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Introduction: Interrelated social and ecological challenges demand an understanding of how environmental change and management decisions affect human well-being. This paper outlines a framework for measuring human well-being for ecosystem-based management (EBM). We present a prototype that can be adapted and developed for various scales and context...
Citations
... Indicators typically focus on conventional and quantifiable metrics (e.g. biophysical and ecological data) rather than nonmonetary social dynamics, such as human wellbeing and CES (Breslow et al. 2017;Dacks et al. 2019;Hornborg et al. 2019). While indicators of biological and ecological conditions are critical, it is a large leap to assume they wholly represent what society values and finds meaningful in a given ecosystem. ...
... Traditionally, ecosystem assessment indicators have monitored ecosystem components and high-level, secondary social data and assumed that these indicators will serve as a proxy for CES (Breslow et al. 2017;Dacks et al. 2019;Hornborg et al. 2019). This link between measurable, biophysical indicator metrics and how much those metrics actually matter to or affect people is widely understudied (Olander et al. 2018) and misses the multifaceted nature in which people interact with the environment. ...
... Despite challenges, it is a worthwhile effort that is likely to benefit from community involvement. Indicators developed through local, participatory processes are more likely to accurately represent the lived experiences and values of a community, which in turn can bolster support for the ecosystem assessment and subsequent policies (King et al. 2014;Hernández-Morcillo et al. 2013;Biedenweg et al. 2016;Breslow et al. 2017;Sterling et al. 2017). Future research should aim to address how the complexities of CES that we have described here can positively influence policy-making and conservation strategies. ...
Human well-being is critically linked to the condition of marine ecosystems. Intangible services, benefits, and values derived from ecosystems play a vital role in human well-being and promote conservation efforts that ultimately support ecosystem sustainability. Similar to many regions, communities along the west coast of Hawai‘i Island are intertwined with their diverse and productive ecosystem. Though multiple resource management programs focus on operationalizing ecosystem-based management in this region, they lack adequate inclusion of connections between people and their environment. To address this, we used the Cultural Ecosystem Services (CES) framework to investigate intangible connections and opportunities to include them in resource management. Through unstructured interviews with community members on Hawai‘i Island, we explored relationships between CES and human well-being. We found that certain CES seem to be strongly related and/or connected to a large number of other CES. We also describe emergent interview themes, which include the ecosystem’s influence on well-being, types of access to CES, and the values that people ascribe to their ecosystem-derived connections. Importantly, these themes represent necessary modifications to ecosystem assessment frameworks. Additionally, we suggest stepping away from discussing CES as if they exist in segregated categories that contribute to individual facets of human well-being. Taken collectively, our findings support deepening the scope of ecosystem assessments and improving sociocultural indicators for the benefit of marine ecosystems and human well-being alike.
... King et al. (2014) describe the assessment of well-being in a social-ecological context, and highlight the evolution of ways to assess well-being, from a narrow focus on objective measures of economic conditions to a more complex and holistic concept through including subjective and objective measures of social components, environmental sustainability indicators, quality of life indices, and theories of multidimensional well-being. Breslow et al. (2017) present a framework for determining indicators of well-being specifically for ecosystem-based management, and advance previous frameworks by including multi-directional relationships among well-being indicators, and identify comparable categories based on context specific factors. Specific to agriculture, Brown et al. (2021) argue that most agricultural sustainability indicator frameworks do not include farmer wellbeing, but provide evidence that the inclusion of subjective well-being measures contribute more fully to what constitutes farmer well-being. ...
... The values that underpin these frameworks are not always explicitly formulated but rather implicit in the methods used to measure well-being (Brown et al. 2021). Processes to filter a large array of values into domains of well-being are common (Breslow et al. 2017), leading to diverse steps of aggregation or decomposition to determine well-being indicators. In Fig. 1, we conceptualize this process moving from farmer values to well-being indicators through various domains. ...
... We coded for five aspects: (i) descriptive, including geographic location, type of agriculture and well-being definitions, (ii) well-being domains, described below, (iii) method of data collection, such as interviews, focus groups, surveys, landscape/transect walks, (iv) presence of biocultural context, including a discussion of place and place-attachment beyond the location of data collection, and (v) implementation of recommendations, either clearly stated or inferred. We surveyed articles Breslow et al. 2017;Betley et al. 2021), noting that affect, culture, and place domains were specifically added to respond to our objective of assessing studies for methods that capture place-based and bio-cultural context of well-being measures. In Table 1, we define each domain and provide indictor examples for each from the literature. ...
