1.Keith G. Tidball & Richard StedmanCornell UniversityPositive resource dependency in urbansystems: applying urgent biophilia andrestorative topophilia20 May 2013Linn Hall, Royal Swedish Academy of SciencesStockholm, Sweden

2. First, some historyElmqvist visitingscholar and 1st SU/SRC& Cornell/CALS MOUworkshop Fall 20112nd SU/SRC &Cornell/CALS MOUworkshop and meetingFall 2012 Visiting ResearchersPhD Course 2013 3. Background and Framing BigPicture Humans have lost their ecological identity, which we arguemay be related to loss of resilience and adaptive capacityamong 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 recoverour ecological identity in the way humans respondto large scale disasters? How should we value community-based ecologicalrestoration in human vulnerability and securitycontexts? 4. Background and Framing BigPicturethere will be social mechanisms behindmanagement practices based on local ecologicalknowledge, as evidence of a co-evolutionary relationshipbetween local institutions and the ecosystem in whichthey are locatedmechanisms by which information from theenvironment can be received, processed, andinterpretedtangible evidence of social mechanisms behindsocialecological practices that deal with disturbance andmaintain system resilienceBerkes & Folke 1998 5. Main Messages for Today Deficit-based perspectives on urban systems arebarriers to movement from undesirable to moresustainable system states. Issues such as ecological identity, humanexemptionalism, anthropocentrism, and resourcedependence contribute to barriers. Urgent biophilia and restorative topophilia mayenhance ecological identity and beneficial positivedependency. Positive dependency may start, re-start, or expandvirtuous cycles that confer desired resilience. 6. RoadmapKey Terms Dependency Urban Systems Ecological Identity Biophilia TopophiliaIntroducing Positive Dependence Origins and Assumptions Critiques Positive dependenceRestorative Topophilia Core definition and principles A basis for action Key caveatsUrgent Biophilia Description Origins Research to date Further implicationsImplications, Caveats and Conclusions 7. Keith G. TidballEcologically speaking, if the city is dead, the ecologicalsensibilities of the inhabitants of the city will also be dead.NE Heller, 2010, ESA Meetingsa description of the unique relationship between the users of environmentalattributes and the environmental attribute itself ResourceDependence 8. What is largely still missing in social-ecological resilience theory is a treatment ofcities and urban areas. This includes the historical lessons that can be drawn fromdistant urban pasts in regard to sustaining ecosystem services during times ofhardship and crisis ( Stephan Barthel, 2011).given its origins in ecology, it is not surprising that most resilience scholars havehistorically been interested in empirical analyses of non-urban areas (e.g., shallowlakes, production forests, and small-scale agriculture, see Berkes and Folke 1998;Gunderson and Holling 2002; Berkes et al. 2003), and have devoted less attentionto the specifically human and social elements of human-dominated systems,such as cities (Ernstson et al., 2010 Ambio ).Urban Systems 9. Ecological Identityone part of the way in which people form their self-concept: a sense ofconnection to some part of the nonhuman natural environment, based onhistory, emotional attachment, and/or similarity, that affects the ways inwhich we perceive and act toward the world; a belief that the environmentis important to us and who we are Clayton 2003 10. Biophilia? 11. Proliferation of concept 12. Topophilia Topohilia (Tuan 1974) love of place A place is a center of meaning orfield of care (Tuan, 1977) based onhuman experience, socialrelationships, emotions, andthoughts. Through human experience,abstract space, lackingsignificance other than strangeness, becomes concreteplace, filled with meaning (Tuan1977, p. 199). 13. Introducing Positive DependenceEcological and social resilience may be linked through the dependence onecosystems of communities and their economic activities. The question is, then, whether societies dependent on resources andecosystems are themselves less resilient. Adger, 2000 14. Resource Dependence:The Traditional View Rural sociological origins Strong historical rurallegacy of resourcedependence Dependence defined byemployment inextraction, processing ofraw materials (forestry,fisheries, mining, energy) Resource dependencelinked with communitywell being Rural developmentpractitioners Researchers (early on) 15. 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.) 16. However Booster view largely wrong:research shows Few jobs: rural is not resourcedependent Poor outcomes for dependentplaces Higher rates of poverty,unemployment, education,etc. Linkages dont come: unevendevelopment Language of the resourcecurse Summaryresource dependenceis the past, not the future, of ruralsystems (the new truism) 17. Gentle Critique of this view Narrow use ofsecondary data mostly employment andincome based narrow view ofemployment: extractionand processing Problems of scalemeasured at large(irrelevant?) geography Great diversity ofoutcomes Lack of subjectiveindicatorsforanyeyes.blogspot.com 18. This Needs to be Challenged1. Conceptualizing too narrowly2. What about urban systems? 19. Recent expansions Employment is morethan extraction (e.g.natural resourcetourism) Dependence is morethan employment:e.g. communitysymbols/identity/basis for (in)action We need to take thisline of critiquefurtherMynatour.orgVn-tourism.com 20. Need to examine actions andpsychologies at multiple scales. 21. Two key conceptual andmethodological issues Dependence as psychological state conflatedwith ~ behavioral indicators Scale: Who depends? Communities? Orpeople? 22. A conceptual typology of dependenceIndividual Community/AggregatePsychologicalAttitude, personal identity(An individual feels dependent)Social representations,Cultural cognitionCommunity identityBehavioralIndividual actions thatExpress or create dependenceSecondary data: indicators ofcommunity well beingCommunity level actions 23. Enter positive dependence?Transition from deficit-based to asset-basedperspectives Terms: addiction, reliance, craving imply vulnerabilityor weakness So do most findings, as conventionally measured Another class of synonyms for psychologicaldependence: trust, confidence, belief, faith that implysomething positive: dependence versusdependability? Held by individuals or larger social aggregates Can this base of confidenceprovide a basis foraction: stronger sense of agency, resilience, And thus foster virtuous cycles? 