This research focuses on the challenges and opportunities facing local governance agents in advancing an ecosystem approach to conceptualizing and governing community health in Norfolk County, Ontario. Norfolk County is a rural, agriculturally-based community dependent upon tobacco production. This industry has collapsed, triggering widespread socioeconomic impacts and community health pressures. The government is searching for alternative modes of economic development and tensions are high with respect to the direction and nature of these developments. Some citizens are concerned about the security of their rural livelihoods. Others are concerned about ecological integrity. Still others are convinced of the need for aggressive economic growth. Local decision-makers are struggling to meet all of these requirements. An ecosystem approach views health as part of the broader socio-ecological system, recognizing that health outcomes are by-products of complex biophysical, social, political and economic system interactions at nested spatial and temporal scales. The approach contrasts with conventional health models, which tend to be reactionary, narrowly focused, and short-sighted. Such models are typical of the hierarchical, technocratic nature of public administration which renders decision-making structures and processes ill equipped to deal with complex problems. More systemic, integrated, participatory and collaborative approaches to decision-making are needed in order to better address the complexities involved in facilitating healthy and sustainable community development. Additionally, governance agents must also be able to embrace and navigate these evolving approaches to health conceptualization and governance. An investigation into Norfolk County grounds this analysis by revealing the challenges and opportunities facing local governance agents in advancing an ecosystem approach. The case study research effectively tests the utility and feasibility of the ecosystem approach through a qualitative analysis. The research contributes criteria required for advancing an ecosystem approach to community health governance and practice and empirically tests them within the context of Norfolk County.

Environ 15 % des terres émergées mondiales sont protégées d’une manière ou d’une autre. Conflits homme/faune, prédation du bétail, pertes agricoles, braconnages divers, la liste des tensions entre aires protégées Africaines et leurs périphéries est longue. Ceux-ci peuvent être vus comme des « problèmes pernicieux », caractérisés par la présence simultanée de valeurs culturelles divergentes et de nombreuses incertitudes sociales ou scientifiques. L’approche constructiviste des sciences « post normales », aborde la réalité comme le résultats d’une construction sociale, et reconnait donc l’existence d’une pluralité de réalités. La participation d’acteurs locaux dans nos démarches scientifiques permet de prendre en compte ces réalités. Cette thèse est focalisée sur les interactions entre la Foret de Sikumi (FS), une aire protégée Zimbabwéenne, et les communautés rurales vivant à sa périphérie. Nous nous sommes intéressés aux tensions liées aux pratiques de conduite du bétail. Nous retrouvons là les caractéristiques des problèmes pernicieux : difficulté à identifier le problème de manière définitive ; incertitudes scientifiques et sociales ; valeurs culturelles conflictuelles et liens avec d’autres problèmes. Pour comprendre et modéliser les interactions entre acteurs à travers la conduite du bétail, nous avons co-construit un outil de recherche participatif sous la forme d’un Jeu de Rôle (JdR) nous permettant d’étudier les stratégies locales de conduite du bétail. Nos travaux montrent comment l’utilisation d’environnements virtuels permettent aux chercheurs de s’extraire du paradoxe majeur des problèmes pernicieux : toute action modifie le système et donc le problème, sans jamais le régler. La participation d’acteurs locaux nous a permis de redessiner une vision commune des incertitudes sociales et scientifiques au travers de processus de négociation. Nous montrons comment le résultat de notre effort collectif dépasse les ambitions premières et la manière dont le chercheur doit nécessairement perdre en partie le contrôle de l’objet construit au profit des partenaires locaux. Finalement, nous exprimons notre conviction que des approches comme la nôtre sont pertinentes pour la gestion des aires protégées, particulièrement avec l’émergence des parcs transfrontaliers en Afrique australe. / About 15 % of the world’s terrestrial area has some kind of protected status. Human-wildlife conflicts, crops raiding, livestock predation, poaching, illegal natural resources harvesting, the list of issues taking place at the edge of African protected areas is long. These issues are wicked problems, characterized by scientific uncertainties and involve conflictive cultural values and interconnections with other problems. The constructivist approach of post-normal sciences (PNS) assumes that reality is socially constructed. Studying and addressing wicked problems therefore requires insights on local stakeholders’ perspectives. In this PhD we focused on interactions between the Sikumi Forest (SF), a Zimbabwean protected area, and the rural communities living at its periphery. More particularly, we focused on the tensions related to cattle herding practices. The situation shows characteristic of wicked problems: the difficulty to frame a precise problem; high uncertainties about the studied