Building social-ecological resilience through adaptive comanagement in the Cache River Watershed of southern Illinois (original) (raw)

There is growing recognition that the sustainable governance of water resources requires building social-ecological resilience against future surprises. Adaptive comanagement, a distinct institutional mechanism that combines the learning focus of adaptive management with the multilevel linkages of comanagement, has recently emerged as a promising mechanism for building social-ecological resilience. This paper employs the concept of adaptive comanagement to analyze ongoing institutional reforms in the Cache River watershed of southern Illinois. Since the 1970s, efforts have been made to promote collaborative decisionmaking aimed at the restoration of the watershed. However, the current governance system remains vulnerable because little attention has been given to building the capacity of the watershed for learning and adaptation. Adaptive comanagement can contribute to building resilience in the watershed by creating awareness, generating interest, creating opportunities, and building capacity for adaptation. Acheson, J.M. 2006. Institutional failure in resource management. Annual Review of Anthropology. 35: 117-134. Adams, J.; Kraft, S.; Ruhl, J.B.; Lant, C.; Loftus, T.; Duram, L. 2005. Watershed planning: pseudo-democracy and its alternatives-the case of the Cache River watershed, Illinois. Agriculture and Human Values. 22: 327-338. Adger, N.W.; Hughes, T.P.; Folke, C.; Carpenter, S.R.; Rockstrom, J. 2005. Social-ecological resilience to coastal disasters. Science. 309: 1036-1039. Akamani, K. 2012. A community resilience framework for understanding and assessing the sustainability of forest-dependent communities. Human Ecology Review. 19: 99-109. Akamani, K. 2013. Transitions toward adaptive water governance: the case of the Cache River watershed in southern Illinois, U.S.