Resilience thinking and the evolution of collaborative environmental governance in the Western Cape
Date
2014-03
Authors
Muller, Kobus
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Association of Southern African Schools and Departments of Public Administration and Management
Abstract
To cope with complex environmental governance realities, new innovative
models of collaborative governance or co-management have emerged in
South Africa over the last 15 years. Resilience – defi ned as the capacity of a
system to absorb disturbance and still retain its basic function and structure –
is dependent on the system’s adaptive capacity or its ability to reorganise
and renew itself in the face of change. A concept growing in importance for
understanding, managing and governing complex socio-ecological systems
is that of resilience. Increasingly, collaborative governance is also combined
with learning-based approaches such as adaptive management, formulated
originally to deal with complexity and uncertainty.
In the Western Cape in the globally threatened biodiversity hotspot of
the Cape Floral Kingdom, institutional innovation has also fl ourished in
the environmental governance arena. This article focuses on a selection
of these new collaborative governance models and will attempt to
analyse and understand their evolution from a resilience perspective.
In conclusion, some observations and refl ections will be offered on the
practical implications of applying resilience thinking to collaborative
governance settings and the possible insights we can gain from this
Description
Keywords
collaborative environmental governance, western cape, resilience thinking,
Citation
Muller, K. Resilience thinking and the evolution of the collaborative environmental governance in the Western Cape. Administratio Publica, vol 22, no 1, March, pp5-23