1

To assist in future arid land use strategies, you have

been employed by the SA Department of
Environment and Natural Resources to conduct
research on the relationship between environmental
change and station management practices in the
arid north of SA over the twentieth century. Due to
the nature of the physical environment it has
proven difficult to determine the trajectory of
environmental change in this period. How would
you go about tackling this problem?



Kiama Council has a Local Environmental Plan
that calls for the retention of a rural hinterland
and landscape to meet social and ecological
conservation objectives. There are various aspects
to this, one of which is the preservation of a rural
aesthetic. Council desires to preserve landscapes
that look rural but is vague as to what this means.
How would you go about assessing the success of
this policy over the next five years?
2
Traditional View of Roles in EM

Environmental management =
natural/environmental scientists


Social scientists as assistants




New roles for social sciences in environmental
management
Recognition that environmental problems have
social solutions
Recognition of gap between scientific data
and policy responses

[policy broadly defined: law, policy, management
plans, etc]











3
What do we need to know in order to manage
land, water and vegetation more sustainably?
Ross, 1999, p.33






Which land, water and vegetation do we wish to
manage?
Management is always derived from certain
understandings of what resources exists and what
uses/outcomes are desired
What are out purposes and cultural context?Are
we talking agricultural resources, recreational,
Aboriginal, conservation?
How are the landscapes that shape our
management aims and actions created in the
individual, group and organisational mind?
4

Environmental Problems as wicked

Complex
No definitive formulation
Likely never be a solution
Highly connected to other issues/problems
Timeframes beyond policy frameworks



Multidisciplinary research
Non-integrated research drawing on experts in
various disciplines to tackle various parts of a
problem.
Ross 1999 suggests EIA is along these lines


Interdisciplinary Research
Where an integrating theory or framework is used
to link one or more disciplines, so that experts in
different fields work together, or where a single
researcher draws on other disciplines

Transdisciplinary Research
Similar to interdisciplinary but attempts to build
new theories, methods, knowledge etc from the
component approaches. More than just
combination, useful for new problems, eg those
thrown up by NRM.
5

Social sciences broadly defined

a general term covering all the sciences dealing
with interactions between people (Ross, 1999)


Understanding the nature of environmental
problems and how they might be solved requires
much more than a scientific appreciation of
environmental processes. It demands an
understanding of how societies work, and how
collective action within those societies is both
organised and constrained (J ohnston, 1989, in
Mercer 1991)


Role in NRM
Social sciences frame the context in which other
knowledge can be applied; questioning the fit
between that knowledge and its context and
evaluating its purpose; and providing a critique of
science and technology which is valuable as an
input to technological decision-making from the
beginning, not just to explain what went wrong
(Australian Science, Technology and Engineering
Council in Ross, 1999)

6
In relation to ecological restoration

The question of which nature is complex
enough just from a scientific viewpoint.
Science can give normative criteria for new
landscape patterns, culture will give us the
realised design
Nassauer, quoted in Gobster and Barra, 2000,
in Restoring Nature: Perspectives from the
Social Sciences and Humanities

Even if ecologists can provide theoretical and
technical input to answer questions about what
goes where and how to accomplish it, the
ultimate success of such effort relies on
cultural acceptance, Gobster and Barrow
7

Relevant disciplines
- geography
- sociology
- history
- anthropology
- economics
- law
- political science
- psychology
- linguistics/communication
- philosophy
8
We
Who is we?
Landholders, policy-makers, researchers, advisers, public
servants, companies, the general public
Different aims
Different relationships to environment
Different things we need to know


Knowing
What is knowing?
Is there a set of facts out there awaiting discovery and
application of knowledge of them?
What do we know and how do we come to know it?
In what context and under what conditions do we come to
generate environmental knowledge?
Knowledge as socially constructed
Environmental issues and priorities as socially constructed

Managing
What do we mean by this
Behaviour patterns in using and modifying the environment
Institutions
Policy Instruments
Institutional frameworks that shape our behaviour


9
What is an institution?


An institution is a persistent, at least partially
predictable arrangement, law, process, custom or
organisation serving to structure aspects of the
political, social, cultural or economic transactions
and relationships in society. They allow organised
and collective efforts toward common concerns and
the achievement of goals. Although by definition
persistent, institutions constantly evolve
Dovers, 1999, p.96


Persistent public agencies (govt departments)
Market processes and arrangements
Policy and policy-making arrangments
Legal institutions (common or statute law, courts)
Informational institutions (eg media)
Formal and Informal networks
Social norms, frameworks, customs


How can we understand institutions, how they
form, how they are structured, how ideas form and
are translated to policy, and what happens as those
ideas and policies are translated in action of various
sorts?
10
Monitoring and Evaluation

Required for understanding the development and
enactment of environmental and NRM policy.

Can occur at many scales: from the evaluating
federal programs to examining the activities of
landholder groups eg Landcare, Bushcare etc


Landcare evaluation illustrates well the role of
social science in EM/NRM

Difficult to document and measure biophysical
outcomes.
Counting tangible outcomes (members
numbers, trees planted, fencing put up)
necessary but insufficient and shallow.
Social and cultural processes
Engaging and shaping rural environmentalism
and stewardship
Political role of Landcare
Symbolic role of Landcare activities
Reproducing existing unequal social relations
Reasons for involvement/non-involvement
Influence of LC groups locally