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Linking and analyzing governance of natural resources at different scales requires the development of a conceptual framework for analyzing social-ecological systems that can be easily applied by a range of stakeholders whose interests lie at different scales, but where the results of the analysis can be compared in a straightforward way. We outline...
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... research focuses on the Guiana Shield region of South America, which extends from Colombia in the west to Brazil in the east (Fig. 2), covering an area of 2.5 million square kilometres, Brazil, for example, has formally protected vast areas of the Amazon region, either as biodiversity conservation areas or indigenous territories. However, Brazil is also the world's fourth largest emitter of greenhouse gases, with a significant contribution from deforestation in the ...
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... Jones et al., 2019;Pierce and McKay, 2008;Ungar et al., 2020). Visual and spatially explicit methods are used in different forms, including Geographical Information Systems (GIS) (Resendez de Lozano et al., 2014;Widener et al., 2016), Night-time light (NTL) remote sensing images (Qiang et al., 2020), spatial images captured via drones (Ungar et al., 2020), photovoice (Pierce and McKay, 2008), videos and photos (Berardi et al., 2015), and mapping (Flint, 2010;Ayaviri Matuk et al., 2019;Chelleri et al., 2016;Pietta and Tononi, 2021;Ungar et al., 2020). Examples of the latter are the combination of observation, interviews, document review, surveys, and secondary data analysis (Winkler et al., 2016) or the integration of indicator-based assessment with survey data, archival data, and participatory rural appraisal (PRA) techniques (Ahmadvand and Karami, 2009). ...
... Similarly, when the frameworks are based on resilience theory, capitals are labelled as "social resilience attributes" (Chelleri et al., 2016), "dimensions of vulnerability and resilience" (Jha et al., 2021), "community resilience dimensions" (Magis, 2010), or pillars of "livelihood resilience" (Amadu et al., 2021). Other designations used to refer to community capitals are leverage points (Koskimäki, 2021), variables or components of social-ecological systems associated with k-p-w (knowledge-practice-worldviews) (Ayaviri Matuk et al., 2019), system viability indicators/orienteers (Berardi et al., 2015), drivers of change (Berrio-Giraldo et al., 2021) or drivers of vulnerability (Rogers et al., 2013), livelihood assets (Yuliati and Isaskar, 2018;Zhang and Fang, 2020;Edwards et al., 2019;Pandey et al., 2017), community livelihoods (Zacarias, 2018), integral ecology quadrants (Wheeler et al., 2018), adaptation priorities (Basel et al., 2020), visions of development (Clelland, 2021), or dynamic capabilities (Widener et al., 2016). In some frameworks capitals are referred to as ecosystem services (Davids et al., 2021), ecosystem outcomes (Davids et al., 2022) or ecosystem benefits (Kittinger et al., 2013). ...
... The importance of including a multiplicity of actors in environmental management is substantieted by the fact that the concept of systems is a mental construct and cannot be separated from epistemological considerations (Berardi et al., 2015). Caring about what people value in relation to the place they live in is also important to advance Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (Ungar et al., 2020) through collectively supported development strategies (Flint, 2010). ...
Sustainability has increasingly gained momentum as an underlying framework to orient decisions and actions in environmental management. However, while acting in view of sustainability goals is a noble intention, both the conceptualization and the implementation of sustainability remain a subject of debate. This is partly due to the widespread lack of consideration for its social dimension and the interactions this has with the environmental and economic dimensions. To this end, the Community Capitals Framework and other asset-based approaches are often used to deal with these problematic aspects of sustainability in environmental management. Through a systematic review of scientific peer-reviewed articles, this paper investigates the conceptual and practical application of such approaches. Results from our analysis show that different declinations of community capitals exist within environmental management. In all the forms they assume in the 42 frameworks identified, their employment seems effective in promoting the inclusion of social, economic and environmental dimensions when conducting sustainability assessments. However, we identified two main difficulties that challenge the application of asset-based approaches in practice. First, in most cases, capital assessment is not carried out in the planning phase of an environmental intervention in order to identify community resources; capitals are employed instead to measure the impact of an ecological change ex-post, thus being discordant with their theoretical foundations. Second, the existence of a vast array of terms to refer to community assets creates disorientation among exponents of different stakeholder groups and hinders a practical and effective application of this concept. On the basis of our results, we claim the importance of conducting community resources assessment and stakeholder consultation at different times and through practice oriented approaches and cross-silos communication efforts in order to develop a shared understanding of the problem and facilitate sustainable, adaptive and participatory approaches to environmental management.
