Keith G. Tidball & Richard Stedman Cornell University
Positive resource dependency in urban systems: applying urgent
biophilia and restorative topophilia 20 May 2013 Linn Hall, Royal
Swedish Academy of Sciences Stockholm, Sweden
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First, some history Elmqvist visiting scholar and 1 st SU/SRC
& Cornell/CALS MOU workshop Fall 2011 2 nd SU/SRC &
Cornell/CALS MOU workshop and meeting Fall 2012 Visiting
Researchers PhD Course 2013
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Background and Framing Big Picture Humans have lost their
ecological identity, which we argue may be related to loss of
resilience and adaptive capacity among humans in social- ecological
systems. How can ecological identity be remembered and recovered?
(Clayton & Opotow, 2003; Clayton 2003) Are there clues about
how we might recover our ecological identity in the way humans
respond to large scale disasters? How should we value
community-based ecological restoration in human vulnerability and
security contexts?
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Background and Framing Big Picture there will be social
mechanisms behind management practices based on local ecological
knowledge, as evidence of a co-evolutionary relationship between
local institutions and the ecosystem in which they are located
mechanisms by which information from the environment can be
received, processed, and interpreted tangible evidence of social
mechanisms behind social ecological practices that deal with
disturbance and maintain system resilience Berkes & Folke
1998
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Main Messages for Today Deficit-based perspectives on urban
systems are barriers to movement from undesirable to more
sustainable system states. Issues such as ecological identity,
human exemptionalism, anthropocentrism, and resource dependence
contribute to barriers. Urgent biophilia and restorative topophilia
may enhance ecological identity and beneficial positive dependency.
Positive dependency may start, re-start, or expand virtuous cycles
that confer desired resilience.
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Roadmap Key Terms Dependency Urban Systems Ecological Identity
Biophilia Topophilia Introducing Positive Dependence Origins and
Assumptions Critiques Positive dependence Restorative Topophilia
Core definition and principles A basis for action Key caveats
Urgent Biophilia Description Origins Research to date Further
implications Implications, Caveats and Conclusions
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Keith G. Tidball Ecologically speaking, if the city is dead,
the ecological sensibilities of the inhabitants of the city will
also be dead. NE Heller, 2010, ESA Meetings a description of the
unique relationship between the users of environmental attributes
and the environmental attribute itself Resource Dependence
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What is largely still missing in social-ecological resilience
theory is a treatment of cities and urban areas. This includes the
historical lessons that can be drawn from distant urban pasts in
regard to sustaining ecosystem services during times of hardship
and crisis ( Stephan Barthel, 2011).Stephan Barthel, 2011 given its
origins in ecology, it is not surprising that most resilience
scholars have historically been interested in empirical analyses of
non-urban areas (e.g., shallow lakes, production forests, and
small- scale agriculture, see Berkes and Folke 1998; Gunderson and
Holling 2002; Berkes et al. 2003), and have devoted less attention
to the specifically human and social elements of human- dominated
systems, such as cities (Ernstson et al., 2010 Ambio ).Ernstson et
al., 2010 Ambio Urban Systems
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Ecological Identity one part of the way in which people form
their self-concept: a sense of connection to some part of the
nonhuman natural environment, based on history, emotional
attachment, and/or similarity, that affects the ways in which we
perceive and act toward the world; a belief that the environment is
important to us and who we are Clayton 2003
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Biophilia?
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Proliferation of concept
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Topophilia Topohilia (Tuan 1974) love of place A place is a
center of meaning or field of care (Tuan, 1977) based on human
experience, social relationships, emotions, and thoughts. Through
human experience, abstract space, lacking significance other than
strangeness, becomes concrete place, filled with meaning (Tuan
1977, p. 199).
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Introducing Positive Dependence Ecological and social
resilience may be linked through the dependence on ecosystems of
communities and their economic activities. The question is, then,
whether societies dependent on resources and ecosystems are
themselves less resilient. Adger, 2000
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Resource Dependence: The Traditional View Rural sociological
origins Strong historical rural legacy of resource dependence
Dependence defined by employment in extraction, processing of raw
materials (forestry, fisheries, mining, energy) Resource dependence
linked with community well being Rural development practitioners
Researchers (early on)
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A quick history Traditional booster view: Rural jobs = resource
jobs These jobs are better: higher paying, more stable Inputs of
new wealth Linkages to subsequent development A great deal of
indicator-based work: W US energy boomtowns (1970s) The
sustainability of resource-dependent communities (1990s) Dominated
by analysis of secondary data (US Census, NAICS, StatsCan,
etc.)
