D9.1 - Principles for Just and Equitable Nature-based Solutions and Green-blue Infrastructure : ARCADIA Work Package 9 Governance, policy and finance
Year: 2024
Type: report
Abstract: Nature-based solutions (NbS) can play a key role in shaping sustainable futures for cities and regions by contributing to green-blue infrastructure (GBI) and adapting to and mitigating climate change and reponding to biodiversity loss. At the same time, NbS aims to address various social, ecological and economic challenges simultaneously, often referred to as generating co-benefits. While NbS offers a mix of co-benefits, they can also exacerbate existing inequalities and contribute to exclusion and gentrification, benefiting some privileged groups. Furthermore, human needs are interconnected with those of nature. Hence, nature-based transformations of environments need to safeguard life and aim to improve the living conditions for both nature and humans. In the collective effort to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) established by the United Nations (UN), NbS can significantly contribute to a better future for all. The European Commission (EC) has incorporated NbS (and GBI) into its missions and key regulations to foster a greener, healthier, inclusive, and resilient Europe. However, the connection between NbS and the concept of justice is largely unknown. In this regard, and to leave no one behind, exploring and addressing the relationships between justice and nature-based transformations is crucial. In the context of NbS, justice goes beyond mere equality that, typically, tends to standardize the needs of different groups and communities, focusing on the final product and providing an identical service. It also extends beyond merely ensuring the appropriateness of benefits, usually seen as equity. It focuses on the differences in needs and contexts to adapt the final service effectively and respectively. This report considers justice as a broader concept that refers to the fairness of nature-based transformations regarding the results and procedures and, in some cases, tries to tackle the roots of disparities. Based on this starting point, justice is considered a process-oriented approach in this report that carries a long-term perspective, taking into account the local and regional contexts by recognizing the causes of inequity and imbalances in the governance, planning, design and implementation of NbS. Furthermore, transformative change is understood as fundamental, systemic reorganisation across technological, economic, cultural and social factors, including paradigms, goals and values. In this report, we encourage a two-step perspective shift to effectively achieve justice through NbS. First, it is crucial to recognize that NbS cannot per se be considered just only due to its nature-based technical function. Second, NbS can only be considered a just approach if it contributes to a fair process and outcome for both human and non-human environments. This report elaborates on driving transformative change by ensuring that nature-based interventions go beyond being only technical solutions and directly address deeper socio-ecological imbalances. This report investigates principles for just and equitable nature-based interventions, including how cities and regions can use principles or processes behind the development of principles to guide nature-based transformations. The report highlights the critical role of integrating the principles for just and equitable NbS into broader transformative change processes and elaborates on how justice can be more systematically addressed in processes to design, plan and implement NBS, and how this can foster climate resilience.
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7133580211