Advancing adaptive governance of social-ecological systems through theoretical multiplicity

In recent years there has been rising scientific and policy interest in the adaptive governance of social-ecological systems. A systematic literature review of adaptive governance research during the period 2005–2014, demonstrates a vibrant debate taking place that spans a variety of empirical and theoretical approaches. The particular strength of adaptive governance is that it provides a theoretical lens for research that combines the analyses of novel governance capacities such as adaptive capacity, collaboration, scaling, knowledge and learning. As a way to give greater depth and analytical rigour to future studies over the next decade and beyond, we highlight the added value of theoretical multiplicity (i.e., focusing on the combination of theories to address complex problems). We argue that theoretical multiplicity can encourage stronger synergies between adaptive governance and other theoretical approaches and can help address epistemologically grey areas in adaptive governance scholarship, such as power and politics, inclusion and equity, short term and long term change, the relationship between public policy and adaptive governance.     

Drinking water quality governance: A comparative case study of Brazil,Ecuador, and Malawi

Human health is greatly affected by inadequate access to sufficient and safe drinking water, especially in low and middle-income countries. Drinking water governance improvements may be one way to better drinking water quality. Over the past decade, many projects and international organizations have been dedicated to water governance; however, water governance in the drinking water sector is understudied and how to improve water governance remains unclear. We analyze drinking water governance challenges in three countries – Brazil, Ecuador, and Malawi – as perceived by government, service providers, and civil society organizations. A mixed methods approach was used: a clustering model was used for country selection and qualitative semi-structured interviews were used with direct observation in data collection. The clustering model integrated political, economic, social and environmental variables that impact water sector performance, to group countries. Brazil, Ecuador and Malawi were selected with the model so as to represent the diversity of the clusters. This comparative case study is important because similar challenges are identified in the drinking water sectors of each country; while, the countries represent diverse socio-economic and political contexts, and the case selection process provides generalizability to our results. We find that access to safe water could be improved if certain water governance challenges were addressed: coordination and data sharing between ministries that deal with drinking water services; monitoring and enforcement of water quality laws; and sufficient technical capacity to improve administrative and technical management of water services at the local level. From an analysis of our field research, we also developed a conceptual framework that identifies policy levers that could be used to influence governance of drinking water quality on national and sub-national levels, and the relationships between these levers.     

Post-frontier governance up in smoke? Free-for-all frontier imaginations encourage illegal deforestation and appropriation of public lands in the Brazilian Amazon

ABSTRACT

Post-frontier governance in the Brazilian Amazon highlights the interaction of regulatory technologies, institutions and practices to combat illegal deforestation and appropriation of public lands. While the Amazon fires received tremendous media coverage in 2019, the dismantlement of environmental laws and regulatory agencies has supported the rise in deforestation as early as 2012. We discuss the impact of post-frontier governance in Southwest-Pará by analyzing the spatial distribution of deforestation, territorial management, law enforcement, and environmental regularization from 2000 to 2018. The integration of spatial analysis with qualitative field surveys in the blacklisted municipality Novo Progresso shows that deforestation control largely fails, specifically in undesignated public lands. While land tenure security remains the biggest challenge in the region, the persistent imagination of free-for-all frontier spaces encourages the uncontrolled appropriation of and speculation with public lands. Here, the Rural Environmental Registry (CAR) has been identified as a key instrument to secure land claims.     

基于经济视角的雾霾天气分析及治理研究

近年来中国尤其是华北地区雾霾情况日趋严重.雾霾天气不仅对中国人民身体健康形成了威胁,并且在很大程度上对中国经济的正常健康发展形成了制约.本文探讨了中国雾霾的主要形成原因及雾霾对社会各方面造成的危害,根据雾霾成因分析经济产业调整的具体方式,以期优化经济产业结构,科学规划城市发展,从 源头治理雾霾,有效地促进经济产业持续健康有序的发展.     

Assessment of stormwater runoff management practices and governance under climate change and urbanization: An analysis of Bangkok,Hanoi and Tokyo

As human history is changing on many fronts, it is appropriate for us to understand the different perspectives of major global challenges, of which, water is a major priority. The water resources in urban areas are either approaching or exceeding the limits of sustainable use at alarming rates. Groundwater table depletion and increasing flood events can be easily realized in rapidly developing urban areas. It is necessary to improve existing water management systems for high-quality water and reduced hydro-meteorological disasters, while preserving our natural/pristine environment in a sustainable manner. This can be achieved through optimal collection, infiltration and storage of stormwater. Stormwater runoff is rainfall that flows over the ground surface; large volumes of water are swiftly transported to local water bodies and can cause flooding, coastal erosion, and can carry many different pollutants that are found on paved surfaces. Sustainable stormwater management is desired, and the optimal capture measure is explored in the paper. This study provides commentary to assist policy makers and researchers in the field of stormwater management planning to understand the significance and role of remote sensing and GIS in designing optimal capture measures under the threat of future extreme events and climate change. Community attitudes, which are influenced by a range of factors, including knowledge of urban water problem, are also considered. In this paper, we present an assessment of stormwater runoff management practices to achieve urban water security. For this purpose, we explored different characteristics of stormwater runoff management policies and strategies adopted by Japan, Vietnam and Thailand. This study analyses the abilities of Japanese, Vietnamese and Thai stormwater runoff management policies and measures to manage water scarcity and achieve water resiliency. This paper presents an overview of stormwater runoff management to guide future optimal stormwater runoff measures and management policies within the governance structure. Additionally, the effects of different onsite facilities, including those for water harvesting, reuse, ponds and infiltration, are explored to establish adaptation strategies that restore water cycle and reduce climate change-induced flood and water scarcity on a catchment scale.     

