Andreas von der Dunk

Bio: Andreas von der Dunk is an academic researcher from École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne. The author has contributed to research in topics: Cultural landscape & Natural capital. The author has an hindex of 3, co-authored 3 publications receiving 1210 citations.

Contributions of cultural services to the ecosystem services agenda.

Abstract: Cultural ecosystem services (ES) are consistently recognized but not yet adequately defined or integrated within the ES framework. A substantial body of models, methods, and data relevant to cultural services has been developed within the social and behavioral sciences before and outside of the ES approach. A selective review of work in landscape aesthetics, cultural heritage, outdoor recreation, and spiritual significance demonstrates opportunities for operationally defining cultural services in terms of socioecological models, consistent with the larger set of ES. Such models explicitly link ecological structures and functions with cultural values and benefits, facilitating communication between scientists and stakeholders and enabling economic, multicriterion, deliberative evaluation and other methods that can clarify tradeoffs and synergies involving cultural ES. Based on this approach, a common representation is offered that frames cultural services, along with all ES, by the relative contribution of relevant ecological structures and functions and by applicable social evaluation approaches. This perspective provides a foundation for merging ecological and social science epistemologies to define and integrate cultural services better within the broader ES framework.

Land-use conflicts in a Swiss peri-urban landscape: Which socio-demographic and environmental variables are associated with their presence and absence?

Abstract: Land-use conflicts are multifaceted social phenomena especially prevalent in periurban landscapes where land is limited and the margin of separation between diverse urban and rural uses is small Their complexity poses an ongoing challenge for research and management We investigate which socio-demographic and environmental variables are associated with conflict occurrence The study area is located in a peri-urban landscape of Switzerland where conflict data were collected through a content analysis of the local print media Decision trees are calculated to relate the presence or absence of conflicts to possible explanatory variables The results show that four main variables are associated with the occurrence of land-use conflicts: proportion of rented accommodation, steepness of the terrain, population growth, and the proportion of commuters The tree model is useful for theory building and can stimulate discussions on where land use conflicts are most likely to occur Furthermore, based on the study we would suggest accompanying land change processes in areas with a high proportion of rented accommodations with especially comprehensive public participation processes

Pervasive human-driven decline of life on Earth points to the need for transformative change

Abstract: The human impact on life on Earth has increased sharply since the 1970s, driven by the demands of a growing population with rising average per capita income. Nature is currently supplying more materials than ever before, but this has come at the high cost of unprecedented global declines in the extent and integrity of ecosystems, distinctness of local ecological communities, abundance and number of wild species, and the number of local domesticated varieties. Such changes reduce vital benefits that people receive from nature and threaten the quality of life of future generations. Both the benefits of an expanding economy and the costs of reducing nature's benefits are unequally distributed. The fabric of life on which we all depend-nature and its contributions to people-is unravelling rapidly. Despite the severity of the threats and lack of enough progress in tackling them to date, opportunities exist to change future trajectories through transformative action. Such action must begin immediately, however, and address the root economic, social, and technological causes of nature's deterioration.

Where are Cultural and Social in Ecosystem Services? A Framework for Constructive Engagement

Abstract: A focus on ecosystem services (ES) is seen as a means for improving decisionmaking. In the research to date, the valuation of the material contributions of ecosystems to human well-being has been emphasized, with less attention to important cultural ES and nonmaterial values. This gap persists because there is no commonly accepted framework for eliciting less tangible values, characterizing their changes, and including them alongside other services in decisionmaking. Here, we develop such a framework for ES research and practice, addressing three challenges: (1) Nonmaterial values are ill suited to characterization using monetary methods; (2) it is difficult to unequivocally link particular changes in socioecological systems to particular changes in cultural benefits; and (3) cultural benefits are associated with many services, not just cultural ES. There is no magic bullet, but our framework may facilitate fuller and more socially acceptable integrations of ES information into planning and management.

A Quantitative Review of Urban Ecosystem Service Assessments: Concepts, Models, and Implementation

Abstract: Although a number of comprehensive reviewshave examined global ecosystem services (ES), few havefocused on studies that assess urban ecosystem services(UES). Given that more than half of the world’ ...