... Les systèmes socio-écologiques comprennent, entre autres, des agents décisionnels individuels qui poursuivent divers objectifs et qui affectent la dynamique du système de plusieurs manières . Par conséquent, comprendre comment les différents acteurs identifient, perçoivent et représentent leur système est d'un intérêt crucial pour l'étude des interactions entre les systèmes écologiques et sociaux (Berardi et al., 2015 ;Berkes et al., 2008). ...
L’objectif de la thèse est d’explorer les actions et les perceptions des acteurs intervenants dans la transformation de ces espaces délaissés, au niveau d’un territoire (sur la base du cas de l’Aire Métropolitaine de Lyon-Saint-Etienne, LySEM), dans le contexte des changements globaux. Il s’agit en particulier de savoir si les acteurs mobilisent la transformation et/ou régénération des friches pour développer des trajectoires socio-économiques et écologiques soutenables, à l’échelle locale ? Et si oui, comment procèdent-ils ?Dans le chapitre 1, nous avons cherché à identifier les parties-prenantes à considérer lors de la mise en œuvre d’initiatives de transformation de friches, quelle qu’elle soit leur nature, et les logiques qui sous-tendent ces projets de transformation, en fonction des contextes et des enjeux au sein des territoires. Nous avons pu montrer dans le chapitre 2, sur la base d’exemples tirés de la littérature, les possibilités qui s’offrent aux acteurs pour redévelopper des friches sous une perspective socio-écologique, en soutenant les capacités adaptatives des systèmes écologiques et les capacités adaptatives des systèmes sociaux. Ainsi, nous avons proposé un cadre heuristique pour analyser la transformation des friches, avec un volet écosystémique, permettant de limiter les approches économico-centrée de ces initiatives.Dans le chapitre 3, nous avons d’abord, exploré la prise en compte des changements climatiques, dans la mise en œuvre de stratégies et d’actions pour l’adaptation et la préservation de la biodiversité. Cette analyse a montré que les acteurs, bien qu’ils soient conscient des impacts des changements climatiques au niveau local, les actions en faveur de l’atténuation et/ou l’adaptation climatique restent subordonnées aux intérêts limités du court-terme, notamment de nature socio-économique et aux approches de planification qui favorisent des réponses isolées, réactives. Nous avons pu constater aussi un fort intérêt pour la transformation des délaissés vers des espaces verts en les promouvant et en les concevant pour leurs avantages esthétiques, d'infrastructure verte et de loisirs, et dans une moindre mesure pour la biodiversité. Dans le chapitre 4, nous nous sommes focalisés sur les acteurs de l’aménagement du territoire intervenants de manière directe ou indirecte dans la transformation des friches, afin d’explorer leurs points de vue (world views) à propos de la mise en œuvre d’un changement qui permet une reconfiguration du système d’aménagement en vue de développer des trajectoires socio-économiques et écologiques soutenables, au niveau du terrain d’étude, LySEM. Nous nous sommes appuyés sur l’approche par la construction de récits de changement (ou narrative of change), pour analyser les dires des acteurs. Cette analyse a montré que les narratives produites remettent en question le modèle capitaliste de développement économique, sans pour autant proposer d’imaginaires alternatifs transformateurs. Les territoires tentent de remobiliser les sites en friches dans des logiques marchandes et répondre à des enjeux de compétitivité, d’optimisation du développement socio-économique, tout en intégrant des objectifs environnementaux comme outil d’aménagement. Dans le chapitre 5, nous avons réalisé une revue de littérature à propos de la transformabilité des systèmes socio-écologiques complexes afin de mettre l’accent sur les risques d’apparition de problèmes pernicieux qui peuvent entraver ces processus de transformations délibérées. La compréhension des processus sous-jacents aux transformations socio-écologiques apporte des éléments pour anticiper la mise en œuvre en identifiant les facteurs conduisant à l'émergence de problèmes pernicieux lors de la conception de transformations socio-écologiques.
