Introduction

People–place relations are crucial for understanding how to transition to sustainable futures. Sense of place has been used to describe and, in some cases, predict peoples’ pro-environmental behaviors, attitudes, and perceptions and the degree of concern to act or be involved in and for nature (Masterson et al. 2017; Stedman 2008). Understanding peoples’ sense of place provides a better understanding of how to promote environmental stewardship programs, implement transformative programs and interventions, and improve social–ecological outcomes (Frantzeskaki et al. 2018; Masterson et al. 2017, 2019; Mumaw and Raymond 2021). From static, place-bound and fixed ideas within place research, newer understandings have emerged to problematize and pluralize ‘sense’ of place into ‘senses’ of place. Senses of place reflect more appropriately the multiscale and multilayered challenges that we face as global ecosystems’ integrity and societies’ wellbeing are declining, and capture the dynamic change of meanings, attachments, and place understandings (Raymond et al. 2021). These open, dynamic, fluid, and pluralistic conceptions of place can help us explore the disruptive, conflictive, and rapidly changing senses and places emplaced in a relational exchange (ibid). Stemming from these pluralistic conceptions, senses of place then become an important tool for exploring power dynamics and structures, and the complex dynamics of justice (Masterson et al. 2017, 2019; Schlosberg et al. 2017).

The multidimensional character of justice requires a rich and deep understanding of the diverse values people have of different places and the relations and interactions that shape and affect each other. Senses of place and justice analyses can also shed light on how shock events are experienced by residents in terms of loss and disruption—as an injustice—and the effects on identity, temporal continuity, and wellbeing (Schlosberg et al. 2020). Gentrification processes have also been analyzed by capitalizing on place-related meanings by recreating them and consequently ‘creatively destroying senses of place and the city’ (Di Masso et al. 2021, p. 231). Taking an environmental justice lens, this can be done by identifying common health patterns of place-remaking across diverse neighborhoods and their association to political–historical settings (Anguelovski 2013) or revealing how municipal structures overlook the time, care, and collective investments in community gardens (Kotsila et al. 2020). Because justice examinations are context specific and enmeshed in social–ecological–technical dynamics, it is crucial to explore peoples’ senses of place with a relational understanding to capture human and more-than-human relations (Pineda-Pinto et al. 2022; Raymond et al. 2021; Robertson 2018; Schlosberg et al. 2017), justifying the expanded view of people–nature–place relations.

Including nonhuman considerations when exploring senses of place will allow us to shift from notions of human exceptionalism to exploring how a place is experienced and made from an ethics of ecological responsiveness in which humans and nonhumans are relationally affecting each other (Barad 2007; Robertson 2018; West et al 2020). With this shifting from a human to a more-than-human place understanding, we are positioning the nonhuman as an active agent and revaluing their potentiality and capabilities (Schlosberg 2012, 2014; Strang 2017). Thus, our conceptual and empirical work contributes to the paradigm shift in sustainability science that emphasizes relationality, dynamic processes and experiences, and ecological responsiveness (West et al. 2020). It is also sits within calls for multispecies sustainability, based on the intergenerational interdependability of needs of all species (Rupprecht et al. 2020) and multispecies justice as an ethical and political approach to recognizing, protecting, and caring for other beings (Celermajer et al. 2021; Chao et al. 2022; Tschakert et al. 2021).

Against this backdrop, we use senses of place as an analytical lens to identify underlying and potential future ecological or more-than-human conflicts, injustices, and entanglements. For this, we adapt the self–others–environment framework (Gustafson 2001), which helps us navigate through people’s lived experiences and meanings in terms of justice or people’s senses of (in)justice. In applying a modified version of this framework, we integrate the self–others–environment framework with the four dimensions of ecological justice through a multispecies lens. The interrelated dimensions of justice—misrecognition, misrepresentation, maldistribution, and obstruction of capabilities (Schlosberg 2007, 2012)—form the core interrogation of our in-depth interviews. Ecological justice translates these four dimensions of environmental justice by extending them to the nonhuman world. As such, ecological justice is defined as a means for making visible those social–ecological individuals or communities that are misrecognized and devalued (misrecognition), marginalized and excluded from decision-making processes (misrepresentation), who are burdened with impacts, threats, externalities, and a lack of ecological space to exist (maldistribution) (Schlosberg 2007, 2012, 2014; Wienhues 2020), and which have been subject to an obstruction of the capabilities and needs to function and live in an optimal state (Schlosberg 2012, 2014; Strang 2017). Injustices are analyzed by identifying what diverse place meanings are recognized and valued through the interactions of the self–others–environment interactions. We apply this framework to data collected in Melbourne, Australia, through in-depth interviews (n = 31) with diverse stakeholders involved in the protection, restoration, and environmental planning of urban ecosystems. Through this analysis, we explore how peoples’ senses of (in)justices can trigger community and local government stewardship and involvement to protect, restore, and emancipate their urban natures through new, designed, and inherited practices. We ask the following questions: How do we examine place’s positive and negative meanings regarding people’s sense of justice or injustice in Melbourne’s vulnerable areas? How do these senses of place activate or deactivate environmental ethics of responsibility towards the more-than-human realm in an urban context?

