Exploring spiritual values in forest management practices in the Netherlands

Abstract

While forest-related spiritual values (forest spirituality) have long been incorporated in global forest-related policies and strategies, the significance of spiritual values in forest management practices remains little researched. This study investigates how spiritual values are articulated in forest management practices in the Netherlands. We applied a conceptual framework with 10 spiritual dimensions derived from religious scholarship to qualitatively explore the roles of these dimensions in practical forest management. Data were collected by interviewing public and private foresters across the Netherlands and analysed following a constructivist-interpretivist approach. As a result, we found four themes in which forest spirituality is articulated in management practices. Firstly, forests are increasingly used for ritual practices aimed at spiritual enrichment and health, with different consequences for public and private forest management. Secondly, ontological and relational considerations affect several forest management practices. These are mainly related to diverging views on tree felling and educational programmes aimed at nature connectedness. Thirdly, forest spirituality is expressed in local legends and historical monuments, deployed to raise the public's interest in forests. Fourthly, ineffabale aspects of spirituality emerge in references to unspecified spiritual experiences and occasional cases of intuitive forest management. We conclude that forest spirituality -entangled with broader ‘ecospiritual’ trends in society- is not only significant for nature experience but also -increasingly- for ritual and healing practices in forests, for connectedness with nature and for forest use such as tree planting and felling. In particular, public foresters increasingy have to reconcile their management with the ‘spiritual’ ideas and practices of a diversifying public.