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This chapter summarizes the underlying concepts of the book including: (1) an introduction to systemic management as it emerges from published tenets of management, derived in part from the recognized need for both ecosystem- and biosphere-based applications, (2) a review of the motivation to reject current or conventional management and accept a preferable, more objective, alternative, (3) an introduction to some of the steps involved in systemic management as applied to the eastern Bering Sea, an example of the ecosystem component of systemic management that is developed at the end of each subsequent chapter, and (4) a summary and preview of the progression of concepts found in the remaining chapters. Two of these concepts are introduced in this chapter: (1) integrative patterns are reflective of the complexity behind their emergence and (2) objectivity can be achieved by changing the role of stakeholders from that of setting goals to that of asking management questions.

While genuine conservation measures tend to be a last resort the increasing number of fisheries crises in the 2^nd half of the 20^th century led to numerous innovations in fisheries management and the establishment of relatively effective institutions. This chapter describes the forces that fostered increased political action by non-commercial forces, the resulting period of conflict and gradual formation of coalitions to solve major problems in specific fisheries. It covers the politics of protecting charismatic megafauna, “rationalizing” fisheries through establishment of property rights, and the development of alternatives to MSY. Legitimacy and the need for co-management are also discussed in the final section.

This chapter sheds light on how the concept of ecosystem-based management (EBM) came into existence and why this shall be considered as a remedy to environmental problems. The concept of EBM is believed to have emerged due to deficient conventional policymaking systems. The conventional regulatory approach to environmental problems is considered to be a complex blend of local and national land-use and natural resource policies. On the other hand, the EBM approach is considered to be quite effective in curbing a wide range of environmental problems. Despite having various definitions, EBM is found to have three common elements: landscape-scale focus, collaborative planning that includes all stakeholders, and implementation that is flexible and adaptive.

Ecosystem-Based Management and Marine Protected Areas. Ecosystem-based management (EBM) can be seen as a comprehensive strategy that includes the concern about the sustainable yield of fish alongside the ecosystem impacts of fishing and the impacts of fisheries management on human communities. While preventing overfishing goes a long way toward reaching its objective, protecting sensitive habitats from damaging fishing gear and reducing or eliminating bycatch of birds, mammals, and turtles must be given their due importance. Consideration should also be given to the trophic knock-on effects of fishing for one species that may cause other species less or more abundant. Marine protected areas are still considered the magic key to EBM, but their impact on total fish abundance has rarely been evaluated.

Ecosystem-based management (EBM) is an integrated environmental management approach that focuses on sustaining and protecting ecosystems and promoting the sustainable use of natural resources. Most of the scholars and practitioners believe that the EBM approach has many such attributes that are similar to other environmental problem-solving approaches, but it is different when it comes to recognizing the scale at which the environmental problems are addressed and the nature of government involvement. EBM is considered to be the most effective approach in terms of protecting the environment and restoring the ecological health. To examine the effectiveness of EBM, this book examines several initiatives that have been taken to conserve and restore terrestrial or aquatic landscapes in the United States.

The seven different initiatives discussed in this book reflect that landscape-scale focus is an important and effective way to conserve and protect biological diversity. The comparative analysis of these seven cases shows that landscape-scale focus is a crucial method for the adoption of more protective policies and practices, and enables planners to adopt more comprehensive approaches to environmental problem-solving. This tool may also help coordination to form among different agencies and jurisdictions. As per the optimistic model of ecosystem-based management , an integrative scientific assessment can be put into practice with the help of landscape-scale focus, and that can ultimately make stakeholders and policymakers aware of the relationships among ecosystem elements and processes. Collaborative efforts of policymakers and stakeholders can formulate and implement innovative approaches and plans to environmental conservation and restoration. According to scientists, buffers between set-aside land and developed areas should be retained to ensure long-term biological effectiveness of the proposed reserves.

The San Francisco Bay estuary's tidal marshes play an important role in its ecosystem services for human society and the local economy. Next steps in implementation of the ecosystem services concept to the marsh conservation and restoration would be to move from general pronouncements about the tremendous benefits tidal marshes provide for society to credible, quantitative estimates of ecosystem service values that can be relatively easy to obtain and interpret, and incorporating such information into decision-making, business-conducting, and consumer-behavior realities. Preferably such estimates of ecosystem service values should be presented in an ecosystem-based management approach (EBM) that explicitly accounts for the interconnectedness within and among systems, recognizing the importance of interactions among many target species or key services and nontarget species and services. One such quantitative approach is the recently developed modeling suite InVEST, which is designed to address the principles of EBM, bringing together credible, useful models based on ecological production functions and economic valuation methods, with the intention of bringing biophysical and economic information about ecosystem services to bear on conservation and natural-resource decisions at an appropriate scale.

