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Managing for resilience
Citation:
Allen, C. R., G. S. Cumming, A. S. GARMESTANI, P. D. Taylor, AND B. H. Walker. Managing for resilience. WILDLIFE BIOLOGY. Nordic Board for Wildlife Research, Ronde, Denmark, 17(4):337-349, (2011).
Impact/Purpose:
To inform the public.
Description:
Early efforts in wildlife management focused on reducing population variability and maximizing yields of select species. Aldo Leopold proposed the concept of habitat management as superior to population management. More recently, ecosystem management, whereby ecological processes are conserved or mimicked, has come into favor. Managing for resilience builds on these roots, and is critical to ecosystem management by focusing on maintaining key processes and relationships in social − ecological systems so they are robust to a great variety of external or internal perturbations at a range of ecological and social scales. Managing for resilience focuses on system-level characteristics and processes, and the endurance of system properties in the face of social or ecological surprise. Managing for resilience consists of actively maintaining a diversity of functions and homeostatic feedbacks; steering systems away from thresholds of potential concern; increasing the ability of the system to maintain its identity under a wide range of conditions; and increasing the capacity of a system to cope with change through learning and adaptation. The critical aspect of managing for resilience, and therefore ecosystem management is undertaking adaptive management to reduce uncertainty and actively managing to avoid thresholds in situations where maintaining resilience is desired. Managing adaptively for resilience is the approach best suited for coping with external shocks, including global change, climate change and the non-linear complex dynamics arising from linked social − ecological systems.
