Today's natural resource managers must be able to navigate among the complicated interactions and conflicting interests of diverse stakeholders and decisionmakers. Technical and scientific knowledge, though necessary, are not sufficient. Science is merely one component in a multifaceted world of decision making. And while the demands of resource management have changed greatly, natural resource education and textbooks have not. Until now. Ecosystem Management represents a different kind of textbook for a different kind of course. It offers a new and exciting approach that engages students in active problem solving by using detailed landscape scenarios that reflect the complex issues and conflicting interests that face today's resource managers and scientists. Focusing on the application of the sciences of ecology and conservation biology to real-world concerns, it emphasizes the intricate ecological, socioeconomic, and institutional matrix in which natural resource management functions, and illustrates how to be more effective in that challenging arena. Each chapter is rich with exercises to help facilitate problem-based learning. The main text is supplemented by boxes and figures that provide examples, perspectives, definitions, summaries, and learning tools, along with a variety of essays written by practitioners with on-the-ground experience in applying the principles of ecosystem management. Accompanying the textbook is an instructor's manual that provides a detailed overview of the book and specific guidance on designing a course around it. Ecosystem Management grew out of a training course developed and presented by the authors for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service at its National Training Center in Shepherdstown, West Virginia. In 20 offerings to more than 600 natural resource professionals, the authors learned a great deal about what is needed to function successfully as a professional resource manager. The book offers important insights and a unique perspective dervied from that invaluable experience.

Particularly about forests in the USA.

Resource management in the United States is undergoing a fundamental change. Traditional sustained-yield approaches that focus on commodity production and human resource use are steadily giving way to ecological approaches, often referred to as ecosystem management, that have long-term ecological sustainability as their primary goal. To achieve that goal, ecosystem management emphasizes socially defined goals and objectives, integrated and holistic science, collaborative decision making, and adaptable institutions. Political considerations are an essential component of ecosystem management, yet its socio-political context has been largely ignored by those studying and writing on the subject.The Politics of Ecosystem Management is the first book to focus entirely on the political challenges facing ecosystem management as it moves from theory to practice.The authors examine: the history of natural resource management in the United States the theory behind ecosystem management potential inconsistencies and contradictions in the themes of ecosystem management political philosophies that undergird traditional resource management alternative political principles inherent in ecosystem management opportunities and barriers for achieving collaborative ecosystem managementThe Politics of Ecosystem Management considers the sweeping and profound changes that will be required of the American governance system -- its political philosophy, institutions, notions of citizenship, and politics, as well its resource management practices -- if the shift to ecosystem management is to be realized. It is a lucid and accessible volume that represents a vital contribution to the literature for students, researchers, and professionals involved with any aspect of developing and implementing ecosystem-based approaches to resource management.

Ecosystem Management in the United States is the first practical and comprehensive guide to ecosystem management efforts nationwide that meets the needs of practitioners and decisionmakers alike. The book is a unique and timely resource that significantly advances our understanding of the realities of ecosystem management by moving the debate from vague discussions of theory to an examination of real issues faced by people who are actually working with ecosystem-based approaches. It is an invaluable reference for everyone involved with land management or protection.

Ecosystem management has emerged in the past several years as the new paradigm for managing public and private land. It combines the principles of ecosystem-level ecology with the policy requirements of resource and public land management. This collection of selected readings will serve as an introduction to the concepts of biological diversity, ecological process, biotic integrity, and ecological sustainability that underlie ecosystem management.

For the better part of the last century, "preservation" and "multi-use conservation" were the watchwords for managing federal lands and resources. But in the 1990s, amidst notable failures and overwhelming needs, policymakers, land managers, and environmental scholars were calling for a new paradigm: ecosystem management. Such an approach would integrate federal land and resource management across jurisdictional boundaries; it would protect biodiversity and economic development; and it would make federal management more collaborative and less hierarchical. That, at any rate, was the idea. Where the idea came from—why ecosystem management emerged as official policy in the 1990s—is half of the story that James Skillen tells in this timely book. The other half: Why, over the course of a mere decade, the policy fell out of favor? This closely focused history describes an old system of preservation and multi-use conservation ill equipped to cope with the new ecological, legal, and political realities confronting federal agencies. Ecosystem management, it was assumed, would not demand choices between substantive and procedural needs. Looming even larger in the push for the new approach was a shift of emphasis in both ecology and political science—from stability and predictability to dynamism and contingency. Ecosystem management offered more modest managerial goals informed by direct public participation as well as scientific expertise. But as Skillen shows, this purported balance proved to be the policy's undoing. Different interpretations presented conflicting emphases on scientific and democratic authority. By 2001, when both models had been tested, the Bush administration faulted federal ecosystem management for running "willy-nilly all over the west," and shelved the policy. In this book, Skillen gets at the truth behind these contrary interpretations and claims to clarify how federal ecosystem management worked—and didn't—and how many of the principles it embodied continue to influence federal land and resource management in the twenty-first century. How the policy's lessons apply to our politically and environmentally fraught moment is, finally, considerably clearer with this informed and thoughtful book in hand.

As the 21st century approaches, the need to put principles of sustainable living and ecosystem management into practice has never been so urgent. Ecosystem Management for Sustainability recognizes this need and shares the experiences of the editor and 54 contributing authors, each leaders in the advancement of ecosystem management and champions of the natural environment. The book uses the Man And Biosphere program as a case example of a wide variety of resource management activities at work. Through the multi-authored contributions to this book, documentation of a comprehensive spectrum of ecosystem management and sustainable development principles is achieved. Ecosystem Management for Sustainability provides a link between theory and practice of these two philosophies.