In the next section, we present a brief overview of the sense of place literature, specifically the self–others–environment framework (Gustafson 2001) positioned within a plural, relational, and more-than-human justice understanding. We present the bridging points between the self–others–environment framework and the dimensions of justice as our analytical framework. “Methodology and methods” details the qualitative approach of the research design. The thematic findings are shown in “Results”. In “Discussion”, we bring the discussion forward with recommended strategies to improve stewardship behaviors and actions that can prevent ecological injustices. We conclude by outlining how a sense of place analytical framework can contribute to a better understanding of ecological justice, which includes unpacking peoples different place meanings about their values, roles, worldviews, and levels of influence to (in)activate nature.

Senses of place and ecological justice

Senses of place: self–others–environment

As an established field of knowledge, sense of place has offered researchers and practitioners many tools to better understand how people relate to places to improve environmental management and planning. While sense of place has been researched from many different perspectives (Williams and Miller 2020), it has commonly been conceptualized in terms of place attachment—the emotional bond between an individual and a place or how strongly a person is connected to a geographic locale, and place meanings—the descriptive, symbolic meanings that people ascribe to a place (Stedman 2003). Being directly related to the biophysical setting, ‘[s]ymbolic meanings about the place can be translated into cognitions or beliefs: descriptive statements about “what kind of place this is”’ (Stedman 2008, p. 66), allowing for a place to hold multiple meanings by one individual. For example, a home can be a wilderness area, a place for enjoying with family and for exercising simultaneously. Different place attachments or emotional connections are formed from the meanings we ascribe to a place, which affects the behavior and attitudes we express toward that place (Masterson et al. 2019; Stedman 2003, 2008). Exploring sense of place as a social construct—people’s experiences, histories, and personal particularities (Adams et al. 2017)—is as essential as understanding the biophysical, environmental features and attributes of a place that situate an individual in a specific space and time (Masterson et al. 2017, 2019; Raymond et al. 2017; Stedman 2008).

Recent conceptualizations of place argue for plural understandings of senses of place, where there is a recognition of local–global dynamics, social–ecological–technical interconnections, and spatial–temporal experiences shaping and (re)shaping senses and places (Raymond et al. 2021; Williams and Miller 2020). The pluralization of senses of place allows for richer explorations of places in contestation, where displacement, social–ecological vulnerabilities, erosion of resilience, and tensions affect peoples’ experiences and how places are cared for and valued. It also enables a deeper understanding of how multiple layers of people–place relationships are reinforced, changed or revalued in response to different forms of social, ecological or technological change (Raymond et al. 2021).

To date, little research has considered how theories on multispecies relationships and nonhuman agency intersect with senses of place to enable a deeper understanding of issues of ecological injustice. Complex entanglements exist between human and nonhuman species across current and future generations (Rupprecht et al. 2020). More-than-human species’ concerns and interests need to be negotiated and compromised, not as resources to be used, but as subjects in their own rights (Chapron et al. 2019). Meanings assigned to nature can be used to unpack people–nature connections and experiences and to understand further when nature is undermined, under threat, and to ‘give nature a voice’.

This pluralistic lens is apparent when we investigate ecological injustices with a focus on giving nonhuman nature agency as a way to represent nature in situated restoration attempts and in decision-making processes in urban greening or regeneration planning. Nonhuman natures are recognized as active agents that relate to people and place and, thus, can shape place and people. As active agents, nonhuman natures are recognized as having capabilities, that is, the ability to flourish, exist, shape their environment, and thus need a healthy, bountiful habitat for their needs to be met (Nussbaum 2006; Schlosberg 2012). Thus, being devalued and not having a healthy habitat is an issue of justice.

To explore justice through people’s experiences, we use our adaptation of Gustafson’s (2001) analytical model to explore what makes places meaningful (Fig. 1). The analytical framework offers a structure for mapping and analyzing the relational dynamics between self–others–environment. We explore how the three broad categories—self, others, and environment—relate and overlap with each other, thus highlighting the dynamic and interrelated nature of senses of place (Gustafson 2001). We adapt this model, though, which is more static and human-centered, and instead propose and focus on people’s more-than-human relationality. People’s more-than-human relationality is constituted by self–others relationships, which show relations between a person, other people and beings, the senses of community, senses of recognition and anonymity (Gustafson 2001), and the entanglements between human and nonhuman others (Fig. 1). The others–environment relates to the atmosphere or life of a place and the association with the ‘types’ or different forms of inhabitants of the site (Gustafson 2001). The self–environment relates to the knowledge, familiarity, capacity to shape the environment, opportunities the environment offers (Gustafson 2001), and the capabilities and agency of and between human and nonhuman beings.

Fig. 1
figure 1

(adapted from Gustafson 2001)

Analytical model of self–others–environment

Full size image

Gustafson (2001) highlights the importance of spatial scale, wherein smaller, local places are usually identified with the dimensions of self, other, and self–others, while larger places, such as regions or countries, relate more to the ideas of environment, others, and environment–others relations (Fig. 1). Underlying the three-pole model are four fundamental conditions—distinction (similarities and differences between places), valuation (positive or negative valuation of place), continuity (a person or community’s life path connected to place), and change (place meanings can be processed, new meanings are created, others reproduced or modified) (Gustafson 2001).