... Інструменти екологічної спільноти можуть сприяти розвитку екологічної свідомості в громаді, за умови набуття ширших інституціональних прав, а також більшого фінансування, як це показує зарубіжний досвід. Зокрема Berardi A., Mistry J., Tschirhart C. на прикладі захоплення прибережних зон Гвіанського щита досліджують, що інтеграція альтернативних громадських рухів корінного населення як представників локальної ідентичності та інших зацікавлених осіб можуе бути ефективними в забезпеченні життєздатності екосистеми Гвіанського щита за посередництва інститутів громадянського суспільства [14]. В Україні поки такі інститути мають доволі слабкий вплив, а екологічні рухи реалізовуються в описаних вище спонтанних заходах просвітницько-популярного характеру. ...
The article is a theoretical overview of the problem of local identities and their level of environmental awareness depending on the criteria of territorial identification. The definition of ecological consciousness is given and its main components are listed. Territorial and territorial-motivational identification criteria are highlighted. The territorial criterion includes identification by political-administrative and landscape-geographic features. The primary sign of territorial identification for an individual is the one that carries greater value. The great significance of the natural-geographic criterion for Ukrainians is theoretically substantiated and its rapid transformation due to industrialization, as a result of which Ukraine turned into a country with a bad ecological situation, is indicated. Within the territorial and motivational criterion, the area can be considered as a resource or as a value. Local identity, which is concentrated around the natural resources of the territory, is usually characterized by an anthropocentric type of ecological consciousness of a destructive nature. Aggressive agriculture, illegal mining, environmental pollution are defined as a severe impact on ecology. Within the limits of the anthropocentric type, a mild form of impact on nature through recreational activities, which has moderately destructive features, is highlighted. Both forms of environmental consciousness are based on the masculinity of male-type identity. It is substantiated that representatives of the ecocentric type of consciousness basically rely on intangible resources. The territory of residence is considered by them as a value accompanied by significant emotional ties and rootedness. The nature of ecological behavior is determined by the features of the place of residence (nature protection zones or zones of high environmental pollution).
Keywords: local identity, territorial identification, anthropocentric, ecocentric, ecological consciousness
... System viability recognises that the healthy survival of any system at any scale requires attention to a number of essential responses to different 'environmental' states (where 'environment' can be the biophysical, social, economic, political) (Bossel, 1999(Bossel, , 2001(Bossel, , 2007. Our system viability framework, adapted through previous research with Indigenous Peoples (Berardi et al., 2013;Berardi et al., 2015;Mistry et al., 2010;, focuses on community responses or strategies to different environmental states, asking the following questions: How do we meet our basic needs? -to exist under normal environmental conditions, you need basic resources such as food, water, heath, shelter and fuel; How do we work with others? ...
... Our use of the system viability framework for the traditional knowledge indicators arises from long-term development of the approach with Indigenous communities across the Guiana Shield region of South America (Berardi et al., 2013;Berardi et al., 2015;Mistry et al., 2010;. There are other indicator frameworks, for example the Indicators of Resilience in Socio-ecological Production Landscapes and Seascapes (SEPLS) (Dunbar et al., 2020), that explore community or landscape resilience. ...
