellen; Burch, William R.

doi:10.1080/08941929709381034

Cited by 266 publications

(158 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…We adopt a sociological definition of institution as a collective solution to a societal problem or challenge (Machlis et al 1997). NRM institutions focus on the challenge of effectively managing natural resources.…”

Section: Institutional Resiliencementioning

confidence: 99%

Trust ecology and the resilience of natural resource management institutions

Stern¹,

Baird²

2015

E&S

115

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ABSTRACT. The resilience of natural resource management (NRM) institutions are largely contingent on the capacities of the people and organizations within those institutions to learn, innovate, and adapt, both individually and collectively. These capacities may be powerfully constrained or catalyzed by the nature of the relationships between the various entities involved. Trust, in particular, has been identified repeatedly as a key component of institutional relationships that supports adaptive governance and successful NRM outcomes. We apply an ecological lens to a pre-existing framework to examine how different types of trust may interact to drive institutional resilience in NRM contexts. We present the broad contours of what we term "trust ecology," describing a conceptual framework in which higher degrees of diversity of trust, as conceptualized through richness and evenness of four types of trust (dispositional, rational, affinitive, and systems based), enhance both the efficacy and resilience of NRM institutions. We describe the usefulness and some limitations of this framework based on several case studies from our own research and discuss the framework's implications for both future research and designing more resilient governance arrangements.

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Section: Institutional Resiliencementioning

confidence: 99%

Trust ecology and the resilience of natural resource management institutions

Stern¹,

Baird²

2015

E&S

115

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…Imagine if our legacy had not been constrained by deeply held cultural investments in private property systems, dif®cult to modify without major social and economic disruption; something understood by Geisler (1999) in his elaboration on culture and inferred by Machlis et al (1997) in their representations of the human ecosystem, referred to in our introductory comments. Imagine if the dominant culture had been open to the values and possible bene®ts of other, more communal resource allocation and management traditions.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Beyond these matters, however, we justify this focus on the socio-cultural because we see little evidence that such knowledge is informing policy development for NRM in Australia. Indeed, in policy forums we have witnessed senior policy makers explicitly undervaluing socio-cultural dimensions of NRM as`soft' or`unscienti®c', observations which re¯ect differential power relations in the production of knowledge, and privilege particular ways of knowing over others (Clark, 1993;Labinger, 1995;Machlis et al, 1997;Stratford et al, 2000). Yet it is in the intercultural borderlands that the potential exists for creative and compassionate modes of NRM, approaches mindful of equity and effectiveness as well as ef®ciency.…”

Section: Conceptual Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Because it accounts for the human ecosystem idea and emphasises the importance of social and cultural dimensions of sustainability, after Machlis et al (1997) and Geisler (1999), the capital assets model that we propose aids the development and implementation of integrated policy that enhances NRM and other outcomes. For example, surveys about sustainability and community undertaken over three years by the authors and others throughout the Huon Valley Municipality, south of Hobart, the capital of Tasmania, demonstrate a number of challenges related to sustainability.…”

Section: Conceptual Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Second, a detailed delineation of the interrelationships among the social and the cultural is furnished by Machlis et al (1997). Where Geisler writes of culture, Machlis and his colleagues use the term`human social system' to mean social institutions (health, justice, faith, commerce, education, leisure, government, and sustenance); social cycles (physiological, individual, institutional and environmental); and social order (identity, norms and hierarchy).…”

Section: Conceptual Frameworkmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Capital assets and intercultural borderlands: socio-cultural challenges for natural resource management

Stratford

Davidson²

2002

Journal of Environmental Management

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In their design or implementation, many natural resource management (NRM) programs ignore critical socio-cultural dimensions of the challenge to advance sustainability. Building on particular ideas about culture and human ecosystems, we combine the strengths of the capital assets model of sustainability and the idea of intercultural borderlands to respond to this gap. To advance our thesis about the utility of these tools, we critically reviewed and analysed a cross-disciplinary literature relating to the socio-cultural dimensions of NRM. This paper stems from that labour and examines particular tensions that arise in land management as a result of Australians' speci®c colonial and postcolonial legacies. These tensionsÐrelated to ethnicity, gender, population, age and healthÐare among the threads in the larger tapestry that comprises the socio-cultural dimensions of NRM. For the Australian case, they are central, longstanding and persistent, and thus worthy of analysis; and they are applicable in general terms to other places with similar histories of settlement and land use.

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The effects of local filtering processes on the structure and functioning of native plant communities in experimental urban habitats

Borowy

Swan

2022

Ecology and Evolution

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Despite a growing literature‐base devoted to document biodiversity patterns in cities, little is known about the processes that influence these patterns, and whether they are consistent over time. In particular, numerous studies have identified the capacity of cities to host a rich diversity of plant species. This trend, however, is driven primarily by introduced species, which comprise a large proportion of the urban species pool relative to natives. Using an experimental common garden study, we assessed the relative influence of local assembly processes (i.e., soil environmental filtering and competition from spontaneous urban species) on the taxonomic and functional diversity of native plant communities sampled over four seasons in 2016–2018. Taxonomic and functional diversity exhibited different responses to local processes, supporting the general conclusion that species‐ and trait‐based measures of biodiversity offer distinct insights into community assembly dynamics. Additionally, we found that neither soil nor competition from spontaneous urban species influenced taxonomic or functional composition of native species. Functional composition, however, did shift strongly over time and was driven by community‐weighted mean differences in both measured traits (maximum height, Hmax; specific leaf area, SLA; leaf chlorophyll a fluorescence, Chl a ) and the relative proportions of different functional groups (legumes, annual and biennial‐perennial species, C4 grasses, and forbs). By contrast, taxonomic composition only diverged between early and late seasons. Overall, our results indicate that native species are not only capable of establishing and persisting in vacant urban habitats, they can functionally respond to local filtering pressures over time. This suggests that regional dispersal limitation may be a primary factor limiting native species in urban environments. Thus, future regreening and management plans should focus on enhancing the dispersal potential of native plant species in urban environments, in order to achieve set goals for increasing native species diversity and associated ecosystem services in cities.

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The human ecosystem Part I: The human ecosystem as an organizing concept in ecosystem management

Cited by 266 publications

References 19 publications

Trust ecology and the resilience of natural resource management institutions

Trust ecology and the resilience of natural resource management institutions

Capital assets and intercultural borderlands: socio-cultural challenges for natural resource management

The effects of local filtering processes on the structure and functioning of native plant communities in experimental urban habitats

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