Senses of place as senses of ecological injustices-in-place

Senses of place offer a tool to evaluate how biophysical characteristics and dynamic changes in social–ecological systems affect senses of place, but it also helps unpack patterns of place meaning and place attachment that influences a place’s resilience (Masterson et al. 2017, 2019; Stedman 2008) and how human–nonhuman entanglements affect and shape each other through multiple senses. Both ecological justice and senses of place are constructs that can help us navigate through the complex, multidimensional, and relational interactions that emerge from social–ecological–technical systems. Concepts like justice can help us uncover instances of unfair and uneven interactions, processes, actors, and systems affecting and shaping each other. Senses of place can help us describe who, where, how, and why these people–nonhuman nature–environment relations arise. Senses of place can help us characterize whose voices are (de)valued, what people value, and how they experience human–nonhuman relations. By bringing plurality to the senses of place, we can demarginalize voices that are oppressed and displaced by dominant and unjust narratives, forces, and processes (Manzo and Desanto 2021; Masso et al. 2021). Concepts such as relationality, valuation, recognition, and anonymity highlight the connections between senses of place and ecological justice research. Using these broad inquiry categories can reveal how specific meanings and actions can be enhanced to increase stewardship and prevent ecological injustices. We investigate what people’s senses of ecological injustice (negative perception/relation) or justice (positive perception/relation) are through their lived experiences and extend this notion to senses from the nonhuman world as they relate to others.

To examine these relations, we use senses of place as an analytical framework to provide a more nuanced account of social and ecological inequalities, misrecognition, and misrepresentations. By understanding how people relate to their local ecologies and how they perceive issues of justice, in terms of the four dimensions: distribution, recognition, participation, and capabilities through a more-than-human approach (Pineda-Pinto et al. 2022; Robertson 2018; Schlosberg 2007), we hope to untangle the intricate, complex reality of ecological injustices. Specifically, we explore how different groups relate and their meaning to place in terms of distribution of impacts (distribution), how they are recognized by different groups (recognition), and how these groups engage in addressing them (participation), exploring different ways of valuing nature and the abilities to act with and for nature (socio-ecological capabilities). Through this analysis, we plot the negative or positive valuation of meanings, or, in other words, if there are senses of ecological injustices-in-place or ecological justice-in-place, respectively.

Methodology and methods

This research is positioned within a pluralistic understanding of the world, in which different ways of knowing, being, and valuing are recognized (Kronenberg and Andersson 2019; Williams 2014, p. 81). We use this pluralistic understanding and awareness to understand better how places are made and unmade, contested, reimagined, negotiated, destroyed, and restored with the ultimate goal of improving ecological justice outcomes. Within this understanding, we conducted in-depth interviews (n = 31), which were designed to explore the senses of place of people living and working in areas identified as ecological injustice hotspots in Metropolitan Melbourne, meaning areas that were social–ecologically deprived (Pineda-Pinto et al. 2022). In Table 1 and Fig. 2, the specific localities are detailed. The Greater Metropolitan Area of Melbourne is one of Australia’s fastest growing regions, characterized by urban sprawl patterns that have generated an unsustainable footprint (DELWP 2018). Driven by disorganized planning approaches, new developments do not have an adequate supply to basic infrastructure and services (Brain et al. 2016). These urbanization patterns of sprawl, combined with poor planning, have fragmented, and destroyed unique ecosystems (Ives et al. 2013), resulting in uneven geographies in Melbourne that are faced with systemic social–ecological injustices.

Table 1 Interviewee log for Metropolitan Melbourne social-ecological injustice hotspots embedded case studies
Full size table
Fig. 2
figure 2

Map of Metropolitan Melbourne highlighting the study sites (local government areas) in the two major injustice hotspots in the west and southeast regions (Pineda-Pinto et al. 2022)

Full size image

The interview questions were structured along the four main dimensions of ecological justice—distribution, recognition, participation, and capabilities (see ESM 1.1 for the interview guide). The questions were designed to understand what environmental issues affect the participant’s local green spaces, how these impacts are managed and addressed by different groups and levels in society and local government, and the degree of representation of the different stakeholders when advocating for nature. Specifically, they focused on fleshing out perceptions of participants in terms of ways to represent nature, how to reposition themselves from a perspective of the lives of ‘others’ (how these might be impacted by different decisions and actions), ways in which nature could be an active participant in decision-making processes and how the resilience and capabilities of other species and local ecosystems allows them to cope with urban impacts and changes. We interrogated their perception within their understanding of the resilience and capacity of these ecosystems to adapt to current and future impacts and threats. The criteria for selecting interviewees were to include people with different experiences and expertise, working with and for nature in cities across different sectors. To get a sense of the people working at different levels, we identified interviewees using the Department of Energy, Land, Water, and Planning’s (DELWP) database of environmental volunteer groups and associations for all of Victoria and targeted environmental grassroots volunteers and activists, sustainability planners and officers from local councils, and park rangers from Parks Victoria (the statutory institution charged with the protection of the state’s land and water parks and reserves) employing a snow sampling technique (Table 1). This strategy provided an overview of urban green space governance, crucial for understanding ecological justice outcomes and its related senses of place. As a qualitative, case-based methodology, this research method focused on thematic coverage, rather than representativeness, and concluded the interview process once theoretical saturation was achieved.

Coding and analysis

We use thematic analysis to identify and interpret patterns and meanings (Braun and Clarke 2006). Thematic analysis allows us to unpack and explore in detail complex data through a systematic and well-structured procedure, offering a rigorous and trustworthy account of the data (Braun and Clarke 2006; Nowell et al. 2017). To conduct a systematic analysis of the data, we followed an iterative step-by-step process (Fig. 1) and documented the ‘trail’ of decisions and actions (Braun and Clarke 2006; Nowell et al. 2017). We use these steps in combination with a thematic network approach which allows us to identify in a more structured way, three levels of themes: basic, organizing, and global and the production of a visual representation of the themes (Attride-Stirling 2001) (Fig. 3). In all phases there is a component of data and researcher triangulation, reflexivity, and process documentation (Braun and Clarke 2006; Nowell et al. 2017).

