Judith A. Layzer (Ed): Natural Experiments: Ecosystem-Based Management and the Environment

Abstract

Ecosystem-based approaches (EBM) to natural resource management are at the forefront of progressive science and policy discussions. This holistic approach is inherently multi-dimensional. Managers and decision-makers must orient their view to all components of an ecosystem, including human interests. Three key underlying principles of EBM include landscape-scale planning that is intentionally collaborative (trans-jurisdiction/trans-sector) with an experimental, adaptive nature. The common single sector approach attends to human activities each in isolation from one another. This approach fails to address, much less maintain, the integrity of the interactions between the management sectors. This leads to a loss of valued ecosystem goods and services and ignorance about fundamental ecological and socio-economic linkages. Through a systematic empirical analysis, this book investigates the ways, and extent to which, seven cases throughout the US employ the three principles above with a goal of understanding whether the promise of EBM theory is effective in practice. Specifically, the author seeks to understand the circumstances that facilitate innovative management practices whose policies “conserve and restore ecosystem health.” Through a “focused comparison method,” evidence of environmental improvements, such as habitat restoration and species conservation, is assessed. Informed judgments are made to determine the ways in which the three principles of EBM affect each case’s outcomes. The first two chapters are contextual in that they place the author’s research aims among scholars’ arguments for and against an EBM approach. This results in both an optimistic and pessimistic model of EBM. These models serve as a baseline from which the author systematically assesses the evidence from each case. The optimistic approach praises EBM aspirations of bringing together otherwise disparate interests to create place-based plans and policies. The intended adaptive and flexible nature of these types of collaborations are hailed as one that promotes individual and institutional learning leading to improved management systems. The pessimistic approach cautions that the inertia infiltrating existing management is stronger than the willingness to create change. In addition, this model holds that stakeholder collaboration will not necessarily lead to consensus and shared goals. Rather, representatives will unknowingly uphold the status quo, act independently, and use power struggles to maintain sectorbased interests. The next seven chapters are each devoted to a case study, all of which have been acknowledged as initiatives experimenting with implementation of EBM principles. Cases include internationally-recognized initiatives and are grouped by terrestrial examples (Austin’s Balcones Canyonlands Conservation Program, San Diego Multiple Species Program) and aquatic examples (Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan, California Bay Delta Program), or are studied for comparison (Arizona Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan, Florida’s Kissimmee River, California Mono Basin). Some follow a more optimistic model of EBM with unintended benefits such as the development of innovative models that provoke thinking about the social and natural interrelationships of a system. Some cases are more in-line with the pessimistic model and have unintended consequences such as the disappointing Hum Ecol (2009) 37:251–252 DOI 10.1007/s10745-009-9229-2