Managing Environmental Conflict: An Earth Institute Sustainability Primer

Conflicts over environmental issues arise from diverging interests and values among stakeholders. This book provides a primer on causes and solutions to such conflicts, offering a collaborative approach to managing environmental disputes. It emphasizes ongoing dialogue, analysis, action, and learning to bring stakeholders together for collective solutions. The primer examines why and how system dynamics can constrain or expand the possibility of constructive management of conflicts and features a case study from the Amazon Basin. Managing Environmental Conflict synthesizes knowledge, methods, and practices from consensus building, collaborative governance, complex adaptive systems science, environmental conflict resolution, and environmental peacebuilding.

Format: Hardback
Length: 216 pages
Publication date: 15 February 2022
Publisher: Columbia University Press

Environmental conflicts arise due to diverging interests and values among stakeholders, particularly over issues such as land use, natural resource management, and laws and regulations. This book serves as a primer on understanding the causes and solutions to these conflicts. It provides a comprehensive overview of the theory and practice of collaborative approaches to managing environmental disputes.

Joshua D. Fisher, the author, delves into the core concepts of collaborative conflict management and presents a clear, practical, and implementable framework for understanding and responding to environmental disputes. He outlines strategies to bring stakeholders together, emphasizing ongoing processes of dialogue, analysis, action, and learning. This collaborative approach aims to create new opportunities for stakeholders to better understand each other and the natural world, enabling more effective and context-appropriate environmental governance.

The primer examines why and how system dynamics can constrain or expand the possibility of constructive management of conflicts. It features a case study from the Amazon Basin, where local communities, extractive industry operators, conservationists, and land managers have often clashed over access to natural resources, illustrating how to adapt the conflict management framework to distinct contexts.

Managing Environmental Conflict is a comprehensive synthesis of knowledge, methods, and practices spanning consensus building, collaborative governance, complex adaptive systems science, environmental conflict resolution, and environmental peacebuilding. It offers valuable insights for academics and practitioners, including decision-makers, scientists, and conflict management professionals. By presenting this important and timely topic, the book contributes to advancing our understanding and addressing environmental conflicts in a more constructive and sustainable manner.

Dimension: 216 x 140 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780231196864