The Multiple Species Conservation Program (MSCP) is a comprehensive, long-term habitat conservation plan that focuses on the acquisition of a 172,000-acre preservation network of biological core areas and wildlife corridors over a 30-year period, in San Diego. The city and county of San Diego have acquired thousands of acres of land from the fund, raised through federal and state assistance, to conserve the biodiversity in the region. Although the MSCP adopts a collaborative, landscape-scale planning process that is based on the predictions of the optimistic model of ecosystem-based management (EBM), it has certain aspects which are more consistent with the pessimistic model of EBM. There are some aspects of the MSCP that reflect on its shortcomings. The preservation lacks buffering, and offers fewer habitats than its total suggested acreage. The major problem with the MSCP is its being development friendly.

What is the likelihood of science and technology progress for biodiversity from the sustainable development goals? This chapter argues that it is higher than it may seem as a result of scientific developments ready for wide application and a structure of biodiversity governance able to spread innovation. The chapter initially argues that there are three potential fields for innovation under the specific targets of the sustainable development goals: integration of biodiversity with other spheres, ecosystem-based management, and remote sensing. Next, it argues that innovation is likely because the biodiversity governance system has developed localized centers for developing innovation with a system for transferring those findings across scales. It focuses specifically on the importance of the National Biodiversity Strategies and Action Plans developed under the Convention on Biological Diversity, the expert systems developed at the international level, and the ability of international organizations to implement innovative approaches to biodiversity governance. The conclusion is that there is a high potential for innovation, but that taking action after the Aichi biodiversity targets end in 2020 will be key.

This chapter compares simple and complex models of ecosystem service provision and spatial distribution for carbon storage and sequestration and crop pollination. Carbon stock estimates from the two models agreed well across multiple scenarios of land use in the Willamette Basin, Oregon. Estimates diverged much farther into the future, with the simpler model providing a more conservative estimate. The results also showed good agreement between estimates of pollination levels of watermelon in the California Central Valley (R² = 0.99). Some divergence between estimates in the tails of the pollinator index distribution suggest that the simple model is most appropriate in landscapes where the pollinator community is not very diverse or where pollinators have similar habitat preferences. Managers selecting priority areas (represented by areas within the top quartile of service provision) for carbon or pollination investments would likely make the same decisions with either the simple or complex model, as the spatial patterns predicted by both simple and complex models aligned well. The question of whether simple or complex models better represent reality cannot be answered until ecosystem services become widely and regularly monitored.

We might not live in a sustainable age, but we’re living in the age of sustainability. The movement has gained a level of prominence in recent years that is difficult to dispute. The scholarly fields associated with sustainability have expanded dramatically; new tools and methods have appeared that help define, measure, and assess sustainability; and a broad range of organizations and communities have embraced the principles of sustainable living. Sustainability, in fact, has gone from marginal ecological idea to mainstream movement in a surprisingly short amount of time. We now see sustainability publicized at the supermarket, on university campuses, at the aquarium, in corporate headquarters, in government ministries, and in countless other places. A growing number of universities, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and corporations in the Western world possess an “office of sustainability”— replete with sustainability plans and guidebooks—but none have an “office of green radicalism” or an “office of the status quo.” In a sense, this environmental discourse has won out over rival conceptions of humanity’s relationship to the natural world. This chapter is an attempt to sketch out the different ways in which sustainability has gained a foothold in contemporary society. It is not meant to suggest that our world is sustainable. On the contrary, many barriers and entrenched interests have kept our world rather unsustainable, and Mathis Wackernagel has even argued that, since the 1990s, we have exceeded the Earth’s capacity to sustain us; we are now living in a state of global overshoot. The goal here, rather, is to show the ways in which our society has constructively responded to our ecological crisis—to demonstrate the growth and elaboration of the sustainability movement and describe some of the successes it has achieved in counteracting our bad habits. As the philosophy of sustainability has developed, so too has it expanded its scope. If we recall from earlier chapters, the concept of sustainability began in the eighteenth century as a method of managing forests, and by the 1960s and 1970s it had become a reaction to industrialism and the trend toward ecological overshoot.