Traditional practices of Indigenous Peoples support the sustainable management of a quarter of the global land area. Yet their traditional knowledge is declining. To date, there has been insufficient focus on the development of participatory and evidence-based processes for assessing the state of traditional knowledge at national levels. We used traditional knowledge indicators and participatory video to evaluate the state of traditional knowledge within three Indigenous groups in Guyana. We find that traditional knowledge is perceived to be ’stable’ and responding and adapting to a diverse set of environmental factors and new circumstances. There are differences amongst Indigenous groups, but also commonalities, which help identify areas of intervention and point towards developing shared and collective narratives at the national level to feed into policy making. The findings have critical implications for the ways in which traditional knowledge should be researched, measured and safeguarded.
... In the present study, a 1:50,000 scale was used to demarcate the landscape units, where data were integrated on each landscape in loco, allowing a better discernment of these units and subsequent detailing of their subunits. The analyses used different groups of data, which for Berardi et al. (2015) aid perceiving the functioning of systems along the scales in the characterization of organizational systems of interest, leading to understand the productive or synergic situations that maintain or overturn the viability of the perceived systems. Work scales influenced directly the setting of landscape limits, which the more detailed the information, the more information can influence its boundaries. ...
Landscapes are formed by physical elements of material order and abstract elements of immaterial order, so their management and planning should consider these two aspects. Aiming to understand the landscapes of Ouro Preto, Minas Gerais State, the appropriation by the actors who work in the landscape was identified and classified, and also its dynamics from 1973 to 2015. The research analyzed the current landscape and its historical evolution, distinguishing material and immaterial dimensions, from field trips, soil types, relief, slope, drainage, conservation units, administrative zoning, urban areas, natural resources, transport and building infrastructure, satellite images, and semi-structured interviews. As a result, a map with the landscape units and their subunits, which have distinct characteristics, with their proper settings was obtained. The landscape has continuous boundaries with various operating scales, posing a major challenge for its proper management. The number of generated ecosystem services are difficult to measure, but its benefits are used by everyone. The dynamics of the landscape has been shaped by a slow evolution, set by mining activities, including revegetation areas after clear cuts and currently the inclusion of tourism in certain regions.
... Indeed, it has been argued that environmental governance must engage with normative and political dimensions of scale rather than taking temporal and spatial considerations as natural and taken-for-granted entities (Bulkeley 2005). As a result, Bulkeley (2005) argues for a new grammar to incorporate scale into environmental governance rooted around notions of territory to represent multiple political jurisdictions, and hierarchy to articulate the relationships and possible conflicts between nested socio-ecological systems (Berardi et al. 2015). ...
Accelerated changes to the planet have created novel spaces to re-imagine the boundaries and foci of environmental health research. Climate change, mass species extinction, ocean acidification, biogeochemical disturbance, and other emergent environmental issues have precipitated new population health perspectives, including, but not limited to, one health, ecohealth, and planetary health. These perspectives, while nuanced, all attempt to reconcile broad global challenges with localized health impacts by attending to the reciprocal relationships between the health of ecosystems, animals, and humans. While such innovation is to be encouraged, we argue that a more comprehensive engagement with the ethics of these emerging fields of inquiry will add value in terms of the significance and impact of associated interventions. In this contribution, we highlight how the concept of spatial and temporal scale can be usefully deployed to shed light on a variety of ethical issues common to emerging environmental health perspectives, and that the potential of scalar analysis implicit to van Potter’s conceptualization of bioethics has yet to be fully appreciated. Specifically, we identify how scale interacts with key ethical issues that require consideration and clarification by one health, ecohealth, and planetary health researchers and practitioners to enhance the effectiveness of research and practice, including justice and governance.
... A series of interventions are underway involving ASTiP 6 colleagues at the OU in facilitating the framing of public policy issues regarded as being wicked problems (in areas of health, education, agriculture, and environment) with participants from relevant sectors. These ASTiP activities have been ongoing outside of the eSTEeM project, particularly in areas of water governance (Foster et al. 2016), environmental governance , and indigenous community development (Berardi et al. 2015). The eSTEeM inquiry has given impetus to a more concerted strategy of mobilising STiP expertise, including STiP alumni, alongside colleagues at the workplace. ...