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However Booster view largely wrong: research shows Few jobs:
rural is not resource dependent Poor outcomes for dependent places
Higher rates of poverty, unemployment, education, etc. Linkages
dont come: uneven development Language of the resource curse
Summaryresource dependence is the past, not the future, of rural
systems (the new truism)
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Gentle Critique of this view Narrow use of secondary data
mostly employment and income based narrow view of employment:
extraction and processing Problems of scalemeasured at large
(irrelevant?) geography Great diversity of outcomes Lack of
subjective indicators foranyeyes.blogspot.com
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This Needs to be Challenged 1. Conceptualizing too narrowly 2.
What about urban systems?
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Recent expansions Employment is more than extraction (e.g.
natural resource tourism) Dependence is more than employment: e.g.
community symbols/identity /basis for (in)action We need to take
this line of critique further Mynatour.org Vn-tourism.com
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Need to examine actions and psychologies at multiple
scales.
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Two key conceptual and methodological issues Dependence as
psychological state conflated with ~ behavioral indicators Scale:
Who depends? Communities? Or people?
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A conceptual typology of dependence Individual
Community/Aggregate Psychological Attitude, personal identity (An
individual feels dependent) Social representations, Cultural
cognition Community identity Behavioral Individual actions that
Express or create dependence Secondary data: indicators of
community well being Community level actions
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Enter positive dependence? Transition from deficit-based to
asset-based perspectives Terms: addiction, reliance, craving imply
vulnerability or weakness So do most findings, as conventionally
measured Another class of synonyms for psychological dependence:
trust, confidence, belief, faith that imply something positive:
dependence versus dependability? Held by individuals or larger
social aggregates Can this base of confidenceprovide a basis for
action: stronger sense of agency, resilience, And thus foster
virtuous cycles?
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Populating the typology with virtuous / vicious cycles (
Tidball and Stedman, 2012). Individual Community/Aggregate
Psychological (pos / neg) Attitudes: Negative: Risk aversion,
unwillingness to change Positive: attachment, biophilia Social
representations, community identity: Negative: we are backward,
with few other options, stuck. Positive: shared vision, collective
identity, community as special place Behavioral (pos / neg)
Individual actions: Negative: disinvestments in human capital based
on faith in industry or lack of awareness of options Positive: use
faith in the resource as a launching pad for creativity,
entrepreneurship, etc. Secondary data: indicators of community
action Negative: disinvestments in alt development strategies
Positive: community-driven initiatives: resource based development
strategies, CBRM
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The question becomes under what circumstances can dependence
lead to virtuous cycles? (positive dependency)
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Road map Check -in Key Terms Dependency Urban Systems Biophilia
Topophilia Introducing Positive Dependence Origins and Assumptions
Critiques Positive dependence Restorative Topophilia Core
definition and principles A basis for action Key caveats Urgent
Biophilia Description Origins Research to date Further implications
Broad Positive Dependency & Resilience Implications Caveats and
Conclusions
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Restorative Topophilia
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Topophilia Empirical expression in place attachment -- research
Concerns whole place rather than environment Experiential
(constructed rather than innate) Based on attributed
symbols/meanings
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Restorative Topophila When love of place fosters individual and
collective action that repair and/or enhance valued attributes of
place Requires strong attachment and important meanings under
threat.
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Some caveats: what accounts for virtuous versus vicious tips?
