Negotiating wilder nature: developing a views-of-nature typology

Abstract

Communication is an integral part of landscape management, and effective dialogue across views of nature and knowledge systems is needed for sustainable transformations. To allow for a plurality of biodiversity management practices, the ability to recognise and reflect on diverging management approaches and attitudes is needed to facilitate a dialogue between holders of conflicting visions. This article offers a typology that helps identify and understand competing discourses, or ‘nature arguments’, which actively shape what can (or cannot) be thought of as reasonable management strategies to accommodate biodiversity. We explore nature arguments anchored in fundamentally different assumptions about what is right, appreciated or true, and identify three different ideal types. In literature, web-pages, public debates and professional journals, we see a trend in views of nature towards ‘a wilder paradigm’, challenging existing approaches to biodiversity accommodation. Comprehension of the different nature views, including one’s own, and a simultaneous awareness of ‘persuasive powers’, can help the facilitation of a difficult and sometimes heated negotiation.