‘Eco-civic’ optimisation: A nested framework for planning and managing landscapes

Abstract

An important institution for regional resource governance is civic engagement in local affairs, including resource use issues. Local civic engagement has traditionally been structured around local government and, more recently, to catchment-based decision-making bodies. If citizens are to participate in regional resource management in ways that are meaningful to them, it is important that both the landscape units being discussed and the jurisdictional boundaries are meaningful. We have been examining how boundaries for resource management regions might be identified. Three considerations are believed to be important if regional resource management is to be meaningful to the citizens involved. Firstly, that the regional boundaries maximise the areal proportion of the region that residents consider to be part of their 'community', which should lead to greater commitment to civic engagement in resource management. Secondly, that the character of the landscape units within the region possess a high degree of homogeneity, reflecting greater coincidence of interest among the inhabitants of the region. The third consideration is a hierarchical multi-scaling capacity to deal with externalities of resource use. The approach was tested through identification of a series of nested 'eco-civic' resource management regions for north-eastern New South Wales in Australia. The results delineate resource governance regions that nest at local to regional scales for integrated natural resource management. Such 'eco-civic' regions demonstrate a better spatial representation of social and ecological characteristics than existing regional frameworks. Crown

Change of Land Use Patterns in the Areas Close to the Airport Development Area and Some Implicating Factors

“…It is essential to understand causes and effects of such changes on the environment in both developed and developing countries, at both micro and macro levels; for example, a decrease in agricultural and ecological lands in China [9,17], the similar study conducted in the United States [4,16], the rapid growth in the peri-urban zones in developing countries resulted from increased commercial development [18], the growth of urban area in relation to population growth in China [19], and prediction of the effects of land use change on water supply in the watershed area by the model [20]. Such studies illustrate the causes and effects as well as recommendations on integrating the findings into plans and policies under a sustainability goal, as confirmed by the study of Musacchino and Coulson [21] and Brunckhorst et al [22].…”

A boundary-spanning organization for transdisciplinary science on land stewardship: The Stewardship Network

“…TSN follows up on the planning processes by helping establish and support socially and ecologically coherent stewardship institutions, called clusters, to implement the strategies they develop. Based on the concept of eco-civic regions (Brunckhorst et al 2006), TSN's clusters serve as enduring social structures through which communities collectively plan and implement stewardship activities that address salient local ecological concerns in culturally appropriate ways.…”

“…TSN helps local communities determine the geographic boundaries and programmatic priorities for stewardship that make sense for their local social-ecological system, and demarcate the planning area accordingly. As eco-civic regions, TSN's clusters maximize the area that residents consider part of their community while also retaining a high degree of ecological and social homogeneity, which leads to greater commitment to civic engagement in resource management (Brunckhorst et al 2006). Grounded in transdisciplinary scientific knowledge co-generated by researchers and practitioners, the result is high-impact, transformative stewardship that engenders social and ecological change.…”

Sustainable landscape management based on cultural ecosystem services

“…Landscape-level socio-ecological assessments have been acknowledged to reinforce civic engagement and enable collaborative decision-making processes [9,10].…”