SES; incomplete scientific knowledge; competing cultural values; and the interconnection to other problems. In order to understand cattle-related interactions between rural communities and the protected area, we co-designed a participatory research tool taking the form of a role-playing game (RPG) enabling us to elicit cattle herding strategies. The RPG was used with naïve villagers (villagers who were note involved in the co-design). This PhD thesis shows how the use of virtual worlds allows researchers to cope with the catch-22 of wicked problems, that is that any action transforms the problem and brings us “back to the beginning”. The co-design of the research tool allows to deal with one of the major characteristics of wicked problems: uncertainties. In the participatory design of the RGP, these were collectively reframed through negotiation. Participation led to the appropriation of the co-designed object by local actors, as a result our project went beyond the initial ambitions and produced a multi-dimensional tool of which we necessarily lose control. In a wider perspective, we believe that with the emergence of Transfrontier conservation in Africa, participatory approaches like ours can provide alternative ways to study and manage coexistence between protected areas and their peripheries.

Esta tese tem como tema o conjunto de recursos comuns naturais e os formatos de gestão que permitem novos sistemas de governança nos espaços rurais no entorno de áreas protegidas. Como questão central, busca responder como os diversos atores afetados pelo processo de criação de uma área protegida organizam-se e desenvolvem ações coletivas para a gestão dos recursos comuns no entorno destas áreas. Têm-se como hipótese que há uma aproximação entre os atores conforme seus objetivos em relação aos recursos comuns naturais, o que remete a configuração de um novo sistema de governança que propicia o desenvolvimento de ações coletivas próprias de gestão dos recursos comuns. Outra hipótese é que a ação do Estado, por meio de políticas governamentais, apresenta efeito limitado na coordenação das ações e na promoção do consenso entre os atores. Desta forma, o objetivo deste trabalho é estudar a ação coletiva dos atores sociais na gestão dos recursos comuns no entorno do Parque Nacional da Serra da Bodoquena (PNSB), o qual abrange áreas dos municípios de Bodoquena, Bonito, Jardim e Porto Murtinho no Estado de Mato Grosso do Sul. Por meio da abordagem institucional no estudo da auto-organização e autogovernança em situações de gestão do conjunto de recursos comuns desenvolvida por Elinor Ostrom, buscou-se a fundamentação teórica para explicação dos fenômenos e problemática identificada. Metodologicamente trata-se de uma pesquisa de campo e documental, a qual apresenta um delineamento de estudo de caso small-N, aplicando-se o framework para análise de sistemas sócio-ecológicos (SES), procedendo-se também uma sistemática análise documental próxima à meta-análise. Conclui-se que a esperada mobilização de grupos de indivíduos em busca de objetivos comuns encontra duas vertentes neste caso, com os participantes da arena de ação criando distintos objetivos e distintas ações coletivas de acordo com seus interesses, produtivos ou ambientais, sendo que governo dos comuns permanece sob o controle dos interesses produtivistas arraigados na cultura de produção agropecuária local. / This thesis has as its theme the common natural resources and the management models that allow new governance systems in the rural areas in the surrounding of protected areas. As central question, seeks to answer how the various actors affected by the process of creation of a protected area organise themselves and develop collective actions for the management of common natural resources in the surroundings of this area. There has been hypothesised that there is a closeness among the actors as their goals in relation to common natural resources, which refers to setting up a new governance system that promotes the development of collective actions specific to the management of common resources. Another hypothesis is that state action, through government policies, has limited effect on the coordination and promotion toward a consensus among actors. In this sense, the objective of this work is to study the collective action of social actors in the management of common natural resources in the surroundings of the National Park of Serra da Bodoquena (PNSB), which covers areas of the municipalities of Bodoquena, Bonito, Jardim and Porto Murtinho in the State of Mato Grosso do Sul. Based on institutional approach for the study of the self-organisation and self-governance in common-pool resources situations developed by Elinor Ostrom, the investigation sought the theoretical explanation of phenomena and problem identified. Methodologically this is a documentary and field research, which has a feature of small-N case of study, proceeding an applying of the framework for analysing social-ecological systems (SES), conducting also a systematic analysis of documents close to a meta-analysis. The conclusions point out that the expected mobilisation of groups of individuals in the pursuit of common goals is twofold in this case, with the participants of the action arena creating different goals and different collective actions according to their interests, environmental or productive, and that the govern of the commons remains under the control of agribusiness interests rooted in the culture of the local agricultural production.