Implementing the sustainable development goals (SDGs) adopted at the UN Summit in September 2015 specifically invites the creation of “an integrated, holistic, multi-stakeholder approach”. This implies the need for systems thinking in practice, a tradition that draws on systems theories, tools and techniques able to facilitate better conversation and cooperation between agencies. As an approach it goes beyond development of competencies through formal education programmes. This paper focuses on SDG 17—the means of implementation—and the role of systems thinking in practice for supporting both competence and SDG implementation capability. Two inter-linked initiatives led by systems thinking practitioners in the field of sustainability science are reported; one is an action research inquiry exploring the praxis (theory-informed-action) challenges of applying systems thinking in practice in contemporary workplaces ranging from in-field development projects to government administrations and business ventures, and another which built on the findings from this inquiry—a proposal for developing an action-learning platform for SDG implementation. Experience suggests that implementing SDGs requires not only competence in systems thinking but a capability of putting systems thinking into practice in a dynamic way, as praxis. The proposed action-learning platform can also be regarded as a learning laboratory in the sense that it will offer learning support and a chance to collaborate and experiment. This platform aims to be co-designed with multi-agency practitioners from international development, government planning, business/social enterprise and NGOs. The proposed platform draws on open-source resources, and ideas of social learning, developmental evaluation and systems thinking in practice traditions.
... Instead of asking participants to work through a simplification of SSM and CSH, we adapted another systems approach, Orientor Theory (Bossel, 1999) into a simple framework for exploring the survival strategies of communities. Our adaptation, termed 'system viability' (Berardi et al, 2013(Berardi et al, , 2015, asked participants to explore six distinct strategies for facing up to challenges within their environment: resisting temporary change; adapting to permanent change; developing efficient processes for dealing with scarce resources; developing flexible strategies for dealing with a heterogeneous environment; focusing on immediate existence needs; and engaging in partnerships with others. Once films and photostories, capturing the range of community survival strategies, were developed by the communities, these were analysed by the whole team (academic and Indigenous researchers) to identify community indicators of wellbeing. ...
This chapter portrays the development of a research program involving a number of phases and funded projects over the longer term. The authors depict a lay expertise model of development where local people promote their own solutions to environmental problems. They comment on the way their methodological approach changed over the 15 years of researching with indigenous forest communities in Guyana to find solutions to their complex environmental issues. Their initial expert-led approach, using quantitative methods, became increasingly participatory as more appropriate qualitative and visual methods were employed. The chapter shows how such techniques can be used to overcome communication barriers and how they can aid the interactions between academic researchers and non-academic researchers and between local people and policymakers. The chapter also shows how research and visual techniques may be used not simply to empower local communities to take action themselves but to take ownership, offering the potential for longer term outcomes.
... Understanding the narratives different groups use to organize their grievances can help identify opportunities to promote cooperative solutions. With outside assistance, indigenous communities occupying large areas of rainforest in Brazil, Colombia, and Venezuela have positioned themselves as stewards of a global resource, period financial support through the UNDP and others under the Guiana Shield Facility strengthened their ability to fend off destructive local resource uses (Berardi et al. 2015). Social movements in areas such as women's or indigenous people's rights can also link with actors in local resource conflicts to help legitimize demands for equity, democratization and environmental accountability. ...