Fig. 3
figure 3

(source: Authors; adapted from Attride-Stirling 2001; Braun and Clarke 2006; Nowell et al. 2017)

Procedure for doing thematic and thematic network analysis outlining the phases, steps, and actions

Full size image

Results

From the analysis of the interview data through the self–others–environment framework, we identified a plurality of senses of place themes within the relations of self–others, others–environment, self–environment, and self–other–environment across the four dimensions of ecological justice. These findings highlight perceptions of (dis)empowerment, (mis)recognition and (dis)connection are in a state of contestation, and the different meanings that different groups have towards the same spaces they manage or care for. These senses of place emerge from the spatial–temporal intersections with power structures, scale, and interconnections between social and ecological relations.

The major themes were synthesized from first, second and third-order themes. In Fig. 4, we synthesized these themes according to how they sit across the self–others–environment relationships analytical framework and if they have a positive or negative meaning. The following sections justify the major themes identified in Fig. 4.

Fig. 4
figure 4

First-order themes and their standing within the self–others–environment interactions. The themes close to the center are associated with positive meanings, closer to the positive (+) sign, while those close to the edges [the negative (−) sign] relate to negative meanings. The thematic network with first-, second- and third-order themes can be found in the ESM 2

Full size image

Self-others as communities of (dis)empowerment

Senses of disempowerment through anonymity and unfair representation

Senses of disempowerment manifested in different ways across participants. One of these manifestations is brought upon the feeling of being a passive agent when participating in planning processes that are perceived as unfair and blurry. Environmental volunteers feel their voice is not loud enough and the spaces and times to raise concerns or express their views is misaligned with established planning processes consultation and participatory phases. There is a sense that the existing mechanisms to protect the environment and give voice to nonhuman nature, do exactly the opposite: favoring private developers or industries’ interests. Planners, coordinators, park leaders and park rangers feel disempowered when trying to be a voice for nature and/or repair/prevent ecological injustices. When discussing whether council can play a bigger role in engaging and raising awareness with the community, planners expressed the limited availability of controls, including access to resources and knowledge, which has a direct effect on their ability to create change.

This view was echoed by many planners and similarly, park rangers expressed being situated in a complex and bureaucratic organization with many hierarchical layers where information gets lost in translation, not enough funds are allocated, and their expertise is many times not considered. For example, when trying to stop a project from occurring or fighting for the restoration of a neglected natural area, there was a sense that nature and their stewards were anonymized. Although there is a recognition that the planning system considers certain ecological values, there is still a structural inequality that is reflected in the disconnect between the Federal and State levels towards the local particularities. To add to this, there is a lack of commitment, politically and technically, to implement higher objective mandates—such as biodiversity conservation. As expressed by one of the participants:

‘…the planning system [is] meant to facilitate appropriate development in appropriate places. […] The bigger problem tends to be poor decision-making and […] real commitment to following the prescriptions in the planning scheme for protecting nature…’ [Interview #17]

The destruction and displacement of nonhumans, habitats, and ecosystems reflects the powerlessness experienced by the others. In established urban areas, ecological space is under fierce competition by infill development. Participants expressed that the area for animals to forage continues to disappear and even birds which can fly and migrate to nearby areas, have very limited habitation and foraging space.

Sense of empowerment through loud champions and collaboration for ecological transformation

In these spaces of contestation, participation in activities to build ecological knowledge, increase social capabilities, and transform the self, the environment, and others (as other people in the community and wildlife), was seen as critical by most participants. Important as well was the capacity to shape the local environment, transform it into a flourishing habitat through ongoing activities. Taking advantage of the opportunities offered by the local ecosystems, be it through possibilities to improve, to create new spaces to bring species back, was also a way for social transformation, by ‘…get[ting] the community out there, get[ting] them appreciating their park, taking ownership of it’ [Interview #24].

The sense of empowerment was boosted through loud and expert champions that reactivated human–nonhuman relations and enabled opportunities for social and ecological transformations. Persons that bring people together, activate a cause for nature and champion transformation, were critical for creating a positive meaning with and for nature. These ‘louder’ voices were actively putting in hours of work, mobilizing resources, talking with the media, influencing, and trying to understand planning, legal and other regulatory processes that could help them trigger a change to repair ecological injustices, or stop harmful activities/land use changes that could potentially trigger an injustice. For example, leaders within groups like Nature West have started:

‘…habitat gardens [by] encouraging local people to recreate habitat for indigenous skinks and lizards or re-vegetate the grassland in their gardens in Wyndham’ [Interview #14].

These efforts stemmed from an understanding that communities can play a role in improving degraded and fragmented ecologies and improve the social–ecological capacities of a place. This understanding was driven by loud champions that were working to empower human and nonhuman natures. Individuals who guide, advice and help environmental groups navigate the complexity of managing urban ecosystems through different restoration, rehabilitation, and protection approaches, were highlighted as leading experts. These loud champions and experts embedded in different projects at different temporal scales were able to (re)activate human–nonhuman interconnections and give a new sense of empowerment to local ecologies. This sense of empowerment translated as new forms of habitats, return of species and an improved interspecies dialog. In return, this required having support at different levels and across organizations for successful nature-based projects in which the communities were the drivers. Knowledge about the capacities of a site and the needs of local species must go together with knowledge about the local communities’ capacities as ecological activators and nurturers.