Le concept de services écosystémiques est de plus en plus utilisé par différentes disciplines scientifiques et pris en compte dans les sphères politiques pour attirer l'attention sur les bénéfices que l'Homme reçoit des écosystèmes. Ce concept mène à étudier les liens complexes entre l'homme et son environnement. Cependant, la majorité des recherches actuelles restent théorique et peu de cas d'étude mettent à l'épreuve ce concept dans une démarche transdisciplinaire. Cette thèse à donc pour objectif principal de combler ce manque en explorant et analysant les dynamiques et processus des services écosystémiques en terme d'offre et de demande, y compris les effets de rétroactions, par une approche socio-écologique dans un contexte de changement planétaire. A cette fin, une étude transdisciplinaire a été conduite sur les prairies subalpines de la commune de Villar d'Arène (Hautes-Alpes) où l'élevage ovin et bovin domine. Des techniques de modélisations statistiques et de systèmes d'informations géographiques ont été combinées pour analyser la fourniture potentielle de services écosystémiques, conduisant à une cartographie de ceux-ci à l'échelle du paysage. La demande en services écosystémiques à quant à elle été étudiée par l'intermédiaire d'entretiens individuels et de groupes avec les acteurs locaux ainsi que des jeux de rôle avec les éleveurs de la commune. La co-construction de scénarios prospectifs avec les acteurs locaux ont permis d'étudier l'évolution de l'offre et la demande en services à un horizon 2030. / The ecosystem service (ES) concept is increasingly used in different scientific disciplines and is spreading into policy and business circles to draw attention to the benefits that people receive from biodiversity and ecosystems. Nevertheless, while the number of case studies considering various dimensions of the interactions between ecosystems and land use via ES has been steadily increasing, integrated research addressing interrelationships between biodiversity, ES and land use has remained mostly theoretical. This thesis aims through a socio-ecological approach to understand: (1) Which ES are potentially delivered given ecological dynamics, (2) how these ES are perceived by stakeholders in terms of value and knowledge, (3) how human management affects ES delivery, and (4) how ES are taken into account in land management decisions, thereby considering feedbacks from ecosystem to the land use system through ES. To address these questions, an interdisciplinary study was conducted on Villar d'Arène (French Alps) a municipality where the subalpine landscape is shaped by extensive mountain livestock farming. Statistical modelling and geographical information systems where combined to analyse the determinants of the spatial distribution of biodiversity and ES within the landscape using ecological (including plant functional traits), biophysical and land-use data. The following ES were mapped: agronomic value, aesthetic value, water quality, carbon storage, soil fertility, soil moisture, conservation of plant diversity and pollination. These allowed us to quantify trade-offs and synergies in the current landscape and to identify key management types supporting multifunctionality. The dynamics of ES was projected under four different scenarios integrating climatic, socio-economic and land-use changes, which were developed using a participative approach with regional experts and local farmers. Analyses of projected scenario impacts showed that ES synergies and trade-offs evolve differently when considering direct effects of climate on ecosystems, and/or their indirect effects through farmers adaptive responses. Interviews with local stakeholders (experts from nature conservation and agricultural extension, farmers and inhabitants) of mountain grasslands showed that the ES concept is still relatively unknown in explicit terms. Nevertheless after defining ES to interviewees, they expressed a variety of relevant interests and knowledge. Although all stakeholders valued a common set of ecosystem services (agronomic value, aesthetic value, water quality, and conservation of plant diversity), we identified negative and positive representations of the effects of grassland management on ecosystem services, depending on stakeholders perceptions of the relationships between soil fertility and biodiversity, and biodiversity and the other services. Finally, a role-playing game explored how ES cognition mediated environmental feedbacks on farmers' behaviours. Results emphasized the influence of other factors such as socio-economic or climatic context, topographic constraints, social value of farming or farmer individual and household characteristics, on the link between ES and land-management decisions. This case study demonstrates the interest of an integrated approach decomposing the feedback loop from ecosystems to land use when studying ES for scientific or policy purposes.

