Alan P. Diduck

Adaptive co‐management for social–ecological complexity

Building trust through collaboration, institutional development, and social learning enhances efforts to foster ecosystem management and resolve multi-scale society–environment dilemmas. One emerging approach aimed at addressing these dilemmas is adaptive co-management. This method draws explicit attention to the learning (experiential and experimental) and collaboration (vertical and horizontal) functions necessary to improve our understanding of, and ability to respond to, complex social–ecological systems. Here, we identify and outline the core features of adaptive co-management, which include innovative institutional arrangements and incentives across spatiotemporal scales and levels, learning through complexity and change, monitoring and assessment of interventions, the role of power, and opportunities to link science with policy.

Public education: An undervalued component of the environmental assessment public involvement process

Abstract The necessity of providing public education regarding environmental assessment (EA) process and substance is examined. It is argued that public education as part of public involvement has thus far keyed almost exclusively on the project at hand ignoring EA process. Education in EA process would, in general, improve involvement. The potential techniques of a public education program — e.g., plain-language legislation and policies, knowledge-based systems — are established through the literature regarding public legal education and more generally public involvement in EA. The identified education techniques are applied, in a cursory fashion, as evaluation criteria to the requirements of three Canadian EA processes (Federal, Ontario, Manitoba). The requirements of all three processes utilize only partially the education techniques identified. It is suggested that seven public education techniques offer the greatest potential for facilitating EA process education, namely: citizen training, computer-based participation, open houses, plain language, phone-lines, publications, and videos.

Learning, Public Involvement and Environmental Assessment: A Canadian Case Study

Policy makers and scholars have shown increased interest in the learning outcomes of resource and environmental management initiatives. This applies to environmental assessment (EA) as well as to processes that more explicitly incorporate learning-related objectives, such as adaptive management. Using a transformative framework and a qualitative methodology, in this paper we investigate learning outcomes from involvement in an EA of a major hog processing facility in Brandon, Canada. We also examine implications for EA process design, and the pursuit of key social objectives of sustainability. The extent to which the EA in this case facilitated emancipatory learning was quite limited, that is, the process deviated substantially from the ideal conditions of learning. As well, the EA was at best legitimating, and was by no means participatory, empowering, or equitable. The emancipatory potential of involvement in EA, and opportunities for mutual learning, could be increased with earlier involvement, higher degrees of participation, and more open decision-making.

An Assessment of Stakeholder Advisory Committees in Forest Management: Case Studies from Manitoba, Canada

Forest management in Canada is evolving from being largely bilateral and closed to being more inclusive and open. In an effort to test new approaches to public participation, many forest products companies have established advisory committees. Since there is little empirical evidence documenting advisory committee processes, our purpose was to determine the strengths and weaknesses of such processes. This was achieved by assessing the advisory committees of three major forest products companies in Manitoba, Canada, responsible for managing over 5 million hectares of productive forest. Our approach was inductive and qualitative, involving standardized, semistructured interviews with committee members. Results coalesce around both process and outcome strengths and weaknesses, such as multiple involvement techniques, information sharing and communication, and breadth of participant learning. While the results are mixed, the study confirms that advisory committees have promise as a method of actively involving a select group of stakeholders in forest management.

Transformative learning theory, public involvement, and natural resource and environmental management

This paper reviews studies of transformative learning through public involvement in natural resource and environmental management (NREM). It summarises evidence regarding instrumental, communicative, transformative and sustainability-oriented learning outcomes, and learning processes such as reflection, rational discourse and applying new frames of references in individual and social action. The paper discusses the implications for the design of NREM and public involvement, and presents a new framework connecting non-formal education, involvement in NREM, transformative learning and sustainability. The paper concludes with suggestions for promising future research, such as scaling up transformative learning in the context of NREM, including examining potential complementarities with leading models of social and organisational learning.

The Learning Dimension of Adaptive Capacity: Untangling the Multi-level Connections

This chapter summarizes learning processes at individual, action group, organizational, network, and societal levels of analysis, and details connections linking learning outcomes across multiple levels. The discussion highlights how learning processes may not adequately accommodate contested values, power imbalances, and socio-economic constraints. The chapter casts light on adaptive capacity in multi-level governance by developing the concept of multi-level learning, suggesting ways to produce complementarity across multiple organizational levels, and supporting the proposition that relational spaces enhance adaptive capacity. The chapter also reveals the need for further theoretical development, including fully accounting for network and societal levels of analysis, assessing promising linking institutions (such as community-based social marketing and adaptive co-management), and addressing power asymmetries in learning dynamics. A promising avenue regarding the last point is giving more attention in theory and practice to critical, non-formal education. Further, the chapter emphasizes the need for place-based empirical studies of existing institutions.

