| 1. |
- Andersson, Erik, 1978-, et al.
(författare)
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From urban ecology to urban enquiry : How to build cumulative and context-sensitive understandings
- 2024
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Ingår i: Ambio. - 0044-7447 .- 1654-7209. ; 53:6, s. 813-825
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This paper positions urban ecology as increasingly conversant with multiple perspectives and methods for understanding the functions and qualities of diverse cities and urban situations. Despite progress in the field, we need clear pathways for positioning, connecting and synthesising specific knowledge and to make it speak to more systemic questions about cities and the life within them. These pathways need to be able to make use of diverse sources of information to better account for the diverse relations between people, other species and the ecological, social, cultural, economic, technical and increasingly digital structures that they are embedded in. Grounded in a description of the systemic knowledge needed, we propose five complementary and often connected approaches for building cumulative systemic understandings, and a framework for connecting and combining different methods and evidence. The approaches and the framework help position urban ecology and other fields of study as entry points to further advance interdisciplinary synthesis and open up new fields of research.
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| 2. |
- Chester, Mikhail V., et al.
(författare)
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Sensemaking for entangled urban social, ecological, and technological systems in the Anthropocene
- 2023
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Ingår i: npj Urban Sustainability. - 2661-8001. ; 3:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Our urban systems and their underlying sub-systems are designed to deliver only a narrow set of human-centered services, with little or no accounting or understanding of how actions undercut the resilience of social-ecological-technological systems (SETS). Embracing a SETS resilience perspective creates opportunities for novel approaches to adaptation and transformation in complex environments. We: i) frame urban systems through a perspective shift from control to entanglement, ii) position SETS thinking as novel sensemaking to create repertoires of responses commensurate with environmental complexity (i.e., requisite complexity), and iii) describe modes of SETS sensemaking for urban system structures and functions as basic tenets to build requisite complexity. SETS sensemaking is an undertaking to reflexively bring sustained adaptation, anticipatory futures, loose-fit design, and co-governance into organizational decision-making and to help reimagine institutional structures and processes as entangled SETS.
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| 3. |
- Frantzeskaki, Niki, et al.
(författare)
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A transformative shift in urban ecology toward a more active and relevant future for the field and for cities
- 2024
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Ingår i: Ambio. - 0044-7447 .- 1654-7209. ; 53:6, s. 871-889
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This paper builds on the expansion of urban ecology from a biologically based discipline—ecology in the city—to an increasingly interdisciplinary field—ecology of the city—to a transdisciplinary, knowledge to action endeavor—an ecology for and with the city. We build on this “prepositional journey” by proposing a transformative shift in urban ecology, and we present a framework for how the field may continue this shift. We conceptualize that urban ecology is in a state of flux, and that this shift is needed to transform urban ecology into a more engaged and action based field, and one that includes a diversity of actors willing to participate in the future of their cities. In this transformative shift, these actors will engage, collaborate, and participate in a continuous spiral of knowledge → action → knowledge spiral and back to knowledge loop, with the goal of co producing sustainable and resilient solutions to myriad urban challenges. Our framework for this transformative shift includes three pathways: (1) a repeating knowledge → action → knowledge spiral of ideas, information, and solutions produced by a diverse community of agents of urban change working together in an “urban sandbox”; (2) incorporation of a social–ecological–technological systems framework in this spiral and expanding the spiral temporally to include the “deep future,” where future scenarios are based on a visioning of seemingly unimaginable or plausible future states of cities that are sustainable and resilient; and (3) the expansion of the spiral in space, to include rural areas and places that are not yet cities. The three interrelated pathways that define the transformative shift demonstrate the power of an urban ecology that has moved beyond urban systems science and into a realm where collaborations among diverse knowledges and voices are working together to understand cities and what is urban while producing sustainable solutions to contemporary challenges and envisioning futures of socially, ecologically, and technologically resilient cities. We present case study examples of each of the three pathways that make up this transformative shift in urban ecology and discuss both limitations and opportunities for future research and action with this transdisciplinary broadening of the field.
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| 4. |
- Grilo, Filipa, et al.