Others–environment as apathy and collectiveness

Sense of apathy and weak human–nonhuman interactions

A perception amongst participants was that inaction, mismanagement or severe polluting events towards nonhuman nature were caused by others, e.g., other people or systems. Participants expressed a sense of apathy or passiveness from the others and it was considered to be caused by the distance between people and nature. These place meanings emerging from others–environment were also evidenced through community and government inaction and the inability to align ecological processes, clean-up of pollution events and ongoing environmental impacts to political and policymaking cycles. One of the participants expressed that with matters regarding the protection and restoration of the environment, it might be necessary for environmental policies to get ‘…locked in the land for wildlife’ [Interview #3]. This depicts the misalignment of political and ecological cycles, in which the latter never has a chance to have the continuity and rootedness to flourish.

The view of socio-political apathy was directly related to the state of the ecological ‘others’. Across the study sites, diminished social capabilities were directly related to diminished ecological capabilities. Diminished ecological capabilities can be associated with historical inequalities, low social capacity, and ecological knowledge. The capabilities of living systems in urban areas, such as creeks, large parks or reserves, coastlands, marshlands, and wetlands were restricted by management and political cycles which diminished their capacities. For example, in the western coast of Melbourne, an established Ramsar site is now being affected by coastal phenomena, shifting the sand dunes further down to an unprotected area. These sand dunes are habitat to multiple species of birds but are now having to adapt to a life in which human–nonhuman interactions are affecting their livelihoods. Birds are chased by dogs, scared by drones, killed by boat propellers, and face decreased food sources [Interview #24]. As the foreshore experiences all these changes, the nonhuman others adapt to find new spaces of habitation and food foraging, but also of dealing with new interactions with the multiple agents and forces that hinder their capabilities.

Sense of community collectiveness: ecological injustices for community mobilization

In some cases, polluting or destructive events in urban ecological spaces became catalyzers for change and transformation, bringing a sense of collectiveness and mobilization. Whilst the destruction of an ecological space and the wildlife it supports is tragic and an injustice, it is the injustice that triggers social action and builds capacity at community level and drives an ecological change. Examples of this are ample, but Stony Creek in the west of Melbourne is particularly exemplary. In a little over a year, it experienced a red dye pollution event and suffered the environmental impacts from the Tottenham industrial fire, which as several participants discussed, was an ecological disaster. This disaster, however, reactivated residents, brought environmental groups together and raised these concerns to local councils, as well as water and environmental protection and planning agencies at the state level. This and other similar cases, enabled new ways of social organization, that in turn challenged existing governance structures. Most importantly, it reveals a sense of collectiveness as a driving force, usually silenced and/or with very limited resources, to fight for nature and to have access to that ecological space. Interacting with the nonhuman and human others in those places is seen as being of high ecological value, or, with potential to rehabilitate a destroyed living system.

Environment–self as reciprocal nurturing through time

Sense of ecological selves: communities of interspecies–ecosystem relations

The relational character of the different groups with nature varied across individuals, groups, and levels. The perception of nature from members of environmental and activist groups is of nature as having intrinsic value, with an emphasis on seeing the restoration and protection of the remaining green spaces as vital for wildlife to be able to exist in these spaces. Park rangers and environmental volunteers showed strong bonds with wildlife, plants, and trees. This is most likely due to the ‘on-the-ground’ work done by these groups, in which there is a tending, a nurturing, a caring for these spaces through different activities, such as planting, de-weeding, monitoring, and creating refuges for wildlife. These groups many times talked about wildlife coming back. There was a great sense of ownership, accomplishment, and relief to see how the hard work of years was being transformed into new opportunities for life to flourish, for life to burst into these once degraded spaces. Decades of nurturing a site created strong self–environment bonds and created an awareness of species needs, and ecosystem functioning. Directly nurturing these spaces regularly, builds a knowledge repository of not only the needs of wildlife and ecosystems, but also of the spatial needs in terms of scale, habitat requirements, and the conditions in ecological times for ecosystems to repair and provide benefits for both people and nature. In highlighting the tension between a human lifetime and ecological lifecycles, as well as expressing an ongoing relation of nurture and care, a senior park ranger talked about an 800-year-old gum tree. He described these connections through the life of a tree, that can be a home for a possum when it is hundreds of years old, taking a long time to produce a hollow, that whilst used and reused by many animals, needs to be big enough to be an adequate habitat [Interview #7].

This description shows the ecological interconnectedness and interdependencies, the dynamic exchanges of lives depending on other lives to have habitat and survive. Most importantly, it highlights a deep awareness for species needs and capabilities, and the human awareness, capacities and interconnections needed to meet those more-than-human needs. Knowledge and awareness of ecological spatial–temporal dynamics was identified by environmental planners, and park leaders. One of the planners explained the complexity of planning in coastal and land environments and their interfaces as

‘…very multi-layered, [with the] need to explore cultural heritage and natural history and the whole biodiversity of the coast, and then the interface with the marine environment and that natural marine environment and its habitat values there. It’s really a very complex symbiosis’ [Interview #25].

The new coming presence of the nonhumans enhanced a sense of nurturing. An environmental volunteer shared a deep knowledge and connection to the site he and others have tended. When referring to the inhabitants of this place and others living further up the river he said it is

‘…a really lovely little wild space […] there’s about three or four frogs there and we only get two frogs in our space. So […] ideally we may have to create spaces for all the frogs living in the railroad valley to be in Newell’s Paddock as well […] ideally for me there’d be a natural link all the way along that marathon trail there, so that creatures could jump or crawl or fly or hop […] between the areas without being exposed to predation on that journey’ [Interview #13].