Achieving meaningful public participation in the environmental assessment of hydro development: case studies from Chamoli District, Uttarakhand, India

Uttarakhand, India has great potential for hydro development because of its mountainous environment and fast flowing rivers. While growth in the hydro sector could facilitate industrial development and improve social well-being in the state, it could also have severe negative impacts on social-ecological systems. Using a qualitative methodology involving a review of documents, field observations, and over 100 interviews with government, industry officials and community members, the research investigated two large hydro projects in the Chamoli District. The results show that public participation in project planning and implementation did not exemplify characteristics of meaningful involvement. The participation processes would have been improved with greater opportunities for advanced, decentralised, and more active local involvement. The conclusion is that the central and state governments should play a more assertive role in regulating large-scale hydro development in Uttarakhand, to facilitate meaningful public participation and to protect local environmental, economic and social interests.

Stakeholder engagement in sustainable adventure tourism development in the Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve, India

Stakeholder involvement is often cited as critical to sustainable tourism development, but there is limited documentation for niche areas, such as adventure tourism. The main purpose of our research was to understand stakeholder roles in adventure tourism in the Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve (NDBR), Uttarakhand, India, to identify opportunities for achieving sustainable adventure tourism. Our interviews, treks and other activities revealed that organised adventure activities were still in the early development phase, with trekking being the most popular activity. The roles of various stakeholders are yet to be clearly defined, but the State Forest Department is playing a lead in the rapidly evolving network of relationships among adventure tourism stakeholders. Significant opportunity exists for a more systematic approach to adventure tourism planning that builds on the existing strengths of the various players.

RESEARCH ARTICLE: Social Learning Outcomes in the Red River Floodway Environmental Assessment

Resource and environmental managers are increasingly facing problems characterized by high degrees of ecological and social complexity, uncertainty and indeterminacy, and conflicts over values and interests. Moreover, they are often faced with the need to generate positive change in dynamic social-ecological systems. Comprehensive, rational management approaches have often failed to respond effectively to these types of problems. In response, policy makers and managers are increasingly relying on social learning approaches, i.e., adaptive and participatory approaches that facilitate learning by the individuals and organizations involved in resource and environmental governance. In this article, we examine social learning outcomes from the participation of two community organizations in the environmental assessment (EA) of a proposal to expand the Red River Floodway, a 48-km channel that diverts floodwaters around Winnipeg, Canada. The research design was a qualitative, comparative case study involving a review of documents, semi-structured interviews, and direct observation at meetings, open houses, and public hearings. The study findings demonstrate how EA public involvement processes can provide excellent opportunities for single-loop learning in community organizations. Through their involvement, the organizations in question deepened their knowledge, honed their skills, and made substantive contributions to the assessment process. The findings also suggest that public involvement processes can result in double-loop social learning conducive to sustainability. An important catalyst for the double-loop experience in this case was the provision of intervener funding. The findings also shed light on the organizational structure variables essential to create capacity for social learning in community organizations.

Learning for Sustainability Among Faith-Based Organizations in Kenya

Abstract The complex and unpredictable contexts in which environmental and development work take place require an adaptable, learning approach. Faith-based organizations (FBOs) play a significant role in sustainability work around the world, and provide a unique setting in which to study learning. This paper explores individual learning for sustainability within two FBOs engaged in sustainability work in Kenya. Learning outcomes covered a broad range of areas, including the sustainability framework, environment/conservation, skills, community work, interpersonal engagement, and personal and faith development. These outcomes were acquired through embodied experience and activity, facilitation by the workplace, interpersonal interaction, personal reflection, and Bible study and worship. Grounded categories were compared to learning domains and processes described by Mezirow’s transformative learning theory. The findings indicate that for learning in the sustainability field, instrumental learning and embodied learning processes are particularly important, and consequently they require greater attention in the theory when applied in this field.