This sort of thing is an issue for community based conservation and
always makes me wonder about the locus of sustainability and the
potential disconnect between knowledge/information and action. That is,
if we take a systems perspective and recognize the need for feedback in
making management corrections, what happens when environmental change
that is occurring at the local level has non-local causes about which
nothing can even be done at the local level?
Certainly as Kai says, "nearly all communities relying on resources
(including our own) are affected by the forces of global change".
However, many local/community groups don't have access to information
about those forces (which might be remedied with new info tech and
global info-networks), nor is affecting those forces within their local
management realm of possibility.
Cheers - Christopher
willett wrote:
Kai,
Good heavens, I did not mean to say anything against community-based
management--I'm a believer. I was only saying that for a student whose
priority was to save coral reefs (further specification: in the
mid-latitudes, where most coral reefs are), any and all other management
efforts may be overwhelmed by ocean acidification. Destruction of
tropical coral reefs worldwide will extinguish something like (very
roughly) 30% of all ocean species. This includes high-latitude diatoms,
on which most human fisheries depend.
Another clarification, I should have changed the email header, which was
"climate change and community-based management" Although ocean
acidification is caused by CO2 in the atmosphere (and to a lesser
extent, and more locally, by other combustion products) it has nothing
to do with climate change. Thus, most of the so-called geoengineering
remedies for climate do nothing to help ocean acidification. All
CO2-reduction remedies reduce/resolve both these environmental problems.
More references to this amazingly under-publicized problem:
Kolbert article:
http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/061120fa_fact3
Short review of the science: http://co2.cms.udel.edu/ (click on
"Ocean acidification")
Willett
On 12 Mar 2007, at 07:43, Kai N. Lee wrote:
Thanks to Willett for an interesting redirection.
I don't really see why climate change makes community-based management
irrelevant, however. The building of social capital that would
plausibly result from the strengthening of community-based management
might, indeed, be an important step toward saving parts of the culture
of the affected community.
Nearly all communities relying on resources (including our own) are
affected by the forces of global change, including globalization and
climate change. Those forces mean that community-based approaches
cannot be hermetically sealed, even if resources are not to be sold
beyond the community.
This does not mean that Willett's student should not have had his
attention turned to acidification as a major issue in saving coral
reefs, of course.
Cheers,
Kai
Kai N. Lee, Rosenburg Professor of environmental studies, Center for
Environmental Studies, Williams College, Kellogg House, 41 Mission
Park Drive, Williamstown MA 01267 USA. Voice & voicemail:
01+413-597-2358; fax: 01+413-597-3489.
http://www.williams.edu/ces/ces/people/klee/klee.htm
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Christopher A. Thoms, Ph.D.
Andrew W. Mellon Fellow in Environment and Justice
Environmental Studies Program
Colby College
Tel. 207.859.4847
http://www.colby.edu/directory_cs/cathoms/
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MAY ALL THAT BREATHES BE WELL!