24. cycles(Tidball and Stedman, 2012).Individual Community/AggregatePsychological(pos / neg)Attitudes:Negative: Risk aversion,unwillingness to changePositive: attachment, biophiliaSocial representations, communityidentity:Negative: we are backward, withfew other options, stuck.Positive: shared vision, collectiveidentity, community as specialplaceBehavioral(pos / neg)Individual actions:Negative: disinvestments in humancapital based on faith in industryor lack of awareness of optionsPositive: use faith in the resourceas a launching pad for creativity,entrepreneurship, etc.Secondary data: indicators ofcommunity actionNegative: disinvestments in altdevelopment strategiesPositive: community-driveninitiatives: resource baseddevelopment strategies, CBRM 25. The question becomes under whatcircumstances can dependence lead tovirtuous cycles? (positive dependency) 26. 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 27. Restorative Topophilia 28. Topophilia Empirical expressionin place attachment --research Concerns wholeplace rather thanenvironment Experiential(constructed ratherthan innate) Based on attributedsymbols/meanings 29. Restorative Topophila When love of place fosters individual andcollective action that repair and/or enhance valuedattributes of place Requires strong attachment and importantmeanings under threat. 30. Some caveats: what accounts forvirtuous 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 31. 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 Conclusionsback to Keith 32. Urgent Biophilia 33. Proliferation of concept 34. Urgent Biophilia- Roots in Hort TherapyThere are many examples of people, stunned by acrisis, benefitting from the therapeutic qualities ofnature contact to ease trauma and to aid the processof 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 35. Restorative Environments Frumkin (2001) and Hartig (2007) traced human-nature relationshipscontributing to human health to the ancient Greeks, to the New Englandtranscendentalists, and through the American landscape designers AndrewJackson 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 domesticviolence, quicken healing times, reduce stress, improve physical health, andbring about cognitive and psychological benefits in individuals and populationsas 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 etal. 1991). The study of restorative environments complements research on the conditionsin which our functional resources and capabilities diminish, such as red zones. 36. Systemic TherapiesWhat might gardening, tree planting, or other greeningactivities contribute to severely disturbed urban SESresilience?Moving toward an ecological approach, the field ofsystemic therapies contributes alternativeapproaches to healing.Address the environment not merely as a setting butas a partner in the process (Berger and McLeod2006). 37. Systems Within Systems FacilitateHuman Resilience Communication Transportation Manufacturing Hydrological Cycle Carbon Cycle Nitrogen Cycle 38. What IS Urgent Biophilia then? Attraction humans have for the rest of nature (and therest of nature for us?) Process of remembering that attraction Urge to express it through creation of restorativeenvironments restore or increase ecological function confer resilience across multiple scalesBased on Biological Attraction Principle(Agnati et al. 2009)Analogous to Newtons Law of GravitationBiological activities, processes, or patterns are all deemed to be mutuallyattractiveBiological attractive force is intrinsic to living organisms and manifests itselfthrough the propensity of any living organism to act 39. Urgent Biophilia OperationalizedGunderson and Holling 2002Might Urgent Biophilia flourish in the backloop? 40. Examples- New Orleans, LA 41. Examples- Joplin, MO 42. Examples- Detroit, MI 43. Examples- Tohoku Japan 44. How to analyze?LOCATION RED ZONE TYPEAfghanistan Ongoing wars in the Middle EastBerlin, Germany Post-Cold War divisionsCharleston, South Carolina 1989 Hurricane HugoCameroon and Chad Mid 2000s civil unrest in Central AfricaCyprus Demarcation between Greek and Turkish CyprusEurope 1940s WW II Nazi internment campsGuatemala Ongoing post-conflict insecurityIraq Ongoing wars in the Middle EastJohannesburg, South Africa Early 2000s Soweto, Post-Apartheid violenceKenya Early 2000s Resource scarcity conflictLiberia 1989- 2003 civil warMadagascar Costal vulnerabilityNew Orleans, USA 2005 Hurricane KatrinaNew York City, USA 2001 September 11th terrorist attacksRotterdam, Netherlands Ongoing urban insecurityPort-au-Prince, Haiti 2010 earthquakeRussia Post-Soviet Cold War urban insecuritySarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina 1992-1996 conflictSouth Korea Demilitarized ZoneSouth Korea 2002 Typhoon and coastal vulnerabilityStockholm, Sweden Urban insecurity in times of warTokyo and Hiroshima, Japan WW II bombingsUnited States WW II involvementUnited States Violence and prison populations 45. Ok so what? In the context of SES, move towards linkingindividuals with groups of people, neighborhoodsand communities Contact with nature, a kind of self administeredtherapy, as a means to cope with crisis Contribute to the literature connecting individualresilience to the adaptive functioning of larger socialsystems and networks 46. Implications of Restorative Topophilia& Urgent Biophilia for PositiveDependency & Resilience 47. In Conclusion Need to move away from deficitperspectives Circumstances under which positivedependence is likely to emerge What may be lost in translation within aperspective born in rural sociology as it isapplied to urban systems Need for transdisciplinary qualitative andquantitative methods and approaches thatdocument and interpret linkages betweenindividual ecological identity and communityecological sense of place, and theirrelationships to collective action forsustainable urban systems. 48. Acknowledgements