These experiences, however, also highlighted that frogs and other nonhuman living beings that inhabit these fragmented spaces have a sense of anonymity to their lives as well in terms of their ecological isolation and anthropocentric restrictions that hinder their capacities through pollution, predation and scarcity of food and habitat sources.

The data suggest that there are stronger people–nonhuman connections by those working directly in ecological spaces, with their local natures, and as the roles tend to be more administrative and/or political, this association changes. For instance, for participants with roles focused on planning and policy formulation, the sense of connection to place becomes more distant, as in the references to place change in scale and there is no mention of specific species. This macroscale view of their localities and more policy or planning oriented roles shows a different awareness to local conflicts and negative effects. However, this lens also suggests a systems appreciation through a landscape-scale and ‘outer’ understanding of how urban ecosystems work. In this way, participants showed a sense of ecological self, a sense of embeddedness in and with nature at different scales and through different understandings. In turn, the human nurturing created new spaces of interaction and opportunities for nonhuman lives to flourish. Many of these nurtured spaces experienced revitalized ecological flows and processes, which then allowed multiple others to live in a habitat that allowed them to flourish.

Place ownership and empowerment through ecological flourishing

Engaging with a place through different actions—walking, planting, de-weeding, monitoring—created a sense of place ownership, particularly when there was a long-term connection to the place and participants could see the place changing and flourishing. The weekly, fortnightly, or monthly work gave environmental volunteers and park rangers, a sense of ownership and empowerment after seeing the space being regenerated. This sentiment was echoed as well through the work planners did and particularly when they were involved in projects with high community participation, with diversity and inclusion as hallmarks of the projects. Bringing many voices, not only of different social groups, but also of individuals and communities representing the nonhuman aspects of a site, such as the geology, the different species of birds, insects, water, and coastal patterns, created a sense of ownership driven by the transformative capacity of a place in terms of its capacity to flourish.

The different ways of valuing and relating to nature are directly related to the perceived social–ecological capabilities of a site and how this could assist multiple species to flourish. This was most evident at the community level, with the environmental volunteers, but also local council park leaders and park rangers seeing a site with high ecological values and a highly degraded or polluted site, as both having enormous potential for protecting or improving ecological values. Even for spaces that were left for years and were seen as ecologically degraded, there was a strong sense of ecological space being inherently valuable, triggering an attachment and creating a need for it to be protected. A community activist explained the importance of

‘…link[ing] [the remaining grasslands] through waterways and to protect the other small high-quality bits of grassland in the growth corridor and in existing urban areas before they’re lost. There’s still a network of diverse grassland habitats to be protected…’ [Interview #14].

Many of the spaces that are now of high ecological value, used to be highly contaminated, degraded and violented places (see Fig. 5). For instance, Newport Lakes used to be a quarry and then a rubbish tip, just as Quarry Park in Footscray. Braeside Park, which was a sewage treatment facility and Truganina Reserve, the former Altona Landfill Tip, are now green backbones of heavily urbanized communities in the southeast and west of Melbourne, respectively. An environmental volunteer, when referring to the work being done on Kororoit Creek, said that the volunteers had turned around an industrial landscape into a beautiful forest [Interview #19]. A common thread through these spaces of tension and contestation were the senses of embeddedness, empowerment, and ownership to see and experience the flourishing of new life.

Fig. 5
figure 5

Photographs illustrate the changes in Newport Lakes Reserve, which through a community effort transformed a quarry and rubbish tip into a nature reserve (provided by Friends of Newport Lakes)

Full size image

Sense of loss of ecological flourishing

Although there is a positive meaning associated to the idea of seeing degraded spaces as opportunities for nature, there was also a sense of loss associated to the fragility of urban ecosystems and the life they support. It was highlighted that many species struggle in these environments. There are still many challenges that come from having a park for example in a former landfill, with contamination leaking in the soil and water, and trees not able to grow due to the limited availability of soil. Pests, litter, pollution are some of the other challenges that urban ecosystems and wildlife face. Fragmented, small pockets of remnant vegetation without link or connection to other spaces or larger reserves, were also seen as being in a fragile state. Small, grounded creatures were isolated and not able to move and interact across these spaces. As such, ecological flourishing in these urban spaces is associated with a negative meaning caused by anthropocentric restraints of an urban environment, such as land use changes, impermeable surfaces, and urban encroachment. There was a sense of imminent loss and lack of resilience of these ecological spaces and the urban wildlife as they continue to be diminished with time and lose ecological value. Being in a state of stress was used to describe the state of many species and living systems. Urban trees and plants get very stressed as they depend on rainfall or on people to water them [Interview #11].