Participatory GIS for strengthening transboundary marine governance in SIDS

In this paper we explore the challenges involved in engaging the full range of stakeholders needed for effective marine resource management in the transboundary Grenadine Islands shared by the small island developing States (SIDS) of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Grenada. The study describes the ways stakeholders were engaged in the development of participatory geographic information systems (PGIS), both in terms of the research approach (process) and the final geodatabase (product); it illustrates how the approach provides a practical means to strengthen aspects of marine governance, particularly in a SIDS context. We found that PGIS can provide a foundation for ecosystem‐based transboundary marine governance. The advantages of this approach are two‐fold: it provides the fullest possible range of information as input for the management of marine resources and it engages the stakeholders. This engagement takes several forms: capacity to participate in research; ownership of information produced; increased stakeholder understanding; empowerment through access to information; capacity to interact with other stakeholders for information and problem‐solving; and competence to participate in actual governance processes. Lastly, we discuss considerations for other practitioners contemplating using PGIS, particularly those working in similar resource‐limited SIDS environments.     

Justice in development? An analysis of water interventions in the rural South

This paper explores a fruitful convergence between the distributive and procedural dimensions of environmental justice theory and current debates in the field of development studies over capitals and capabilities, institutions, and discourse formation to shed new light on natural resource management projects in the developing world. Specifically, we document the planning and implementation of two types of water interventions in two contrasting regions: watershed development programmes in northeast India and small reservoirs in sub‐Saharan West Africa. We find that there is a contradiction between the inherently political nature of water interventions and the fact that such projects remain grounded in apolitical, technical and managerial narratives. In contrast to the new semantic of development, this depoliticization results in the near absence of attention paid to procedural (participation and empowerment) and distributive (equity) justice concerns and in local actors having to revert to covert ways to achieve their ends. A constructive dialogue between development studies and environmental justice scholars can offer a fresh look on the society‐environment nexus in the developing world.     

Stewardship Volunteering by Older Australians: The Generative Response

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to use Erikson's approach to human development, and specifically generativity, as a framework by which to explore older people's experiences of environmental stewardship activities. Using data from a large qualitative study of environmental volunteers resident in the coastal fringes of Queensland, Australia, the paper provides important, illustrative, empirical support for Erikson's theory of generativity in later life. Findings suggest that older people are much more likely to connect their environmental actions with the longer-term future, and express a need to leave a lasting legacy for future generations. According to respondents, the later years are a time to contribute to the environment as part of a broader cycle of life. The environment is also an important site for intergenerational activities. Whilst the work presented here is only a small, localized study, use of Erikson's theory of human development as a framework helps demonstrate the importance of a generative response in later life.     

The local governance of climate change: new tools to respond to old limitations in Esmeraldas,Ecuador

This article argues that climate change, seen as a socially constructed anticipation of natural disasters and a future-risk that plays out in present politics, is enabling the emergence of new modes of governance in cities of the global south. The article focuses on the process by which the city of Esmeraldas, Ecuador, developed a Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation Strategy. Within the context of climate change adaptation, Esmeraldas mobilised new discourses, stakeholders, and planning mechanisms to address pre-existing urban planning and development limitations. This discursively enabled the municipality's ongoing governance project by leveraging resources, creating consensus, and informing practice. Climate change adaptation thus became an important mechanism for engaging with local priorities, particularly those of the most vulnerable populations, and for bridging the gap between the formal world of policymaking and the reality of life in the city, which is more often structured by informality.     

Governmentality,environmental subjectivity,and urban intensification

This article delineates concepts of eco-modernisation and urban sustainability (including its associated discourses), elucidating Foucault's notion of governmentality and examining select moments of contested urban governance in the neighbourhood of Old Ottawa South, in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It shows how intensification – a “compact city approach” to urban sustainability – as both policy and practice, serves to both discipline and regulate by “conducting the conduct” of environmental and entrepreneurial subjects. It reveals that zoning has more explicitly become a political technology (albeit a flexible one) for achieving “highest and best use” of private property, privileging intensification projects proposed by developers, through a hierarchical exercise of state power that privileges market processes, while undermining community values and priorities.