Determinants of farmer well-being can be derived from objective and subjective measures of social components, environmental sustainability indicators, and quality of life indices, as well as the multiple scales that farms and farmers operate. Yet, despite multiple frameworks on farmer well-being, the extent to which farmer-expressed values are used in the development of farmer well-being indicators is unclear. Challenges can arise from extracting indicators that are insufficiently grounded in place, or that inadequately incorporate context and biocultural relations and practices. Here in this scoping review, we synthesize the methodologies in the literature on assessing farmer well-being and identify the extent to which farmer well-being domains are derived from values expressed directly by farmers. We consolidated and coded 92 papers to respond to the following questions: (1) What are the most frequent farmer well-being domains in published studies? (2) What methods are used to elicit multidimensional farmer well-being domains? (3) Do well-being domains used in the literature adequately reflect a biocultural context, including place-based influences on well-being? Our results show that economics and social relationships are frequent domains of how farmer well-being is identified and assessed. These domains tend to be measured simultaneously, while less common domains, such as governance and place, are rather isolated. A suite of methods was used to assess well-being domains, ranging from basic surveys to in-depth participant observation. Yet, we identify gaps in the methods for deriving farmer well-being indicators. Specifically, methods that refer to farmer-expressed values were rare and domains identified through a place-based approach were often not recorded, but, arguably, critical in developing multidimensionality of farmer well-being. We show that while the translocal approach is well represented in established well-being frameworks, farmer expression is not foundational in well-being assessments but is needed in order to center farmer values when generating indicators of well-being.
... This conceptualization decomposes well-being into four major constituents-Connections, Conditions, Capabilities, and Cross-cutting domains-and provides a structured framework for considering well-being in management contexts (Fig 1A; ibid). When coupled with carefully selected indicators (Fig 1B), this 4Cs framework offers a way to measure and track changes in well-being in response to environmental perturbations and management interventions [13]. The 4Cs framework grew from an effort to assess the full social-ecological system, not just the biophysical components, in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Integrated Ecosystem Assessment (IEA) of the California Current Large Marine Ecosystem (CCLME). ...
... Indicators of HAB effects on human well-being identified from the meta-analysis were evaluated against a subset of screening criteria based on the data considerations described in Breslow et al. [13]. These include the availability of data in each state and for the relevant time period (typically five years prior to the event), whether the data are regularly collected or were generated from one-time or limited duration efforts, and whether the entity responsible for data collection is a government agency or an academic or other institution. ...
... This neglect could ultimately prevent vulnerable communities from being identified initially or at all. To avoid such an outcome, the separation of well-being components offered by the 4Cs framework requires an additional concomitant step of disaggregating data by social variables [12,13]. Expanding on indicator screening and development for marine ecosystem-based management [72], human well-being indicators identified through the 4Cs framework will necessarily be aimed at environmental conditions with equity and justice in mind from the outset [e.g., 16]. ...
Climate change is expected to alter harmful algal bloom (HAB) dynamics in marine and freshwater systems around the world, with some regions already experiencing significant increases in HAB events. There has been considerable investment of effort to identify, characterize, track, and predict the direction and magnitude of HAB response to climate variability and change. In comparison, far less effort has been devoted to understanding how human communities respond to HABs in a changing world. Harmful algal blooms alter social-ecological interactions and can have negative consequences for human well-being. This is especially true for fishing communities because their resource-based economies operate at the interface of the natural environment and society. Identifying the components of human well-being that are most affected by HABs can advance ecosystem assessment and inform choices about climate-ready management strategies in and across complex systems. This study uses a framework for considering human well-being in management contexts to explore the effects of HABs of Pseudo-nitzschia spp. on US West Coast fishing communities. We find that HABs, and the management strategies to address them, affect almost every domain of human well-being; however, less than half of these effects meet the criteria to be considered by federal disaster response and recovery programs that provide relief to impacted communities. Moreover, much of the data used to measure the effects of HABs that are eligible for consideration by these programs are not consistently collected, which could lead to inequitable access to disaster relief. Our analysis provides a starting point for communities to develop a suite of high-quality indicators of human well-being to evaluate HAB impacts, assess the effectiveness of management actions and the equity of management outcomes, and track adaptation to system dynamics and external pressures.
... This may in part be attributable to concerted efforts in the 1990s to early 2000s and the need for cities to measure and report on material flows and progress toward achieving the Millennium Development Goals, predecessor to the SDGs, with explicit focus on gauging economic growth and efforts to improve public health 33 . These types of straightforward measures differ from indicators that attempt to capture the interconnected well-being of ecological systems and humans 34 . Addressing socio-ecological systems as a whole also responds to the call to improve global monitoring of human development which is central to the SDGs 20,35 . ...
