Collaborative Conservation: Strategies for Biodiversity
(VIRTUAL) Fall 2021
Instructor: Joshua Fisher, Earth Institute
Description:
Governments, scientists, and communities around the world are increasingly concerned by the increasing threats to biodiversity and ecosystem health. There are calls around the world for conservation action to stem biodiversity and habitat loss, though the results of conservation programs are highly varied and the overall trend points to an uncertain future. While there is widespread recognition of the need to act, specific conservation actions often result in conflict among stakeholders with different interests and needs in a given landscape. Those conflicts in turn hamper conservation efforts, and can exhaust the financial, political, and environmental resources needed to mitigate threats to biodiversity.
This workshop will provide participants with an overview of strategies that can be deployed to enable more collaborative biodiversity conservation. The workshop will provide an introductory overview of the global context for biodiversity conservation, and will provide introduction to relevant terms, themes and concepts for understanding ecosystem function and social-ecological connections. The workshop will also introduce frameworks for generating collaborative action among diverse sets of stakeholders, with a focus on participatory land-use and conservation planning. The workshop will utilize several case studies to highlight pathways and models for effective collaboration and explore the reasons for conservation success.
Learning Outcomes:
- Social Ecological Systems: The workshop will enable learners to understand important concepts, themes, and terms for examining ecosystem functions, the importance of biological diversity, and social-ecological interdependencies. The workshop will address such questions as: What is an ecosystem? What is biodiversity and why is it integral to ecosystem health? How are human and natural systems connected and what are the interdependencies in these systems?
- Conflict and Collaboration in Conservation: The workshop will introduce learners to theoretical frameworks for understanding the drivers of collaboration and conflict among stakeholders. The workshop will address such questions as: Why do social systems often experience conflict related to natural systems? What are the drivers of conflict? How can conflict dynamics become a basis for collaborative action? How do social ecological systems adapt and respond to conflicts?
- Collaborative Planning and Action: The workshop will enable learners to become familiar with participatory planning and effective conservation management models. Throughout the workshop, participants will explore questions like: What models of participatory governance are effective in generating positive social and ecological outcomes? How can conservation managers invite stakeholders into planning and management processes? What are the benefits of collaboration?
Key Ideas:
- Trends in Biodiversity and Conservation
- Frameworks for Conflict and Collaboration
- Social-Ecological Systems Approach
- Resilience in Social-Ecological Systems
- Environmental Conflict Frameworks
Schedule: (VIRTUAL) November 9th – December 14th 2021: Tuesdays, 5:30 – 8:00pm ET unless otherwise indicated*
Session 1: Tuesday, November 9 – Introduction to the Workshop; Trends, Themes, & Concepts for understanding Biodiversity & Ecosystems
Session 2: Tuesday, November 16th – Frameworks for Understanding Social-Ecological Systems
Session 3: Tuesday, November 23rd – Exploring Conflict and Biodiversity
Session 4: Tuesday, November 30th – Collaborative Environmental Conflict Management
Session 5: Tuesday, December 7th - Deep-Dive on Planning; Introduction to planning toolkits
Session 6: Tuesday, December 14th - New Frontiers in Collaborative Biodiversity Conservation
Instructor Bio:
Joshua Fisher is the director of the Advanced Consortium on Cooperation, Conflict and Complexity (AC4), as well as an adjunct faculty member at Columbia University. Josh Fisher received his PhD in Conflict Analysis and Resolution from George Mason University, where he studied the ecological drivers of armed conflict. His work coupled geospatial statistics, remote sensing, and econometric modeling to develop spatially explicit forecast models of the likelihood of armed conflict. He received his MS from Utah State University in Political Science and his BS in International Law and Environmental Policy. In addition to his academic work, Dr. Fisher has worked in sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America on environmental management and poverty reduction. He has worked with conservation organizations, private sector firms, and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management on natural resource governance and biodiversity conservation issues. Dr. Fisher's current work focuses on natural resource management and governance as tools for conflict