Esta tese tem como tema o conjunto de recursos comuns naturais e os formatos de gestão que permitem novos sistemas de governança nos espaços rurais no entorno de áreas protegidas. Como questão central, busca responder como os diversos atores afetados pelo processo de criação de uma área protegida organizam-se e desenvolvem ações coletivas para a gestão dos recursos comuns no entorno destas áreas. Têm-se como hipótese que há uma aproximação entre os atores conforme seus objetivos em relação aos recursos comuns naturais, o que remete a configuração de um novo sistema de governança que propicia o desenvolvimento de ações coletivas próprias de gestão dos recursos comuns. Outra hipótese é que a ação do Estado, por meio de políticas governamentais, apresenta efeito limitado na coordenação das ações e na promoção do consenso entre os atores. Desta forma, o objetivo deste trabalho é estudar a ação coletiva dos atores sociais na gestão dos recursos comuns no entorno do Parque Nacional da Serra da Bodoquena (PNSB), o qual abrange áreas dos municípios de Bodoquena, Bonito, Jardim e Porto Murtinho no Estado de Mato Grosso do Sul. Por meio da abordagem institucional no estudo da auto-organização e autogovernança em situações de gestão do conjunto de recursos comuns desenvolvida por Elinor Ostrom, buscou-se a fundamentação teórica para explicação dos fenômenos e problemática identificada. Metodologicamente trata-se de uma pesquisa de campo e documental, a qual apresenta um delineamento de estudo de caso small-N, aplicando-se o framework para análise de sistemas sócio-ecológicos (SES), procedendo-se também uma sistemática análise documental próxima à meta-análise. Conclui-se que a esperada mobilização de grupos de indivíduos em busca de objetivos comuns encontra duas vertentes neste caso, com os participantes da arena de ação criando distintos objetivos e distintas ações coletivas de acordo com seus interesses, produtivos ou ambientais, sendo que governo dos comuns permanece sob o controle dos interesses produtivistas arraigados na cultura de produção agropecuária local. / This thesis has as its theme the common natural resources and the management models that allow new governance systems in the rural areas in the surrounding of protected areas. As central question, seeks to answer how the various actors affected by the process of creation of a protected area organise themselves and develop collective actions for the management of common natural resources in the surroundings of this area. There has been hypothesised that there is a closeness among the actors as their goals in relation to common natural resources, which refers to setting up a new governance system that promotes the development of collective actions specific to the management of common resources. Another hypothesis is that state action, through government policies, has limited effect on the coordination and promotion toward a consensus among actors. In this sense, the objective of this work is to study the collective action of social actors in the management of common natural resources in the surroundings of the National Park of Serra da Bodoquena (PNSB), which covers areas of the municipalities of Bodoquena, Bonito, Jardim and Porto Murtinho in the State of Mato Grosso do Sul. Based on institutional approach for the study of the self-organisation and self-governance in common-pool resources situations developed by Elinor Ostrom, the investigation sought the theoretical explanation of phenomena and problem identified. Methodologically this is a documentary and field research, which has a feature of small-N case of study, proceeding an applying of the framework for analysing social-ecological systems (SES), conducting also a systematic analysis of documents close to a meta-analysis. The conclusions point out that the expected mobilisation of groups of individuals in the pursuit of common goals is twofold in this case, with the participants of the action arena creating different goals and different collective actions according to their interests, environmental or productive, and that the govern of the commons remains under the control of agribusiness interests rooted in the culture of the local agricultural production.

