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Aesthetic landscapes: an emergent component in sustaining societies

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Abstract

A revival in the concept of sustainability is appreciated as Earth’s human population continues to increase and its related global concerns in disease ecology, energy resource management, environmental literacy, food production, genetic diversity, and landscape vitality continue to magnify. Sustain is defined within this paper as to keep in existence or to supply with resources or necessities to prevent from falling below a given threshold of health or vitality. Barrett et al. (Bioscience 47:531–535, 1997) illustrated how seven (7) processes (behaviour, development, diversity, energetics, evolution, integration, regulation) transcend eleven (11) levels of ecological organization, ranging from the ecosphere to the cellular. Comprehension of how these processes transcend all levels of ecological organization allow programs and initiatives (e.g. preserving biotic diversity) to be defined by informed incentive, rather than regulatory mandate, within societal systems. We describe how the integration of an eighth transcending process—aesthetics—is essential in the approach to and managing of market and nonmarket capital necessary in sustaining societies.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Laura R. Musacchio and Jianguo Wu for their invitation to contribute to this special issue of Landscape Ecology. We appreciate scholarly critique of the manuscript by three anonymous reviewers.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Eugene P. Odum School of Ecology, University of Georgia, Athens, GA, 30602, USA

    Terry L. Barrett & Gary W. Barrett

  2. Institute of Biomathematics, University of Urbino, Campus Scientifico-Sogesta, 61029, Urbino, Italy

    Almo Farina

Authors
  1. Terry L. Barrett
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  2. Almo Farina
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  3. Gary W. Barrett
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Correspondence to Gary W. Barrett.

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Barrett, T.L., Farina, A. & Barrett, G.W. Aesthetic landscapes: an emergent component in sustaining societies. Landscape Ecol 24, 1029–1035 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10980-009-9354-8

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