It is not often that an academic paper is downloaded over 600,000 times. Even rarer that one is described as ‘the scientific paper sending people into therapy’ [1]. Such is the social phenomenon triggered by the paper Deep Adaptation: A map for navigating climate tragedy [2], published privately after it was rejected by the journal Sustainability Accounting, Management and Policy [3]. What follows is an agronomist’s attempt to understand the basis for the paper’s claim that we face ‘inevitable near-term societal collapse’ due to ‘… uncontrollable levels of climate change bringing starvation, destruction, migration, disease, and war’ [1].

Strong attachments to places are important in understanding the politics of environmental planning, but, as in Tasmania, Australia, are not usually incorporated in planning criteria and standards. We determine whether groups of individuals have similar spatial patterns of attachment at a State scale in Tasmania, and whether attachments to these 'place spaces' are differently motivated, and socially or environmentally determined. We used respondents' lists of places to repeatedly classify the groups of people attached to different place spaces. The associations between stated motivations and the distinctive features identified by place spaces, and between socioeconomic and demographic variables and both motivations and place space groups, were determined for the 293 respondents with complete data using Chi square and ANOVA. Eight of the nine groups of people had spatially well-defined place spaces. Four place spaces were similar to the territories of Aboriginal nations. Two place space groups focused on places with cultural heritage. All others had a strong nature focus. Family activities and childhood memories most influenced the choices of those born in Tasmania, while immigrants focused on heritage. Single features of the landscape, such as kunanyi (Mt Wellington), motivated attachment in many different ways and in many place space groups. Demographic and socioeconomic variables did not strongly differentiate between people in place space groups. Patterns of attachment to place spaces and the diversity of reasons for attachment to them can be determined using our novel methods, potentially facilitating incorporation of place attachment into the planning process.

"Call of the Reed Warbler: a new agriculture, a new earth." Australasian Journal of Environmental Management, 26(1), pp. 102–103

Throughout the world, feral horses (Equus caballus) are causing environmental degradation and a decline in ecological integrity.Evidence from scientific monitoring is needed to inform the public debate and help land managers make informed decisions.We used field observations of vegetation condition at a network of sites in the Australian Alps where horses were present or absent.The data were combined with the remotely -sensed fraction of photosynthetic active radiation (fPAR) and topographic condition.Vegetation condition was assessed in the field by rangers using a modified version of the Landscape Function Analysis (LFA) index.We found significant differences in the LFA index between sites where horses were present or absent.Sites with presence of horses have 10 per cent lower fPAR than sites with absence of horses.The results also indicated a significant correlation between LFA and fPAR.Our analysis supports the hypothesis that feral horses have a negative impact on the condition of Australian alpine vegetation.This study provides a useful and relatively cost-effective method for monitoring the impact of feral horses on native vegetation, and can be used to support decision making and management interventions.

Previous articleNext article FreeEcological Economics and SustainabilityPursuing Sustainability: A Guide to the Science and Practice. By Pamela Matson, William C. Clark, and Krister Andersson. Princeton (New Jersey): Princeton University Press. $35.00. xi + 231 p.; ill.; index. ISBN: 978-0-691-15761-0. 2016.Ted LefroyTed LefroyCentre for Environment, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia Search for more articles by this author Centre for Environment, University of Tasmania, Hobart, Tasmania, AustraliaPDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmailQR Code SectionsMoreSustainability in its modern incarnation is often regarded as a European phenomenon with roots in the concept of sustained yield in French and German forestry. However, before these European antecedents were rediscovered, the North American frontier was closing and the settlers were forced to face one another and work out how to live in a land with newly discovered limits. In the late 19th and early 20th century sustainability became an American question through the efforts of George Perkins Marsh, Gifford Pinchot, and Aldo Leopold.In the second half of the 20th century sustainability became a global challenge with the launch of Gro Harlem Brundtland’s 1987 report for the United Nations titled Our Common Future. It has since been adopted by different academic disciplines and sectors of the economy from agriculture to energy and health care to corporate reporting. The downside of this wide embrace is that sustainability has become a fragmented concept, often compromised, at times hijacked, and occasionally astroturfed. Sustainability continues to be reinvented, most recently as ecomodernism ([Editorial]. 2015. Nature 520:407– 408), and dismissed by some as ineffective until there is root and branch reform of human values and institutions.In Pursuing Sustainability, Matson et al. have done a great service for both students and practitioners by drawing together the disparate sectoral interests and academic concerns across land and water, food and energy, wealth, equity, and corporate responsibility. In the process they make sense of its fragmented history by presenting sustainability not as an argument but a conversation. Arguably the conversation of our times.The authors achieve this through a simple device introduced in Chapter 2 that provides the book with its theory and structure. This framework is based on the conversion of the five capitals (human, natural, manufactured, knowledge, and social) into the constituents of well-being (material needs, health and education, opportunity, security, and community) through the agency of individuals and institutions.In addition to its logical structure, two other features make this volume a valuable primer in sustainability. The first is the selection of case studies used to illustrate the complexity that arises when principles intersect in different settings. The second is the succinct, straightforward style. The effect is a broad and highly accessible survey that reveals sustainability as a social and environmental phenomenon, a set of objectives rather than destinations that are influenced as much by history, culture, and politics as biology and the physical environment. The case studies of a city (London), a region (Mexico’s Yaqui Valley), a country (Nepal), and a global treaty (The Montreal Protocol) have been carefully selected to illustrate how sustainability is shaped by time, space, and the needs and interests of every level of human organization from the subsistence family to the United Nations.Through its elucidation of principles and real-world examples, this volume serves as both a guide to our evolving understanding of sustainability and a practical, diagnostic tool. Beyond its subject matter, the thoughtful structure and clear writing make this a model for textbooks in any discipline. Previous articleNext article DetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The Quarterly Review of Biology Volume 92, Number 1March 2017 Published in association with Stony Brook University Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/690853 For permission to reuse, please contact [email protected]PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

Ecological restoration activities should be conceptualized as a form of governance, as this lens best captures the multiactor, collaborative processes by which societies through governments and nonstate entities seek to achieve environmental outcomes. Successful restoration governance depends on addressing a cluster of challenges concerning optimal spatiotemporal scales, biological feasibility, sociocultural acceptability, financial viability, and institutional tractability. Changes to private law, company law, and taxation are some of the governance reforms available to tackle these challenges.

In an era of climate change, deforestation and massive habitat loss, we can no longer rely on parks and protected areas as isolated 'islands of wilderness' to conserve and protect vital biodiversity. Increasing connections are being considered and made between protected areas and 'connectivity' thinking has started to expand to the regional and even the continental scale to match the challenges of conserving biodiversity in the face of global environmental change. This groundbreaking book is the first guide to connectivity conservation management at local, regional and continental scales.

European colonization precipitated the first industrial transformation of Australian landscapes. We review the evolution of the environmental and societal setting of Australian landscapes since this first industrial transformation, the emergence of drivers precipitating a second industrial transformation, and what it will take to adapt. In concert with climate change and growing societal expectations of environmental stewardship, we identify six emerging economies for ecosystem services - carbon, water, food, energy, amenity and mining - which will exert transformational pressure on land use and management. The requirements for transformational adaptation - to thrive within environmental limits - include: fostering new partnerships between government, science, the private sector, and local communities to support local adaptation; identifying critical environmental limits and rationalizing environmental laws; establishing innovative social processes and adaptive governance; and developing innovative, well-supported market-based and community-based incentives.