We present the Urban Nature Indexes (UNI), a comprehensive tool that measures urban ecological performance under one standard framework linked to global commitments. The UNI was developed by interdisciplinary experts and evaluated by practitioners from diverse cities to capture each city’s ecological footprint from local to global scale. The UNI comprises six themes (consumption drivers, human pressures, habitat status, species status, nature’s contributions to people, and governance responses) that encompass measurable impacts on climate change, biodiversity loss, ecosystem services, pollution, consumption, water management, and equity within one comprehensive system. Cities then adapt the UNI to their context and capacity by selecting among indicator topics within each theme. This adaptability and holistic approach position the UNI as an essential instrument for nature-positive transformations. With the institutional support of IUCN, the UNI offers an opportunity for cities to assess and enhance their contributions towards a more sustainable and biodiverse future.
... Social well-being can be defined as "a state of being with others and the natural environment that arises where human needs are met, where individuals and groups can act meaningfully to pursue their goals, and where they are satisfied with their way of life" (Armitage et al. 2012). Social and cultural aspects of well-being include varied concepts such as resource access, self-determination, community values, traditional products, sense of place, and livelihoods (Dolan and Metcalfe 2012;Breslow et al. 2017;Nelson et al. 2022). ...
... Many aspects of well-being are hard to measure and often require qualitative assessments via surveys of communities (Yang et al. 2015;Moore et al. 2020). In some circumstances, indicators that focus on the measurable qualities of the social-ecological system can omit or even undermine other important, hard-to-measure aspects of well-being (Breslow et al. 2017;Leong et al. 2019). For example, indicators associated with the economics of a valuable resource (e.g., commercial fishing revenue and exvessel value) can undermine the well-being of some individuals or communities by excluding their concerns (Breslow et al. 2017). ...
... In some circumstances, indicators that focus on the measurable qualities of the social-ecological system can omit or even undermine other important, hard-to-measure aspects of well-being (Breslow et al. 2017;Leong et al. 2019). For example, indicators associated with the economics of a valuable resource (e.g., commercial fishing revenue and exvessel value) can undermine the well-being of some individuals or communities by excluding their concerns (Breslow et al. 2017). Identifying diverse perspectives of stakeholders can help clarify disagreements and reveal common goals or management actions that could achieve thriving, sustainable fisheries and fishing communities (Nelson et al. 2022). ...
Objective
To support the movement in marine fisheries management toward ecosystem‐based fisheries management by exploring ecosystem‐level reference points (ELRPs) as an option for managing fisheries at the ecosystem level. An ELRP is an ecosystem harvest level or indicator with one or more associated benchmarks or thresholds (i.e., targets, limits) to identify, monitor, or maintain desirable ecosystem conditions and functions.
Methods
This paper explores the development and implementation of ELRPs in fisheries management to support ecosystem and fisheries sustainability, help identify when ecosystem changes that impact fisheries resources occur, and foster discussions of trade‐offs in management decisions.
Result
We organize existing and potential ELRPs into five categories (statistical analysis of nonlinear dynamics and tipping points, ecosystem productivity, ecosystem trophic information, biodiversity, and human dimensions), provide an overview of analytical methods that can estimate ELRP benchmarks, provide examples of where ELRP benchmarks are being used today, and evaluate pros and cons of the different ELRP categories. We also attempt to identify potential next steps for fisheries scientists and managers to further the science, development, and application of ELRPs.
Conclusion
Ecosystem‐level reference points can be used as a proactive accountability mechanism to achieve ecosystem objectives and maintain the ecosystem in a preferred operating space or as an early warning that ecosystem‐level changes (e.g., tipping points) could be imminent if current biological and ecological trends in the system continue.
... Additionally, in our experience, framing a study's purpose as identifying CKS can be problematic, especially if it is introduced by non-Indigenous researchers or managers rather than initiated by Indigenous communities. Breslow et al. (2017) attempts to bring reciprocal relationships to a human well-being lens, which risks missing reciprocal relationships between people and nature through stewardship when beneficial outcomes to people are the main focus. This linear one-way flow is even more prominent in the ecosystem services framing, which views the ecological system as providing goods and services to people, thereby improving human well-being (Kelble et al. 2013). ...
... For example, recent research has expanded beyond a simple paradigm of measuring what nature does for people-through primarily economic evaluation-by exploring more intangible well-being considerations like how restoration can foster happiness, bring communities together to create social cohesion and improve public health by offering recreation opportunities (Breed et al., 2020;Milner-Gulland et al., 2014;Woroniecki et al., 2020;Yocom et al., 2016). Nonetheless, compared with the research focussed on ecological monitoring and evaluation, little is known about how much restoration practitioners may consider or intend practices that impact human well-being (Biedenweg et al., 2017;Breslow et al., 2017;Leisher et al., 2021). ...
Traditionally, ecosystem restoration has focussed on standard ecological indicators like water or habitat quality, species population abundance or vegetation cover to determine success. However, there is growing interest in how restoration might impact people and communities. For example, researchers have documented positive socio-ecological links between restoration and human well-being indicators like property value, natural hazard mitigation, recreation opportunity and happiness. Furthermore, public health benefits from restoration have been linked to public support for programmes.
