No abstract

J. Gastó, D. Subercaseaux, and L. Vera. 2012. Ecology: an integrated science for the artificialization of nature. Cien. Inv. Agr. 39(3): 397-410. The main challenges confronting contemporary agronomy are being addressed according to the emerging and complex problems of our era. Agronomy corresponds to the science and profession of solving the problems of agriculture. The emergence of agronomy in sociocultural processes and their coevolution is described, as agronomy represents the determinant for the artificialization of nature, the management of natural resources and the transformation and management of land. The integration of nature, culture and human well-being inform the tendencies that are expressed in the cultural landscape. Ecology, ecosystem, territory and cultural landscape are the resultant aspects that provide the basis for the study and development of natural resource and ecosystem management. These subjects also allow us to understand the transition from nature to natural resources. All of these issues are associated with the transition of agronomy from a Cartesian analytical science to an integrative, systemic science, leading to a holistic and transdisciplinary paradigm that must be applied to the agronomic profession and to rural engineering. To be applicable to the problems of our era, the modern agronomic paradigm must be holistic and transdisciplinary and must cross the four hierarchical levels of the sciences: valoric, normative, pragmatic and empirical. This paradigm must also adapt to the unique conditions of various regions and to the evolution of the processes that are characteristic of complex systems associated with the construction of a rurality that is propitious for sustainability and quality of life.Key words: Agronomy, cultural landscape, ecology, ecosystem, evolution of agronomy, natural resources, sociocultural processes, territory, transdisciplinarity. According to Rector Millas' interpretation, the farmer completely understood the meaning of agriculture; he integrated its three fundamental components. The first component incorporates permanent values that are related to agriculture and rural life. The second component indicates that nothing is free in nature, which refers to the second law of thermodynamics; if we want do agriculture, some seeds must be for the wild organisms, integrating nature, fauna, flora and soil. The third component is family, who are the social stakeholders participating in the process.The world is changing gradually but deeply. Therefore, that farmer, now an entrepreneur, would currently be saying: for the bank, for taxes, for the inputs. He would move to a distant city, leaving the country uninhabited.

Rural and agricultural modernization and industrialization (RAMI) increased in recent decades in a multiscalar way. RAMI has implied the rural landscape transformation through the arrival of industrial models. These processes have not been linear or unidirectional; heterogeneities, opposites, mosaics, hybridizations, new interactions, problems, and tensions, between traditional and industrial agriculture and other agriculture types, have emerged. We tackle and problematized the RAMI processes, which is a complex and a real-world problem, from Sustainability Science (SS) and transdisciplinarity. Thus, considering studies and experiences in different rural areas in the world, an epistemological positioning is presented, which allows overcoming scientific frontiers and relating it to rural sustainability. We delve into the Lake Pátzcuaro Basin (LPB), Mexico, an area with a strong agricultural tradition (“milpa” systems). Recently, the presence of industrial agriculture (mainly avocado monoculture and berry greenhouses) has increased, occurring the coexistence between peasant-entrepreneurs, indigenous–non-indigenous, and new-rural. The article aims to understand comprehensively the emerging complexities from the RAMI, deepening LPB’s real case. The epistemological approach developed allow us to conceive the interaction and possible complementation between traditional agriculture, industrial agriculture and other agriculture types, and the emergence of an included middle that corresponds to an “emerging complexity”. Finally, relevant topics and questions are highlighted.

In the Anthropocene, humans have become the dominant force behind the transformation of the planet and its cultural landscapes. In recent decades, there has been a paradigm shift in the sciences, changing the focus from the study of separate components to the study of wholes. In light of this, several fields of study have attempted to address the dichotomous paradigm of nature versus society by developing integrative concepts, such as ‘social metabolism’, to explain the inextricable interrelations between nature and society for building a sustainable future. In this paper, we examine the metabolism of cultural landscapes, considering the actions of social actors in their territories. Cultural landscapes emerge from the artificialization of nature and the opening of the land, resulting in a landscape that conforms to the culture and the availability of technologies, thus creating a whole system with either higher or lower levels of life quality and sustainability. Three central elements operate interactively in the construction of cultural landscapes: the territory, the social actors who act in the territory, and the articulators (e.g., technology and regulations). The construction of cultural landscapes gives rise to a gradient of territorial typologies, including wildland, rural and urban, which have different requirements and consumption of resources and energy. In the Anthropocene, many cultural landscapes have been constructed in such a way that they require and consume increasing amounts of energy. We describe carrying capacity, polycentricity, and Universal Lawfulness as three of the main considerations for the design of sustainable cultural landscapes.