The food security crisis and international “land grabs” have drawn renewed attention to the role of natural resource competition in the livelihoods of the rural poor. While significant empirical research has focused on diagnosing the links between natural resource competition and (violent) conflict, much less has focused on the dynamics of whether and how resource competition can be transformed to strengthen social-ecological resilience and mitigate conflict. Focusing on this latter theme, this review synthesizes evidence from cases in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Building on an analytical framework designed to enable such comparative analysis, we present several propositions about the dynamics of conflict and collective action in natural resource management, and a series of recommendations for action. These propositions are: collective action in natural resource management is influenced by the social-ecological and governance context; natural resource management institutions affect the incentives for conflict or cooperation; and, the outcomes of these interactions influence future conflict risk, livelihoods, and resource sustainability. Action recommendations concern policies addressing resource tenure, conflict resolution mechanisms, and social inequalities, as well as strategies to strengthen collective action institutions in the natural resource sectors and to enable more equitable engagement by marginalized groups in dialogue and negotiation over resource access and use. © 2017, Igitur, Utrecht Publishing and Archiving Services. All rights reserved.
... The list below describes how my involvement in Project COBRA influenced this thesis: • Project-related field trips to the region, in 2012 and 2014 helped form first impressions on the local context, including aspects linked to the social organisation, as well as political, economic and cultural aspects. • The academic publications produced by the COBRA network throughout the project constituted a pool of knowledge on the region in the fields of human and Indigenous rights, social and political science, communication, economy,geography, and ecology, which has served as an intellectual background for this research(Berardi et al. 2013;Berardi et al. 2015;Mistry, Berardi, et al. 2014; Mistry, Bignante, et al. 2014;Mistry et al. 2015;Mistry, Tschirhart, et al. 2014;Oteros-rozas et al. 2015;Tschirhart et al. 2014;Tschirhart et al. 2016).• My exposure to the methodology and methods used in Project COBRA, such as PAR, semi-structured interview techniques as well as focus groups contributed to building my experience and informing my choice of methods of data collection. ...
Having its roots in computer science and information systems, the field of information and communication technologies (ICT) in development has arguably been dominated by technocentric approaches, mainly concerned with describing and managing the mechanisms of technology diffusion and adoption. However, the high failure rate of many ICT for development (ICT4D) interventions and their limited focus on wellbeing impact has drawn attention to the needs for designing better evaluation frameworks to help make sense of the complex realities in which ICT interventions take place, and for interrogating the usefulness of mainstream approaches on the impact of ICT4D interventions on wellbeing. Efforts to operationalise the capability approach, and to apply it to the field of ICT4D constitute an increasingly popular alternative in this regard. The alternative shifts the focus of ICT4D evaluation away from an exclusive focus on technology access and use, towards understanding their multidimensional development outcomes, including their impact on wellbeing. One avenue, which has largely been underexplored, is the potential contribution of systems thinking approaches for further strengthening the focus on multidimensional development outcomes while improving the practical applicability of ICT4D evaluations. This doctoral research sets out to explore how systems thinking concepts and techniques can be used to complement existing approaches so as to increase the success rate of ICT4D interventions, as measured by their effect on the wellbeing of intended beneficiaries. Drawing on multiple theoretical influences, including the capability approach, systemic inquiry, critical theory and pragmatism, this thesis evaluates four ICT4D interventions, including a researcher-led ICT4D intervention, which have all taken place in Indigenous
communities of the North Rupununi, Guyana, between 2005 and 2015. The findings of this study suggest that the wellbeing impact of ICT4D interventions is primarily determined by whether they are introduced to address locally-defined needs and the extent to which beneficiary communities are involved in their design, implementation and evaluation. It argues that applying concepts and techniques from systems thinking can help address some of the criticism and shortcomings of established and emerging approaches for evaluating ICT4D interventions, by looking beyond efficiency and optimisation towards questions of participation, power, purpose and values. The research then outlines the contours of a Systemic Implementation and Evaluation (SIE) framework, as a way to draw attention to the inevitable clashes of worldviews that characterise interventions involving multiple stakeholders, and to allow a critical reflection on the nature of these interventions and the changes brought about. It concludes by producing a series of policy recommendations associated with enhancing the impact of ICT4D interventions on Indigenous wellbeing.
