CRC Press Shared Governance for Sustainable Working Landscapes

Sustaining our agricultural landscapes is no longer just a technical, scientific or even political problem, but it has evolved into a socially complex, so-called wicked problem of conflicting social governance and economics. This creates an extreme economic obstacle where the value of ecosystem services remains low and diffuse and the transactions costs remain high and multiple.Using Uber-like business platform technology and a shared governance model, a symbiotic demand for environmental benefits is created. Enabling multi-sector transactions for environmental benefits, this platform innovation would remedy the "tragedy of the commons"; the economic nemesis to achieving landscape sustainability. In a nutshell, to sustain our agricultural landscapes a transdisciplinary approach supported by a shared governance model housed within a multi-sided platform in needed. This book introduces an assessment framework identifying governance actors, styles and ratios for socio-ecological systems. The assessment uses a new governance compass to identify the types of actors completing which tasks and identifies the styles of governance used to complete the tasks. It is aimed to anyone involved in sustainability science, agricultural policy planning, or integrated landscape design. Review "I like the clear communication style as Timothy Gieseke takes readers on a journey. He systematically builds his arguments and clarifies the issues in a field that has evolved to be very complex and confusing."―Leon Cavalli, Hannabell Electronics, Queensland, Australia "Timothy M. Gieseke brings fresh new insights and understanding to the problem of how to create sustainable forms of agriculture. A compulsory read for anyone involved in sustainability science, agricultural policy planning, or integrated landscape design."―Valerie Payn, Integrated Landscape Designer, Port Shepstone Area, South Africa "This is a superbly researched and written text."―Joseph M. Bradley, Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia, USA "This book is a timely contribution to sustainability in agricultural and rural landscapes."―Alan Carter, Celto Canadian, Vancouver, Canada "The strength of the book lies in the application of the model of sustainability governance to eleven case studies, which greatly enriches understanding of processes necessary for the environmental market signal to have meaning."― Cornelia Butler Flora, Kansas State University, Manhattan, Kansas, USA "Tim Gieseke has authored an important big picture contribution to the scientific literature on today’s seemingly intractable, environmental problems associated with agricultural production. The book provides an excellent overview of the nature of landscape-scale ecological problems, often referred to in government regulatory terms as non-point source problems."― Andrew Manale, US Environmental Protection Agency Office of Policy (retired), Washington, D.C., USA "Timothy Gieseke’s book Shared Governance for Sustainable Working Landscapes is a tour de force on how to effectively manage the 'wicked problems' of unsustainable agricultural systems. This book, which is a novel addition to the growing library of books on sustainability, would be highly useful to policy makers on agricultural systems as well as conservation planners and managers. Also, the book is great for practitioners who are interested in recognizing and managing wicked problems in domains other than agriculture." ― Rod King, Consultant on conversational project management, Clovis, California, USA "Tim Gieseke’s book takes us exactly in the direction we need to go – exploring new business models for investing in and sustaining the wide range of goods and services provided by landscapes. Overall, this book is an ambitious effort to develop actionable ways forward for sustaining the lands and waters on which we all rely." ― Brad Gentry, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, USA "In simple language, following in the