No Nordeste do Brasil, o estuário do Rio São Francisco apresenta extensas áreas de manguezais (32 km2) cujos recursos são utilizados por populações humanas. Este estudo considerou a metodologia de sistemas sócio-ecológicos complexos para analisar a pesca nos manguezais desse estuário, com ênfase no caranguejo Ucides cordatus. Por meio da integração de dados de diferentes áreas (etnobiologia, levantamentos socioeconômicos, estrutura populacional do caranguejo, características da vegetação, arranjo espacial da paisagem, sensoriamento remoto e geoprocessamento) em uma análise multicritério foi determina e mapeada a aptidão dos manguezais para a conservação e a pesca dessa espécie. Uma diversidade de recursos pesqueiros do manguezal (por exemplo, peixes, caranguejos e moluscos), constitui a principal base da economia de subsistência local, em que o caranguejo U. cordatus é o mais importante. As populações locais possuem um vasto conhecimento sobre o tamanho populacional e corporal, ciclo de vida, diferenciação sexual e habitat dessa espécie, e aplicam práticas conservacionistas no uso da redinha. A estrutura populacional do caranguejo revelou um alto potencial pesqueiro, com maior abundância de caranguejos de tamanho comercial do que os de tamanho não comercial. Os manguezais mais aptos para a conservação de U. cordatus (9,4 km2) estão localizados próximos à foz e apresentam alta abundância de caranguejos não comerciais, baixa densidade de caranguejos comerciais e baixo grau de utilização para a pesca. Os manguezais mais aptos para a pesca (10,2 km2) estão distantes da foz e apresentam alta abundância de caranguejos de tamanho comercial, baixa densidade de caranguejos em tamanho não comercial, caranguejos grandes, médio a alto grau de uso e estão próximos aos povoados. Os mapas de aptidão gerados podem auxiliar as agências governamentais no delineamento de áreas extrativistas e de exclusão da pesca, como sugerido no Plano Nacional de Gestão para o Uso Sustentável do Caranguejo-uçá / In Northeastern Brazil, the São Francisco River Estuary comprises a significant mangrove area (32 km2) used by local human populations. This study considered the framework of socio-ecological systems to analyze the mangrove fishery in this estuary, with emphasis on the crab Ucides cordatus. By the integration of data from different fields (etnobiology and socio-economic surveys, crab population structure, vegetation features, landscape arrangement, remote sensing and geoprocessing) in a multi-criteria analysis, we determined and mapped the suitability of the mangroves for the conservation and fishery of this species. We found that a diversity of mangrove fisheries (e.g. fish, crabs and mollusks) constitute the main base of the local subsistence economy, wherein the Ucides cordatus is the most important. The local populations have a substantial knowledge about this crab population and body sizes, life cycle, sexual differentiation, behavior and habitat, and apply conservation practices in the use of the \"redinha\". The population structure of the crab U. cordatus revealed a high fishery potential, with higher abundance (frequency and density) of crabs in commercial size than the non-commercial sized crabs. The mangroves more suitable for the crab conservation (9.4 km2) are those close to the river mouth, showing high abundance of non-commercial crabs, low density of commercial crabs and low degree of use for fishery. On the other hand, the mangroves more suitable for the crab fishery (10.2 km2) are those located far from to river mouth, showing high density and frequency of crabs in commercial size, low density of crabs in non-commercial size, big sized crabs, medium to high degree of use, and are close to the fishery villages. The maps of suitability can aid government agencies in delineating extractive and fishery exclusion areas, as stated by the Proposal of a National Management Plan for this crab, in order to achieve a sustainable fishery

Current approaches of anthropogenic impact on the ecosystems and ecosystem services are within the scope of this master's thesis. The aim of the thesis is, on the basis of current landscape classifications, landscape typologies, and their combination with approaches of ecosystem services classification, to appoint socio-ecological units as functional socio-ecological types of the territory. In other words, on the basis of classification listed, this thesis attempts to prove, that socio-ecological units are functional socio-ecological types of the territory, which should be given proper attention. Socio-ecological landscapes are defined according to degree of anthropogenic impact, selected socioeconomic characteristics, and selected ecosystem services. The thesis focuses on three of four categories of ecosystem services defined in Millennium Ecosystem Assessment - provisioning services, regulating services, and cultural services. As a methodology, the quantitative research was chosen. The research was carried out by data collection and the analysis of statistical data of Czech Statistical Office, Czech Office for Surveying, Mapping and Cadastre, and Statistical Yearbook of Soil Services. The thesis main finding is that social and ecological components of socio-ecological systems are in mutual...

