Governing peri-urban forestry: filling the regulation gap with Swiss "Nature-discovery-parks"?
Jerylee Wilkes-Allemann, NARP - Natural Resource Policy Group, University of Zurich (CH)
Urban areas increasingly rely on goods and services provided by surrounding forests (Mann and Absher, 2008). However, there is often a misfit between regulations and current uses, as the laws and ordinances have often been developed historically and not adequately adapted with actors' changing behavior. E.g. in Switzerland forests are regulated by institutions dedicated to rural areas rather than by laws designed for the specific use and protection issues of peri-urban contexts. Potential ways to steer the use of urban forest areas is establishing new regulations tailored toward regulating flora and fauna in densely populated areas. In Switzerland one such potential means is the Nature-discovery-park, which is geared toward addressing the populations' needs and the potential to foster sustainable resource use in peri-urban areas. However, while other Swiss park categories (e.g. Regional-nature-parks) have grown rapidly, the Nature-discovery-parks seem to be lagging. We pose the question whether and to what extent Nature-discovery-parks may serve as a viable vehicle for regulating peri-urban forests. To conceptually address our questions we employ the Social-Ecological System (SES) framework, developed by Ostrom (2009) to analyze the sustainability of complex social-ecological systems. We aim to: (1) assess what the forest-city interdependencies and the peri-urban forestry specificities (including goods and services provided by forests) are and how they are regulated, and (2) evaluate the pros and cons of Nature-discovery-parks for regulating forest-city interdependencies in contrast to other options. To achieve these aims we study the agglomerations of Aargau, Zurich, Vaud and Berne. To analyze the viability of Nature-discovery-parks we draw on the SES framework to develop multiple assessment criteria, with such indicators as effectiveness, political legitimacy and public acceptance, which we apply in the four agglomerations. The research draws on several empirical sources including analysis of legal documents at the national and regional level, as well as semi-structured expert interviews, a survey of the population in the regions and focus groups with local stakeholders (Morgan, 1998; May, 2001). We conclude that by identifying the elements of the SES it is possible to explain the misfit between regulations and uses. So far, current research has identified the features characterizing parks governance regimes in Switzerland (Willi et al., 2016). However, other governance characteristics such as interdependencies are not considered. Thus, we fill the gap by investigating the forest-city interdependencies, the peri-urban forestry specificities and regulations. Finally, we provide recommendations for new regulatory means for peri-urban forests and improve the development and management of existing and new Nature-discovery-parks.