Self–others–environment as contested ecological stewardship

The interviews evidenced that ecological injustices can be situated within the self–environment, self–others, and others–environment relations. However, most, if not all, of the themes are not static and their associations and meanings can be situated across the three-intersecting poles of self–others–environment. Anonymity of silent stewards is expressed from the self, but is bound to a local spatial area, and the experiences with and about other nonhuman species, which many times were also a devalued or destroyed ecosystem, or a contested space. Thus, with the local ecosystem being anonymized, devalued, and contested, so were the ‘others’, the nonhuman other species inhabiting these anonymous places. The positive meaning associated with these contested and degraded spaces is the revaluation of these places as places of opportunities. Their destruction and degradation triggered a social movement to raise them and their nonhuman inhabitants, out of anonymity. This was done by finding new ways of representation, revaluation and reconnection of and with nonhuman nature—e.g., through community activation of loud champions, building social capacity through recognition of social diversity and promoting activities for social inclusivity. This creation of social capital was activated from a sense of interspecies care, respect, duty towards ‘others’ and a recognition of the injustices placed upon them. Similarly, many of the participants’ deep notions of social–ecological dynamics and species needs and interactions, underscored by long-term people–wildlife–people–place relations, evidenced how injustices are spatiotemporally understood, and the implications for working, caring for, and finding ways to represent nonhuman nature. This sentiment was parallel to the view of children, as the ‘other’, as the future generations that have no access to nature and, thus, no knowledge of their local ecologies. This concern was also exacerbated by the recognition that children are not having access to nature or able to make significant decisions about their future, which is an issue of justice in itself. A vision of interspecies and intergenerational ethical duty, care and respect marks these meanings of ecological injustice across the self–others–environment entanglements.

Discussion

We have applied a self–others–environment framework to examine the in-depth interview data from a sense of place lens, specifically to unpack people’s perceptions of (in)justice. Through our analysis, we have bridged concepts across sense of place and ecological justice in terms of the relational and interdependent character of people–nature relations. Rather than just trying to understand meanings and place attachments in general, we shift our analysis to how meanings, behaviors, and different social roles interact and relate to a place burdened by injustices. From the findings, we identified several themes which highlight concepts related to continuity, disempowerment, anonymity, and social–ecological spatio-temporal dynamics, all within spaces of contestation that both form negative and positive valuations of places, drive interspecies stewardship and caring actions. We find multiple layers of people–self–other relationships (e.g., sense of disempowerment, sense of ecological selves, sense of apathy) which offer empirical support for ‘senses’ of place and their multiple interrelations with ecological (in)justice. Previous work examining the sense of place and justice has also highlighted the importance of unpacking the sense of place to explore people’s senses in experiencing loss, for example, after traumatic disaster events (Blanco-Wells 2021; Schlosberg et al. 2020). Our findings show that ecological injustices created by destruction and degradation triggered negative senses, but these tended to be connected to positive senses, evidenced by the emergence of ways of reconnecting and representing nonhuman nature. Thus, ecological injustices increased social and ecological capacity, with the formation of new capabilities and relationalities based on a sense of interspecies care, belonging, respect, and ethical duty towards the ‘other’. We offer a more nuanced understanding of the spatio-temporal construction of people–wildlife–people–place relations, and how they individually and collectively contribute to ecological injustice. From the senses of place and justice interface, we bring a new theoretical and analytical contribution that advances a pluralistic understanding of the conflicts and injustices that emerge in place and are healed through human–nonhuman relations. We define this new understanding as senses of injustices-in-place, which provides unique contributions to the fields of justice and sense of place.

Senses of injustices-in-place

From a more-than-human lens, we found that negative and positive place meanings can drive strong attachments to place. A strong sense of place could either result from a sense that a place had or is being diminished and devalued or that a place has been protected or repaired. In both instances, there is a tension between the self–others–environment and reciprocal relations that (re)build human and more-than-human capabilities through anonymity, continuity, a sense of community and nurturing, and contestation.

In our findings, we saw how large-scale polluting events, such as the destruction of the Kororoit Creek as an entire living system, could spark different responses and, in the cases we saw, trigger community activation for the restoration and protection of a social–ecological system that experienced such loss and destruction. Senses of empowerment, embeddedness and interspecies care for nature were reflected in the sense of powerlessness and defeat of the other. Similarly, our study also found that institutional neglect invisibilizes communal efforts of social and environmental care (Kotsila et al. 2020) and, as such, makes other nonhumans anonymous through weak environmental protections that do not recognize living systems and nonhuman beings. In addition to previous work on a sense of place or justice, our work allowed us to develop a new theoretical understanding through a new theoretical interface and empirical evidence. By merging the self–others–environment framework with ecological justice, two critical implications occur.

On the one hand, taking a senses of place analytical lens to examine injustices can provide more detailed accounts of the social and ecological capacities, needs, barriers, and thresholds for bearing, (re)producing, or repairing (in)justices. On the other hand, we suggest that senses of place needs to address issues of interspecies and intergenerational justice. The former is because it helps us unpack a deeper understanding of the needs of others–other nonhuman lives. The latter is because the next generations are the ones that will care for nature, will live with the consequences of our current interventions, and will need the ecological knowledge to navigate emerging dynamics and struggles. This notion of intergenerational justice, from a multispecies understanding, also needs to account for the future lives of other species.

The second implication is that the self–others–environment framework can increase its scope by including nonhuman nature within its model. Furthermore, it encourages studying the self–others and others–environment relations as human–nonhuman entanglements. In the methodology, we presented an adapted version of this framework which explores the interrelations between the human–nonhuman experiences to unpack the different senses of place. This more-than-human lens we use for the self–others framework highlights that the self is not the human as the focus and center, but rather it is a relational self, that is entangled in practices of caring for nature, deeply connected to meanings of living a good life (Jax et al. 2018). Through an ecological justice lens, we attempted to highlight the anthropocentric nature of the sense of place analysis. Still, with this lens, we can also see the contestation of not only ecological space but also of the anthropocentric–non-anthropocentric senses that give meaning to and co-shape a place.

Policy, planning, and science implications

We present two areas for increasing stewardship and preventing/restoring ecological injustices through strategies and actions that promote a sense of justice-in-place—the first one relates to improving people’s knowledge of the capabilities of their local social–ecological systems. The second one is about reactivating human–nonhuman–ecosystem relations through diversification of activities to develop a heightened sense of justice-in-place.