Coastal socio-ecological systems face unprecedented challenges due to climate change, with impacts encompassing long-term, chronic changes and short-term extreme events. These events will impact society in many ways and prompt human responses that are extremely challenging to predict. This dissertation employs complex systems methods of agent-based modeling and machine learning to simulate the interactions between climatic stressors such as increased flooding and extreme weather and socio-economic aspects of coastal human systems. Escalating sea-level rise and intensified flooding has the potential to prompt relocation from flood-prone coastal areas. This can reduce flood exposure but also disconnect people from their homes and communities, sever longstanding social ties, and lower the tax base leading to difficulties in providing government services. Chapter 2 demonstrates a stochastic agent-based model to simulate human relocation influenced by flooding events, particularly focusing on the responses of rural and urban communities in coastal Virginia and Maryland. The findings indicate that a stochastic, bottom-up social system simulator is able to replicate top-down population projections and provide a baseline for assessing the impact of increasingly intense flooding. Chapter 3 leverages this model to assess how incorporating heterogeneity in relocation decisions across socio-economic groups impacts flood-induced relocation patterns. The results demonstrate how this heterogeneity leads to a decrease in low-income households, yet a rise in the proportion of elderly individuals in flood-prone regions by the end of the simulation period. Flood-prone areas also exhibit distinct income clusters at the end of simulation time horizon compared to simulations with a homogenous relocation likelihood. Lastly, Chapter 4 explores relationships between extreme weather and agricultural losses in the Delmarva Peninsula. Existing research on climatic impacts to agriculture largely focuses on changes to major crop yields, providing limited insights into impacts on diverse regional agricultural systems where human management and adaptation play a large role. By comparing various multistep modeling configurations and machine learning techniques, this work demonstrates that machine learning methods can accurately simulate and predict agricultural losses across the complex agricultural landscape that exists on the Delmarva peninsula. The multistep configurations developed in this work are able to address data imbalance and improve models' capacity to classify and estimate damage occurrence, which depends on multiple geographical, seasonal, and climatic factors. Collectively, this work demonstrates the potential for advanced modeling techniques to accurately replicate and simulate the impacts of climate on complex socio-ecological systems, providing insights that can ultimately support coastal adaptation. / Doctor of Philosophy / Coastal areas are facing increasing challenges from climate change, including rising sea levels and extreme weather conditions. This dissertation explores socio-economic consequences of these adverse environmental changes for coastal communities. Disruptive repetitive flooding due to exacerbated rise in sea levels is one of these consequences that may eventually leave some highly exposed coastal communities no alternative but migrating from their residences. Focusing on coastal Virginia and Maryland, Chapter 2 develops a data-informed model that can simulate individual relocation decisions and assess how they impact population changes and migration patterns. Chapter 3 employs this model to investigate how future changes in sea levels affect diverse socio-economic groups, their relocation decisions, and the resulting collective migration flows in flood-prone areas. We found that considering demographic differences leaves highly flood-prone areas with less low-income households, higher elderly individuals, and more economic clusters compared to simulations where these differences are not accounted for. Chapter 4 uses machine learning models to simulate the economic impact of extreme weather events as another manifestation of climate change on the agriculture in the Delmarva Peninsula. Through data-based modeling techniques, we identify the climatic conditions most responsible for agricultural losses and recognize modeling choices that enhance our predictive ability. Collectively, this dissertation demonstrates how sophisticated modeling techniques can be used to better understand the complex ways in which climate change will impact human society, with the ultimate goal of supporting adaptation strategies that can better address these impacts.

