Abstract
The literature on ecosystem management and assessment is increasingly focusing on social capacity to enhance ecosystem resilience. Organizational flexibility, participatory approaches to learning, and knowledge generation for responding adequately to environmental change have been highlighted but not critically assessed. The small, flexible municipal organization, Ecomuseum Kristianstads Vattenrike (EKV) in southern Sweden, has identified win-win situations and gained broad support and legitimacy for ecosystem management among a diversity of actors in the region. Navigating the existing legal-political framework, EKV has built a loose social network of local stewards and key persons from organizations at municipal and higher societal levels. As a ‘bridging organization’, EKV has created arenas for trust-building, knowledge generation, collaborative learning, preference formation, and conflicts solving among actors in relation to specific environmental issues. Ad hoc projects are developed as issues arise by mobilizing individuals from the social network. Our results suggest that the EKV approach to adaptive comanagement has enhanced the social capacity to respond to unpredictable change and developed a trajectory towards resilience of a desirable social-ecological system.
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Notes
Pollution abatement of course also impacts on ecosystems but here we focus on the direct impacts through natural resource management.
In The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment context this case is sometimes referred to as Kristianstad Wetlands (http://www.maweb.org/en/subglobal.overview.aspx). Kristianstads Vattenrike roughly translates as “The Kristianstad Water Realm,” but rike also means riches; the double meaning of the name both defines the catchment area and reflects its rich natural values.
The area of the Municipality of Kristianstad is 1,346 km2, most of which is a part of the drainage basin of Helgeå River.
http://www.vattenriket.kristianstad.se/presentation/natverk.htm Magnusson in turn developed his figure after meetings with the authors.
Background info of KV in English is provided by EKV at http://www.vattenriket.kristianstad.se/eng/index.shtml
http://www.vattenriket.kristianstad.se/folder/vattenriket.pdf (Swedish, English, and German)
This physical manifestation of Kristianstads Vattenrike is, confusingly, also called “the Ecomuseum.” It consists of 13 visit sites with information, of which four are more elaborated outdoor museums with exhibitions.
Information on Kristianstads Vattenrike/Kristianstad Wetlands can be found at http://www.maweb.org/en/subglobal.overview.aspx
The term “ad-hocracy” (Toffler, 1970) describes an innovative and collaborative organization “that is able to fuse experts drawn from different disciplines into smoothly functioning ad hoc project teams avoid all the trappings of bureaucratic structure, notably sharp divisions of labor. Coordination can no longer be planned but must come through interaction. The structure of the Adhocracy must be flexible, self-renewing, organic” (Mintzberg, 1979: 432–33).
This was the main message from the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA): “The challenge of reversing the degradation of ecosystems while meeting increasing demands for their services can be partially met under some scenarios that the MA considered, but these involve significant changes in policies, institutions, and practices that are not currently under way” http://www.maweb.org Statement of the Board, p. 10.
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Personal communication
HC, Coordinator of the nature conservation section of KV. Employed by Kristianstad Municipality (50%) and the County Administration Board (50%). Hans.Cronert@kristianstad.se
KM, Information secretary at the Man and Biosphere (MAB) Candidate Office. Karin.Magntorn@kristianstad.se
SEM, Director of EKV since the beginning 1989. Sven-Erik.Magnusson@kristianstad.se
Landowners A, B, and C
Acknowledgments
We thank three anonymous reviewers for valuable and helpful comments. Our research was financed by Formas, The Swedish Research Council for Environment, Agricultural Sciences and Spatial Planning.
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Hahn, T., Olsson, P., Folke, C. et al. Trust-building, Knowledge Generation and Organizational Innovations: The Role of a Bridging Organization for Adaptive Comanagement of a Wetland Landscape around Kristianstad, Sweden. Hum Ecol 34, 573–592 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10745-006-9035-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10745-006-9035-z