Collaborative knowledge mapping to inform environmental policy-making: The case of Canada’s Rideau Canal National Historic Site

Abstract

The Rideau Canal National Historic Site is a complex social-ecological system that connects the Ottawa River and the St-Lawrence River in Eastern Ontario, Canada. As an interjurisdictional waterway, it presents interconnected social-ecological challenges. In this article, we analyze findings from five participatory workshops held with stakeholder groups in the Rideau Canal system. Participants in the workshops co-produced social-ecological relational maps that represent their knowledge and views about determinants of environmental health in the system. The maps were merged by the authors to create an aggregated, collective map grouping all factors that participants perceived as influencing the environmental health of the Rideau Canal. Our analysis focuses on two dimensions of these co-production exercises. First, we use concepts and methods from social-ecological systems and social network analysis to analyze the content of the maps, examining convergences and divergences in stakeholder perceptions of the system and outlining insights into social-ecological linkages that might be relevant for decision- and policy-makers. Most factors cited were social, emphasizing the need for more careful integration of the social and ecological in our understanding of complex historic waterway systems. Second, we examine the value of our workshops, anchored in collaborative systems thinking and network analysis, as a method for eliciting highly variable local knowledge and experiences, and for summarizing these in a consumable form for decision- and policy-makers. We argue that this method facilitates inclusion of various knowledges and perspectives in decision- and policymaking processes and provides pathways to improve social-ecological resilience.