Kirsty Blackstock
Biographic Data
| ID | 1602166 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Kirsty Blackstock |
| GIVEN NAMES | Kirsty |
| FAMILY NAME | Blackstock |
| SIGNATURE | BLACKSTOCK K |
| AFFILIATIONS | James Hutton Institute |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-0429-0215 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 36 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 172 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 36 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2005 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
Value chains for sustainable mountain development
Raising standards for stakeholder engagement in Nature-based Solutions
Working with people is inherent to Nature-Based Solutions (NbS). The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Global Standard for Nature-based Solutions (NbS) requires interventions to work with and for society, acknowledging and integrating stakeholder views in all aspects of NbS in landscapes. However, existing guidance on NbS does not fully reflect all the insights and guidance available from an extensive literature on stakeholder…
Navigating or adding to complexity? Exploring the role of catchment partnerships in collaborative governance
An enduring challenge for environmental governance is how to coordinate multiple actors to achieve more collaborative and holistic management of complex socio-ecological systems. Catchment partnerships are often thought able to achieve this, so here we ask: do such partnerships actually help navigate complexity, or merely add to it? We answer this question by analysing the experiences of four voluntary UK catchment partnerships. Our data combined…
Implementing post-normal science with or for EU policy actors
There is increasing recognition of the wicked nature of the intertwined climate, biodiversity and economic crises, and the need for adaptive, multi-scale approaches to understanding the complexity of both the problems and potential responses. Most science underpinning policy responses to sustainability issues, however, remains overtly apolitical and focussed on technical innovation; at odds with a critical body of literatures insisting on the rec…
Post-normal science in practice
Post-Normal Science (PNS) emphasises the need for scientists and policy-makers to iteratively co-analyse and learn together, as part of an extended peer community. However, the roles and implications for scientific experts when interacting with policy-makers are not well understood. Informed by insights from science and technology studies (STS) on modalities of interaction and the multiple potential roles of experts, we reflect on our experiences…
Regional scale integrated land use planning to meet multiple objectives
Pressure is increasing globally to deliver integrated land use at large spatial scales (10–100 s km2) to address the climate and biodiversity emergencies through delivery of nature-based solutions. There is also pressure to decentralise land use decision-making to sub-national levels of government and multi-stakeholder partnerships, with the aim of improving policy targeting, coordination and participation. Whilst there has been significant resea…
Characterizing value chains’ contribution to resilient and sustainable development in European mountain areas
Mountain areas have been the testbed for sustainable development models focused on balancing their vulnerability and the value of their natural, cultural, and social resources. In these areas, the continuous adaptative interaction between bio-geophysical and socio-cultural processes assembles Socio-Ecological Systems (SES) characterized by a great diversity of ecosystems and land uses, which provide substantial support for the livelihoods of moun…
Agency and constraint in environmental policy coherence
Whether pursuing the breadth of the UN's Sustainable Development Goals or delivering joined-up approaches within a single environmental domain, policy objectives, policy design and policy implementation should cohere vertically and horizontally. However, policy coherence remains a challenge to implement. The limited empirical scholarship on policy coherence tends to focus on policy documentation and/or the outcomes, with little attention to indiv…
Is forest regeneration good for biodiversity? Exploring the social dimensions of an apparently ecological debate
Policy instruments for environmental public goods
It’s on the ‘nice to have’ pile”
Green Infrastructure (GI) research tends to focus on the need for GI to enhance ecological processes, its potential to provide health and economic benefits, and on the barriers preventing its uptake. Yet there has been inadequate focus on the social aspects of GI. In the United Kingdom (UK) the need for GI is well established, such that policymakers and planners are now turning to the question of how GI should be implemented. Drawing on a mixed m…
Transforming knowledge systems for life on Earth
Formalised knowledge systems, including universities and research institutes, are important for contemporary societies. They are, however, also arguably failing humanity when their impact is measured against the level of progress being made in stimulating the societal changes needed to address challenges like climate change. In this research we used a novel futures-oriented and participatory approach that asked what future envisioned knowledge sy…
The role of metrics in the governance of the water-energy-food nexus within the European Commission
Recent years have witnessed a growing interest in the water-energy-food (WEF) nexus in both academia and policy. This concept draws attention to the link between different environmental and societal domains, and potentially entails substantive shifts in governance processes. As a consequence, policy-makers and scientists have started to develop metrics to make these interactions and ‘trade-offs’ visible. However, it is unknown if current framings…
Developing Learning Landscape Partnerships
There are many calls for more effective science-policy interaction and knowledge exchange in order to tackle persistent conservation problems; however, more clarity is needed surrounding the roles and practices involved. To address this challenge, we present the outcomes of an iterative, transdisciplinary process between researchers and protected area managers, to identify good practice in the development of what we call ‘learning landscape partn…
Governing the Cairngorms National Park – Revisiting the neglected concept of authority
Generating public and private benefits through understanding what drives different types of agritourism
Participatory research to influence participatory governance
This paper explores the tensions and opportunities involved in becoming a ‘critical friend’ to government agency planners trying to practise more inclusive forms of governance. It thus tackles two interrelated issues: how to build and manage rapport while retaining a critical research agenda, and how to locate niches for further democratising participation within congested multi‐level governance structures. A five‐year research programme allowed …
