Even amongst more willing academics, our embedded educational experiences and short-cuts of language can make it hard to talk with each other; trying to engage stakeholders and decision makers is that much harder. Ecologists must be humble enough to recognize early forays into using social science methods to analyse engagement and exploring translational ecology are going to be less sophisticated than our colleagues in the social sciences. Eric Toman will explore some of these themes in a strategic and visionary talk; I intend to ground this sort of journey in case examples involving ecological management and decision-making. The first case involves stakeholder perspectives on what agroecosystem resilience means and what decisions could be made, using multi-stakeholder charettes and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Five Good Governance Principles. The second case involves decision making on the goals and approaches of ecological restoration using Conversation Analysis to determine if the specific method of Circular Questioning did foster deeper conversations, more understanding of complex issues, and (again) better decision-making.
Results/Conclusions
In discussing agroecosystem resilience, 17 of the 22 charrettes yielded a strong opinion from the multi-sectorial participants that 5 UNDP Good Governance principles of Legitimacy and Voice, Direction, Performance, Accountability, and Fairness were achieved. This result was that agreements were reached on ways to alter supply and demand management in agricultural production, reform nutrient management, assess farm and supply chain impacts on proximate and diasporic ecosystems, and manage incentives and disincentives to achieve farm production while addressing climate change impacts. For the ecological restoration cases, Circular Questioning moved the stakeholders from too many instances of mistrust and decision paralysis to situations where agreements were reached on (a) the act of doing ecological restoration, (b) what goals to set, (c) how to approach other stakeholders, and (d) what methods to use.