Drawing from this research, the United Nations declared 2021–2030 the ‘Decade of Ecosystem Restoration’ and set a goal to promote more socio-ecological goals in ecosystem restoration. Nonetheless, there is still a lack of information on the extent to which restoration practitioners consider well-being because many granting programmes only require ecological goals and monitoring.
To explore how restoration practitioners design, implement and measure the success of their projects, we used the federally funded Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) as a case study. Since 2010, GLRI has awarded over $3.5 Billion to over 5300 projects across the midwestern United States, but it does not presently require human well-being considerations. We performed an online survey targeting project managers with a sample of GLRI projects (N = 1574). We received 437 responses and found that almost half set a human well-being goal, and more than 70% of those who did believe they reached it. In comparison, 90% of project managers believed they met their ecological goals.
These documented perceptions of positive impacts for both people and nature suggest that restoration may already transcend traditional indicators and monitoring for socio-ecological metrics could capture many ‘unseen’ benefits. Therefore, we recommend that ecosystem restoration programmes adopt a socio-ecological lens to document the full extent of their restoration outcomes.
... This may in part be attributable to concerted efforts in the 1990s to early 2000s and the need for cities to measure and report on material ows and progress toward achieving the Millennium Development Goals, predecessor to the SDGs, with explicit focus on gauging economic growth and efforts to improve public health 32 . These types of straightforward measures differ from indicators that attempt to capture the interconnected well-being of ecological systems and humans 33 . ...
We present the Urban Nature Indexes (UNI), a comprehensive tool that measures urban ecological performance under one standard framework linked to global commitments. The UNI was developed by interdisciplinary experts and evaluated by practitioners from diverse cities to capture each city’s ecological footprint from local to global scale. The UNI comprises six themes (consumption drivers, human pressures, habitat status, species status, nature’s contributions to people, and governance responses) that encompass measurable impacts on climate change, biodiversity loss, ecosystem services, pollution, consumption, water management, and equity within one comprehensive system. Cities then adapt the UNI to their context and capacity by selecting among indicator topics within each theme. This adaptability and holistic approach position the UNI as an essential instrument for nature-positive transformations. With the institutional support of IUCN, the UNI offers an unprecedented opportunity for cities to assess and enhance their contributions towards a more sustainable and biodiverse future.
... Furthermore, collaboration through co-design and co-creation with residents whose well-being is likely to be affected directly or indirectly via UGS planning, including in assessment and consideration of their everyday needs, is of high importance (Breslow et al., 2017;Anguelovski et al., 2020). As a nature-based solution to local political economy, the co-creation and co-design of UGS that brings in a variety of actors, such as designers, artists and architects, and residents can become a strategy for developing socially and locally acceptable UGS and housing solutions (Frantzeskaki, 2019). ...
... The survey was based on questions developed by the University of Washington (as described in Nelson et al. 2023), drawing on earlier work on perceptions of climate change risk broadly (Ballew et al. 2019), and in the context of natural resource-based livelihoods, including agriculture Anderson 2017, Cullen et al. 2018), and fisheries (Schumann 2018). It also includes established indicators of well-being in coastal social-ecological systems (Breslow et al. 2017) and was adapted to the commercial fisheries context of the Canadian Pacific region in a collaboration between the initial designers and those with knowledge of the local context (Harper et al. 2022). This project was a collaborative effort by academic, government, and industry partners, and nongovernmental organizations, with a shared interest in the outputs. ...
Climate change will amplify stress on marine systems already challenged by conflicts and inequities relating to fisheries access, management decisions, and ocean uses across sectors. Understanding how those most connected to fisheries perceive the risks associated with climate change is critical to developing effective responses and establishing management priorities. Adaptation planning efforts may be hindered by perceptions of unequal or unfair distribution of resources and the processes in place to manage them. In contrast, adaptation planning that is more inclusive, transparent, and addresses social dimensions and perceptions of fisheries is more likely to garner support from fishers and fishing communities broadly. We elicited fisher perceptions of climate change impacts on fisheries, and responses to these impacts, through an online survey of commercial fishers in Canada’s Pacific region. The survey highlights substantial concern for climate change, the impacts it will have on fishers’ livelihoods and well-being, and some of the key challenges that may interfere with the ability of fishers and fisheries management to adapt. We frame the findings of the survey drawing from concepts of social justice, focusing on distributive and procedural justice, as necessary considerations, and context for climate change adaptation planning. Developing plans and processes to respond to climate change impacts on fisheries requires not only understanding ecological impacts and challenges, but also the social and institutional considerations that could help or hinder efforts to respond effectively and equitably to a changing ocean.
