SUNY series in Environmental Governance: Local-Regional-Global Interactions – serie

Examines the challenges of environmental governance in contemporary North America.What are the most important transnational governance arrangements for environmental policy in North America? Has their proliferation facilitated a transition towards integrated continental environmental policy, and if so, to what degree is this integration irreversible? These governance arrangements are diverse and evolving, consisting of binational and trinational organizations created decades ago by treaties and groups of stakeholders-with varying degrees of formalization-who work together to address issues that no single country can alone. Together they provide leadership in numerous areas of environmental concern, including invasive species, energy efficiency, water, and terrestrial and aquatic wildlife. This book explores these arrangements, examining features such as stakeholder inclusion, organizational activities and functions, and issue comprehensiveness. Overall, the contributors report an underdeveloped policy architecture consisting of fragmented regional transnational networks of stakeholders and underfunded binational and trinational organizations. They also show evidence of substantial policy entrepreneurship and a vibrant informal underbelly to North American environmental governance, which will be vital in the challenging days ahead.

Explores the evolving role of botanic gardens from products and enablers of modernity and the nation-state, to their recent reinvention as institutions of environmental governance.2020 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title Since their inception in the sixteenth century, botanic gardens have been embroiled with matters of governance. In Postnormal Conservation, Katja Grötzner Neves reveals that, throughout its long history, the botanical garden institution has been both a product and an enabler of modernity and the Westphalian nation-state. Initially intertwined with projects of colonialism and empire building, contemporary botanic gardens have reinvented themselves as environmental governance actors. They are now at the forefront of emerging forms of networked transnational governance. Building on social studies of science that reveal the politicization of science as the producer of contingent, high-stakes, and uncertain knowledge, and the concomitant politicization of previously taken-for-granted science-policy interfaces, Neves contends that institutions like botanic gardens have discursively deployed postnormal science and posthuman precepts to justify their growing involvement with biodiversity conservation governance within the Anthropocene.

Analyzes efforts made by communities and policy makers around the world to push beyond conventional approaches to environmental decision making.Breaking Boundaries analyzes efforts made by communities and policy makers around the world to push beyond conventional approaches to environmental decision making to enhance public acceptance, sustainability, and the impact of those decisions in local contexts. The current political climate has generated uncertainty among citizens, industry interests, scientists, and other stakeholders, but by applying concepts from various perspectives of environmental communication and deliberative democracy, this book offers a series of lessons learned for both public officials and concerned citizens. The contributors offer a broader understanding of how individuals and groups can get involved effectively in environmental decisions through traditional formats as well as alternative approaches ranging from leadership capacity building to social media activity to civic technology.

Examines the challenges of environmental governance in contemporary North America.What are the most important transnational governance arrangements for environmental policy in North America? Has their proliferation facilitated a transition towards integrated continental environmental policy, and if so, to what degree is this integration irreversible? These governance arrangements are diverse and evolving, consisting of binational and trinational organizations created decades ago by treaties and groups of stakeholders-with varying degrees of formalization-who work together to address issues that no single country can alone. Together they provide leadership in numerous areas of environmental concern, including invasive species, energy efficiency, water, and terrestrial and aquatic wildlife. This book explores these arrangements, examining features such as stakeholder inclusion, organizational activities and functions, and issue comprehensiveness. Overall, the contributors report an underdeveloped policy architecture consisting of fragmented regional transnational networks of stakeholders and underfunded binational and trinational organizations. They also show evidence of substantial policy entrepreneurship and a vibrant informal underbelly to North American environmental governance, which will be vital in the challenging days ahead.

Explores the evolving role of botanic gardens from products and enablers of modernity and the nation-state, to their recent reinvention as institutions of environmental governance.2020 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title Since their inception in the sixteenth century, botanic gardens have been embroiled with matters of governance. In Postnormal Conservation, Katja Grötzner Neves reveals that, throughout its long history, the botanical garden institution has been both a product and an enabler of modernity and the Westphalian nation-state. Initially intertwined with projects of colonialism and empire building, contemporary botanic gardens have reinvented themselves as environmental governance actors. They are now at the forefront of emerging forms of networked transnational governance. Building on social studies of science that reveal the politicization of science as the producer of contingent, high-stakes, and uncertain knowledge, and the concomitant politicization of previously taken-for-granted science-policy interfaces, Neves contends that institutions like botanic gardens have discursively deployed postnormal science and posthuman precepts to justify their growing involvement with biodiversity conservation governance within the Anthropocene.