(författare)
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A trait-based conceptual framework to examine urban biodiversity, socio-ecological filters, and ecosystem services linkages
- 2022
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Ingår i: npj Urban Sustainability. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2661-8001. ; 2
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Forskningsöversikt (refereegranskat)abstract
- Maximizing the functional performance of urban green infrastructure is important to deliver critical ecosystem services that support human well-being. However, urban ecosystems are impacted by social and ecological filters that affect biodiversity, shaping how species’ traits are functionally expressed, thus affecting ecosystem services supply. Our Social–Ecological Traits Framework addresses the impacts of socio-ecological systems on the phenotypic expression of traits and ecosystem services delivery. This functional approach to examining the supply of ecosystem services can improve the incorporation of biodiversity knowledge in urban planning decisions for maximizing the effectiveness of ecosystem services as nature-based solutions under multiple types of social and environmental change.
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| 5. |
- Hoover, Fushcia-Ann, et al.
(författare)
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Why go green? Comparing rationales and planning criteria for green infrastructure in US city plans
- 2023
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Ingår i: Landscape and Urban Planning. - 0169-2046 .- 1872-6062. ; 237
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Green infrastructure is an increasingly popular urban sustainability strategy, widely promoted for its ability to provide multiple benefits. We examined 120 planning documents from 19 U.S. cities to identify if and how the stated benefits that cities use within their rationales for green infrastructure programs (rationale statements) align with the criteria used to site green infrastructure at the neighborhood scale (siting statements). Our findings suggest that many of the desired benefits stated in the rationales for green infrastructure lack corresponding and specific siting criteria. This was particularly evident for rationale statements concerning social and cultural ecosystem services, seemingly because certain benefits, especially those related to stormwater management, are prioritized over other green infrastructure services. While multiple benefits remain a dominant rationale for green infrastructure in the cities analyzed, including stormwater management, social cohesion, and biodiversity benefits, siting criteria were dominated by stormwater management, available locations, and other logistical considerations. These findings indicate a large-scale misalignment between the multifunctional ideal of urban green infrastructure and the procedures used to implement green infrastructure programs. We conclude with a discussion of how siting criteria and processes can be elaborated to deliver the desired benefits of green infrastructure.
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| 6. |
- Pickett, Steward T. A., et al.
(författare)
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Shifting forward : Urban ecology in perspective
- 2024
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Ingår i: Ambio. - 0044-7447 .- 1654-7209. ; 53:6, s. 890-897
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The world has become urban; cities increasingly shape our worldviews, relation to other species, and the large-scale, long-term decisions we make. Cities are nature, but they need to align better with other ecosystems to avoid accelerating climate change and loss of biodiversity. We need a science to guide urban development across the diverse realities of global cities. This need can be met, in part, by shifts in urban ecology and its linkages to related sciences. This perspective is a “synthesis of syntheses”, consolidating ideas from the other articles in the Special Section. It re-examines the role of urban ecology, and explores its integration with other disciplines that study cities. We conclude by summarizing the next steps in the ongoing shift in urban ecology, which is fast becoming an integral part of urban studies.
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| 7. |
- Pickett, Steward T. A., et al.
(författare)
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The relational shift in urban ecology : From place and structures to multiple modes of coproduction for positive urban futures
- 2024
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Ingår i: Ambio. - 0044-7447 .- 1654-7209. ; 53:6, s. 845-870
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This perspective emerged from ongoing dialogue among ecologists initiated by a virtual workshop in 2021. A transdisciplinary group of researchers and practitioners conclude that urban ecology as a science can better contribute to positive futures by focusing on relationships, rather than prioritizing urban structures. Insights from other relational disciplines, such as political ecology, governance, urban design, and conservation also contribute. Relationality is especially powerful given the need to rapidly adapt to the changing social and biophysical drivers of global urban systems. These unprecedented dynamics are better understood through a relational lens than traditional structural questions. We use three kinds of coproduction—of the social-ecological world, of science, and of actionable knowledge—to identify key processes of coproduction within urban places. Connectivity is crucial to relational urban ecology. Eight themes emerge from the joint explorations of the paper and point toward social action for improving life and environment in urban futures.
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