TY - JOUR
T1 - Linking science and decision making to promote an ecology for the city
T2 - practices and opportunities
AU - Grove, J. Morgan
AU - Childers, Daniel
AU - Galvin, Michael
AU - Hines, Sarah
AU - Muñoz‐erickson, Tischa
AU - Svendsen, Erika S.
N1 - Funding Information:
Most of the authors are members of and received support from the Urban Sustainability Research Coordination Network (National Science Foundation Grant No. 1140070). Childers received support from the Central Arizona-Phoenix Long-Term Ecological Research Program (National Science Foundation Grant No. DEB-1027188). Grove received support from the Baltimore Ecosystem Study Long-Term Ecological Research Program (National Science Foundation Grant No. DEB-1027188). Grove, Galvin, Hines, Muñoz-Erickson, and Svendsen received support from the USDA Forest Service. Three anonymous reviewers provided extremely helpful suggestions for how to improve our initial submission. In particular, comments regarding Pasteur’s quadrant caused us to propose Fleming’s quadrant and its important role in advancing sustainability science and applications.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2016, © 2016 Grove et al.
PY - 2016/9/1
Y1 - 2016/9/1
N2 - To promote urban sustainability and resilience, there is an increasing demand for actionable science that links science and decision making based on social–ecological knowledge. Approaches, frameworks, and practices for such actionable science are needed and have only begun to emerge. We propose that approaches based on the co‐design and co‐production of knowledge can play an essential role to meet this demand. Although the antecedents for approaches to the co‐design and co‐production of knowledge are decades old, the integration of science and practice to advance urban sustainability and resilience that we present is different in several ways. These differences include the disciplines needed, diversity and number of actors involved, and the technological infrastructures that facilitate local‐to‐global connections. In this article, we discuss how the new requirements and possibilities for co‐design, co‐production, and practical use of social–ecological research can be used as an ecology for the city to promote urban sustainability and resilience. While new technologies are part of the solution, traditional approaches also remain important. Using our urban experiences with long‐term, place‐based research from several U.S. Long‐Term Ecological Research sites and U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service Urban Field Stations, we describe a dynamic framework for linking research with decisions. We posit that this framework, coupled with a user‐defined, theory‐based approach to science, is instrumental to advance both practice and science. Ultimately, cities are ideal places for integrating basic science and decision making, facilitating flows of information through networks, and developing sustainable and resilient solutions and futures.
AB - To promote urban sustainability and resilience, there is an increasing demand for actionable science that links science and decision making based on social–ecological knowledge. Approaches, frameworks, and practices for such actionable science are needed and have only begun to emerge. We propose that approaches based on the co‐design and co‐production of knowledge can play an essential role to meet this demand. Although the antecedents for approaches to the co‐design and co‐production of knowledge are decades old, the integration of science and practice to advance urban sustainability and resilience that we present is different in several ways. These differences include the disciplines needed, diversity and number of actors involved, and the technological infrastructures that facilitate local‐to‐global connections. In this article, we discuss how the new requirements and possibilities for co‐design, co‐production, and practical use of social–ecological research can be used as an ecology for the city to promote urban sustainability and resilience. While new technologies are part of the solution, traditional approaches also remain important. Using our urban experiences with long‐term, place‐based research from several U.S. Long‐Term Ecological Research sites and U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service Urban Field Stations, we describe a dynamic framework for linking research with decisions. We posit that this framework, coupled with a user‐defined, theory‐based approach to science, is instrumental to advance both practice and science. Ultimately, cities are ideal places for integrating basic science and decision making, facilitating flows of information through networks, and developing sustainable and resilient solutions and futures.
KW - Baltimore
KW - New York City
KW - Phoenix
KW - San Juan
KW - Special Feature: An Ecology in, of, and for the City
KW - co‐design
KW - co‐production
KW - ecology for cities
KW - long‐term ecological research
KW - social–ecological
KW - transdisciplinary
KW - urban
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U2 - 10.1002/ehs2.1239
DO - 10.1002/ehs2.1239
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84990923127
SN - 2096-4129
VL - 2
JO - Ecosystem Health and Sustainability
JF - Ecosystem Health and Sustainability
IS - 9
M1 - e01239
ER -