文章基本信息

标题：Does Participatory Planning Foster the Transformation Toward More Adaptive Social-Ecological Systems?
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作者：Susanne Menzel ; Matthias Buchecker
期刊名称：Ecology and Society
印刷版ISSN：1708-3087
电子版ISSN：1708-3087
出版年度：2013
卷号：18
期号：1
出版社：The Resilience Alliance
摘要：The need for social-ecological systems to become more adaptive is widely acknowledged. Social effects generatedby participatory planning have been claimed to contribute to this transformation, but little empirical evidence is available thatbacks up or opposes this notion. We aimed to offer some insights regarding questions as to which social effects are formed inparticipatory planning processes and at what costs, and to then discuss their contribution to the transformation toward moreadaptive social-ecological systems based on empirical evidence. Consequently, we investigated the social effects of participatoryplanning processes, including the social learning processes leading to them. We conducted semistructured interviews withmembers of advisory groups involved in river engineering projects in Switzerland. Our results indicate that participatory planningprocesses can somewhat contribute to maintaining and spreading knowledge and social capital among individuals in a planninggroup, and this may help them collectively deal with new and complex challenges. However, it is costly in terms of time andpatience to build up ecological knowledge, communicative capacities, and trust, with the latter also eroding over time. Overall,we conclude that the contribution of participatory planning via positive social outcomes to the transformation toward adaptivecapacity social-ecological systems is smaller than optimists might hope. However, other forms of planning very likely result inno social effects or even the destruction of social capital. Participatory planning, in contrast, can offer the conditions for relationaland cognitive learning contributing to the maintenance of social and political capital. Based on our results, we suggest shiftingresources from technical to communicative aspects of planning processes and implementations. We recommend that projectleaders provide stakeholders with firsthand information about projects, explain rationales and data behind decisions, and clearlycommunicate that stakeholders do not have decision making competence to support participants in finding their roles in similarparticipatory planning settings
关键词：comanagement; participatory planning; planning costs; qualitative research; social capital; social learning; time;requirements