This thesis contributes to scholarship on applying the Capability Approach (CA) in the informal water sector in post-colonial cities in the Global South. It lays out helpful insights in the field of Sustainable Development Goal no. 6- clean water and sanitation in the backdrop of climate justice. This research aims to translate theoretical roots of the CA into meaningful participatory policy by using a case study approach complimented by different methods of qualitative data collection. The empirical findings are built on in-depth semi-structured interviews and focus-group discussions with participants from informal settlements in India and Indonesia, members of universities, NGOs, government organizations and peoples’ collectives. This study underscores that cities in the global south are complex and that to study them requires more epistemic diversity guided by a decolonial lens. It starts with a systematic literature review, followed by a purposive literature review. The reviews generated four themes: (i) Human needs, well-being and development; (ii) Social cohesion and community processes; (iii) Water security and psycho-social stress and (iv) Vulnerabilities, resilience and adaption. After which, three overarching theories guided the conceptual framework- Sen’s Capability Approach, Ostrom’s theory of the commons, and combined theories of socio-ecological resilience. Through its findings, it proposes the Capability Locus Pathway for Socio-Spatial Change, along with the concept of the Capability Space, to evaluate what transformative processes look like in informal urban spaces and what power communities have in terms of agency and opportunities to lead such collective action. / IDF-Global Challenges Research Fund

Achieving food security under climate change is one of the biggest challenges of the 21st century. The challenge becomes even greater when contextualised within our current limited understanding of how the food system functions as a complex, adaptive socio-ecological system, with food security as one of its outcomes. Adding climate change into this already complex and uncertain mix creates a ‘wicked problem’ that must be solved through the development of adaptive food governance. The thesis has 4 key aims: <ul><li>1. To move beyond an understanding of food security that is dependent solely on agricultural production, and therefore the reliance of future food security predictions on production data based on climate model inputs.</li><li>2. To ground the theoretical aspects of complex adaptive systems with empirical data from multi-level case studies.</li><li>3. To investigate the potential role of the private sector in food system futures.</li><li>4. To analyse food system dynamics across scales and levels.</li></ul> In order to realise these aims, a complex adaptive system (CAS) approach within the GECAFS food system framework is employed to multilevel case studies in South Africa and Brazil. Particular emphasis is placed on the role of the private sector and how these vital actors, comprising a powerful component of the global food system, can be mobilized towards building adaptive capacity for a more resilient food system. Critically, the private sector is often left out of academic discussions on adaptation, which tend to focus more on civil society and governmental capacity to adapt. This thesis provides novel insight into how the power of the private sector can be harnessed to build adaptive capacity. The findings of the thesis showed that applying CAS to issues of governance has three important implications: The first is that in a complex system, it is critical to maintain diversity. This can translate into appreciating a multiplicity of viewpoints in order to reflect a range of decision-making options. This finding makes the case for closer synergy between the public and private sectors around areas like product development and distribution that includes an emphasis on enhancing food security under climate change. In the developing country context, the inclusion of smallholders and local entrepreneurs is also vital for building adaptive capacity. In this sense, it is possible for business to help achieve development goals by developing the capacity of those most vulnerable to socio-economic and environmental shocks. Secondly, adapting to climate change and other environmental and economic pressures will require a shift in mind-set that embraces the uncertainty of the future: ‘managing for uncertainty rather than against it’. This entails a shift in governance mindset away from linear thinking to a decision-making paradigm that is more flexible to deal with unexpected shocks. The third implication for governance is the need to understand the complex interplay of multiple interlinking processes and drivers that function across many levels and sometimes have exponential positive feedbacks in the food system. Adaptive governance is an iterative process, but as more is learnt and information is retained in the system, the ideal is that the beneficial processes that lower inequality and increase food security will start to be reinforced over those that entrench the current inequality in the food system.