Build and multiply different kinds of knowledge and knowledge exchanges: Ways to improve successful outcomes for nature include increasing the knowledge and capacity of individuals and local groups and building more robust networks across groups. This allows learning from experiences of different groups, examples of good/bad practices, or building on to create new projects and ideas. For example, park rangers or parks teams in local councils are seen as experts by many environmental groups; they are the intermediaries between local ecological knowledge and the top-down ‘expert’ knowledge. The effect could be multi-fold if these roles could be amplified and multiplied to reach more extensive and diverse tracts of civil society. A mosaic governance approach proposes to connect and up-scale active environmental citizens working at a micro-level to the macro-level of city planning through multi-scalar processes (Buijs et al. 2019). Ways to up-scale these mosaic processes are to devise policy interventions that harness local ecological knowledge, adopt more-than-human frameworks, and recognize ecological injustices. These need to be embedded in a process of co-production and/or co-creation, but mindful that they can lead to other forms of injustices and power inequalities, or further cement existing ones. Goodwin’s analysis (2019) shows that co-production across different governance levels creates tensions between engagement and autonomy, with engagement tending to override community autonomy. The capacity for developing and strengthening diverse forms of autonomy from social–ecological groups is a critical ecological justice issue and needs to be recognized and stimulated throughout co-production and engagement processes.

Developing new and engaging programs, investments, and urban experimentation through emerging technologies can disintegrate the boundaries between the human and more-than-human, as well as the State and other actors in society. For example augmented reality can potentiate learning outcomes across different population groups, connect and stimulate new ways of understanding nature. Similarly, human-decentering technologies and digital platforms can enable and bring citizen scientists closer to the other-than-human worlds, develop new capabilities and strengthen their autonomy. Innovative design and co-creation interventions can create new materialities for fostering awareness of injustices through performative interventions, new imaginations, and experimentations.

Diversify and up-scale activities that reactivate human–nonhuman relations: Our findings showed a sense of disempowerment and devaluation of local communities’ environmental efforts. The work of environmental groups, activists, park rangers, and even council officials is in tension due to a misrecognition from society in general, the state, and the federal government. This tension and conflict expose power imbalances and suggest that structural changes are necessary. The implications of these power imbalances (Masterson et al. 2019) show that the current power dynamics and structures are creating uneven social–ecological geographies. A co-production governance framework, as proposed by Wyborn (2015) and Frantzeskaki and Kabisch (2016), can for instance help us focus on the co-production processes that shape science and governance relations across power, knowledge, and place. Our research suggests, thus, that by revaluing and empowering local environmental groups and champions and developing and diversifying activities that reactivate human–nonhuman relations, it is possible to repair ecological injustices-in-place. To recruit, train and activate new individuals in environmental protection and reparation, it is critical that ‘…individuals become empowered in the early catalytic stage of scaling to persist as stewardship leaders and practitioners’ (Mumaw and Raymond 2021, p. 8). Finding ways of doing this will be critical for research and practice, but this must start by breaking down unjust pathways and systemic injustices that impede ways of doing and being with the more-than-human. Deep and long-term activism and stewardship requires the deployment of multiple tools, knowledges and practices that intersect and collaborate to create change.

Being a voice for nature means being a voice that creates and shares knowledge, raises awareness, encourages contact, and facilitates new encounters with nature. Nature has multiple meanings for different people, and this diversity needs to be recognized. It has been found that there are gaps in how urban nature is valued and recognized in Australia, with still a marked split between indigenous ways of valuing and engineering or techno-driven practices (Ignatieva et al. 2020). Our study highlights those attitudes towards different ecosystem types (e.g., grasslands vs. eucalyptus forests) vary widely. This influences policies and practices, as recognizing what is valuable will be prioritized, while those devalued or considered as a ‘lesser’ nature will be marginalized or repurposed. Living in, enacting with, and being stewards for nature requires recognizing the dynamic biocultural diversity that underpins human-nature relations (Elands et al. 2019). Thus, repairing ecological injustices requires identifying whose place meanings are valued and which and how different nature types are valued.

Conclusion

To conclude, we suggest that silent stewards and loud champions need spaces for voice empowerment and championing to redirect the sense of disempowerment. The self–others–environment framework highlights the perception of the ‘others’ as individuals or groups within the human community. Our work proposes the inclusion of nonhuman nature within the conceptualization of ‘others,’ but to potentially find ways of exploring nonhuman natures’ through the self. Understanding nonhuman natures through the self can help us avoid conceptualizations that continue to place the nonhuman as ‘others.’ Our conceptual and empirical work contributes to the paradigm shift in sustainability science by emphasizing relationality, dynamic processes and experiences, reconstruction of concepts, and the ethics of care or ecological responsiveness. This work highlights the multiplicity of natures, senses of injustices, and senses of reparations with multiple others.

Planning with and for nature needs to address issues of intergenerational and interspecies justice as the next generations are the ones that will care for nature, will live with the consequences of our current policies and interventions, and will need the ecological knowledge to navigate through complex dynamics and struggles that materialize in urban landscapes. Through this work, we have proposed the concept of senses of injustices-in-place, providing new contributions to the fields of justice and sense of place. The idea of senses injustices-in-place can provide more detailed accounts of the social and ecological capacities, needs, barriers, and thresholds for bearing, (re)producing, or repairing (in)justices.