ExCASES mission: Emerging Ecologies: A Guide for the Perplexed

Research team

David Bavin (project lead) – National Trust

Siobhan Vye – National Trust

Sicily Fiennes – National Trust

Claire Collins – National Trust

Bryony Aitchison – National Trust

Matthew Heard – National Trust

Sarah Crowley – University of Exeter

Theme

ExCASES missions provide short, intense periods of focus towards issues communicated as priorities for RENEW partner organisations and external stakeholders. The ExCASES team work collaboratively with people across different sectors and disciplines, co-designing research and participatory processes to generate empowering outcomes for people and the environment. 

Aims

Conservationists face a bewildering range of complex, interconnected challenges – what is sometimes referred to as a ‘polycrisis’. Science is evolving in response to these challenges, with the emergence and increasing prominence of approaches that propose alternatives to mainstream conservation paradigms. These ‘emerging ecologies’ are, however, largely described and debated within academia, with little translation for practitioners and policymakers. It is crucial that those delivering conservation on the ground have access to the latest critical thinking around how we, as a community, can effectively navigate biodiversity renewal within a complex and rapidly changing socio-political and ecological context.

This mission aims to:

• Identify a selection of emerging ecologies, explaining where they come from and what they mean;
• Provide an overview of how they interact with each other and existing approaches to conservation;
• Provide guidance on how they could be considered, applied, and/or incorporated into conservation strategies.

Approach

This mission began with a literature review of emerging ecologies to identify which are salient in current academic literature. Alongside this, we completed a scoping exercise with stakeholders in the RENEW community to ensure that practitioner perspectives and emergent approaches to conservation on the ground were captured and considered. We are now writing an academic paper and producing accessible guidance tailored to a broad audience.

Next Steps

Our paper and guidance for practitioners will be published here once published. We hope that the guidance will support conservation approaches in delivery organisations.

Outputs

Mission outputs will be linked here when published.