Mostly meanings, rather than attachment Diversity is a double edged
sword Magnitude of variation How is variation distributed Change
fostering vs change inhibiting reflexive or resistant
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Road map Check -in Key Terms Dependency Urban Systems Biophilia
Topophilia Introducing Positive Dependence Origins and Assumptions
Critiques Positive dependence Restorative Topophilia Core
definition and principles A basis for action Key caveats Urgent
Biophilia Description Origins Research to date Further implications
Broad Positive Dependency & Resilience Implications Caveats and
Conclusions back to Keith
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Urgent Biophilia
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Proliferation of concept
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Urgent Biophilia- Roots in Hort Therapy There are many examples
of people, stunned by a crisis, benefitting from the therapeutic
qualities of nature contact to ease trauma and to aid the process
of recovery. (Miavitz 1998; Hewson 2001) Benefits of horticulture
therapy (Markee and Janick 1979; PeoplePlantCouncil 1993; Relf and
Dorn 1995; Relf 2005) among returning war veterans (Brdanovic 2009)
in refugee contexts and in prisons
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Restorative Environments Frumkin (2001) and Hartig (2007)
traced human-nature relationships contributing to human health to
the ancient Greeks, to the New England transcendentalists, and
through the American landscape designers Andrew Jackson Downing
(1869) and Frederick Law Olmsted (1865) (Nash 1982; McLuhan 1994;
Murphy, Gifford et al. 1998; Mazel 2000). To see or actively
experience plants and green spaces can: reduce domestic violence,
quicken healing times, reduce stress, improve physical health, and
bring about cognitive and psychological benefits in individuals and
populations as a whole (Ulrich 1984; Kaplan and Kaplan 1989;
Hartig, Mang et al. 1991; Sullivan and Kuo 1996; Taylor, Wiley et
al. 1998; Wells 2000; Hartig, Mang et al. 1991). The study of
restorative environments complements research on the conditions in
which our functional resources and capabilities diminish, such as
red zones.
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Systemic Therapies What might gardening, tree planting, or
other greening activities contribute to severely disturbed urban
SES resilience? Moving toward an ecological approach, the field of
systemic therapies contributes alternative approaches to healing.
Address the environment not merely as a setting but as a partner in
the process (Berger and McLeod 2006).
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Systems Within Systems Facilitate Human Resilience
Communication Transportation Manufacturing Hydrological Cycle
Carbon Cycle Nitrogen Cycle
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What IS Urgent Biophilia then? Attraction humans have for the
rest of nature (and the rest of nature for us?) Process of
remembering that attraction Urge to express it through creation of
restorative environments restore or increase ecological function
confer resilience across multiple scales Based on Biological
Attraction Principle (Agnati et al. 2009) Analogous to Newtons Law
of Gravitation Biological activities, processes, or patterns are
all deemed to be mutually attractive Biological attractive force is
intrinsic to living organisms and manifests itself through the
propensity of any living organism to act
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Urgent Biophilia Operationalized Gunderson and Holling 2002
Might Urgent Biophilia flourish in the backloop?
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Examples- New Orleans, LA
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Examples- Joplin, MO
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Examples- Detroit, MI
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Examples- Tohoku Japan
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How to analyze? LOCATIONRED ZONE TYPE AfghanistanOngoing wars
in the Middle East Berlin, GermanyPost-Cold War divisions
Charleston, South Carolina1989 Hurricane Hugo Cameroon and ChadMid
2000s civil unrest in Central Africa CyprusDemarcation between
Greek and Turkish Cyprus Europe1940s WW II Nazi internment camps
GuatemalaOngoing post-conflict insecurity IraqOngoing wars in the
Middle East Johannesburg, South AfricaEarly 2000s Soweto,
Post-Apartheid violence KenyaEarly 2000s Resource scarcity conflict
Liberia1989- 2003 civil war MadagascarCostal vulnerability New
Orleans, USA2005 Hurricane Katrina New York City, USA2001 September
11 th terrorist attacks Rotterdam, NetherlandsOngoing urban
insecurity Port-au-Prince, Haiti2010 earthquake RussiaPost-Soviet
Cold War urban insecurity Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina1992-1996
conflict South KoreaDemilitarized Zone South Korea2002 Typhoon and
coastal vulnerability Stockholm, SwedenUrban insecurity in times of
war Tokyo and Hiroshima, JapanWW II bombings United StatesWW II
involvement United StatesViolence and prison populations
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Ok so what? In the context of SES, move towards linking
individuals with groups of people, neighborhoods and communities
Contact with nature, a kind of self administered therapy, as a
means to cope with crisis Contribute to the literature connecting
individual resilience to the adaptive functioning of larger social
systems and networks
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Implications of Restorative Topophilia & Urgent Biophilia
for Positive Dependency & Resilience
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In Conclusion Need to move away from deficit perspectives
Circumstances under which positive dependence is likely to emerge
What may be lost in translation within a perspective born in rural
sociology as it is applied to urban systems Need for
transdisciplinary qualitative and quantitative methods and
approaches that document and interpret linkages between individual
ecological identity and community ecological sense of place, and
their relationships to collective action for sustainable urban
systems.