How does legacy create sticking points for environmental management? Insights from challenges to implementation of the ecosystem approach
Waylen, K. A., K. L. Blackstock, and K. L. Holstead. 2015. How does legacy create sticking points for environmental management? Insights from challenges to implementation of the ecosystem approach. Ecology and Society 20(2): 21. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-07594-200221
Can scenario-planning support community-based natural resource management? Experiences from three countries in Latin America
Waylen, K. A., J. Martin-Ortega, K. L. Blackstock, I. Brown, B. E. Avendaño Uribe, S. Basurto Hernández, M. B. Bertoni, M. L. Bustos, A. X. Cruz Bayer, R. I. Escalante Semerena, M. A. Farah Quijano, F. Ferrelli, G. L. Fidalgo, I. Hernández López, M. A. Huamantinco Cisneros, S. London, D. L. Maya Vélez, P. N. Ocampo-Díaz, C. E. Ortiz Guerrero, J. C. Pascale, G. M. E. Perillo, M. C. Piccolo, L. N. Pinzón Martínez, M. L. Rojas, F. Scordo, V. Vitale,…
Agritourism from the perspective of providers and visitors
Considering the source
Knowledge exchange
There is increasing emphasis on the need for effective ways of sharing knowledge to enhance environmental management and sustainability. Knowledge exchange (KE) are processes that generate, share and/or use knowledge through various methods appropriate to the context, purpose, and participants involved. KE includes concepts such as sharing, generation, coproduction, comanagement, and brokerage of knowledge. This paper elicits the expert knowledge…
Triggering change
Linking process to outcomes — Internal and external criteria for a stakeholder involvement in River Basin Management Planning
The role of map-based environmental information in supporting integration between river basin planning and spatial planning
Transforming knowledge systems for life on Earth
Formalised knowledge systems, including universities and research institutes, are important for contemporary societies. They are, however, also arguably failing humanity when their impact is measured against the level of progress being made in stimulating the societal changes needed to address challenges like climate change. In this research we used a novel futures-oriented and participatory approach that asked what future envisioned knowledge sy…
A typology for defining agritourism
Operationalising sustainability science for a sustainability directive? Reflecting on three pilot projects
The implementation of the Water Framework Directive (WFD) will challenge traditional single discipline or single issue approaches to research, requiring instead new forms such as 'sustainability science'. Sustainability science requires the integration of multiple perspectives to resolve place-based problems. This paper will illustrate some of the challenges and emergent understandings that were observed during three research projects that could …
Dementia care provision in rural Scotland
There has been global neglect of service users' and carers' experiences of dementia care provision in rural areas. The present paper draws on a qualitative study of service provision for people with dementia and their carers in remote and rural Scotland. It draws on interviews with 15 people with dementia and 16 carers to explore their views about health and social dementia care service provision in rural Scotland. A further 14 carers of people w…
Living with dementia in rural and remote Scotland
Generating public and private benefits through understanding what drives different types of agritourism
Agritourism from the perspective of providers and visitors
Policy instruments for environmental public goods
Participatory research to influence participatory governance
This paper explores the tensions and opportunities involved in becoming a ‘critical friend’ to government agency planners trying to practise more inclusive forms of governance. It thus tackles two interrelated issues: how to build and manage rapport while retaining a critical research agenda, and how to locate niches for further democratising participation within congested multi‐level governance structures. A five‐year research programme allowed …
The role of map-based environmental information in supporting integration between river basin planning and spatial planning
Regional scale integrated land use planning to meet multiple objectives
Pressure is increasing globally to deliver integrated land use at large spatial scales (10–100 s km2) to address the climate and biodiversity emergencies through delivery of nature-based solutions. There is also pressure to decentralise land use decision-making to sub-national levels of government and multi-stakeholder partnerships, with the aim of improving policy targeting, coordination and participation. Whilst there has been significant resea…
Characterizing value chains’ contribution to resilient and sustainable development in European mountain areas
Mountain areas have been the testbed for sustainable development models focused on balancing their vulnerability and the value of their natural, cultural, and social resources. In these areas, the continuous adaptative interaction between bio-geophysical and socio-cultural processes assembles Socio-Ecological Systems (SES) characterized by a great diversity of ecosystems and land uses, which provide substantial support for the livelihoods of moun…
The role of metrics in the governance of the water-energy-food nexus within the European Commission
Recent years have witnessed a growing interest in the water-energy-food (WEF) nexus in both academia and policy. This concept draws attention to the link between different environmental and societal domains, and potentially entails substantive shifts in governance processes. As a consequence, policy-makers and scientists have started to develop metrics to make these interactions and ‘trade-offs’ visible. However, it is unknown if current framings…
How does legacy create sticking points for environmental management? Insights from challenges to implementation of the ecosystem approach
Waylen, K. A., K. L. Blackstock, and K. L. Holstead. 2015. How does legacy create sticking points for environmental management? Insights from challenges to implementation of the ecosystem approach. Ecology and Society 20(2): 21. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-07594-200221
Landscapes of Challenge and Change
The Scottish model of national parks reflects wider changes in the management of special or protected landscapes. This paper uses Ingold's dwelling conceptualisation of landscape to reflect on how material and cultural processes affect stakeholders' perceptions of the Cairngorms National Park in Scotland, UK. Important to understanding different views, is the separation, unique to the Cairngorms, of ‘the park’ from its management organisation. Th…
Is forest regeneration good for biodiversity? Exploring the social dimensions of an apparently ecological debate
Raising standards for stakeholder engagement in Nature-based Solutions
Working with people is inherent to Nature-Based Solutions (NbS). The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Global Standard for Nature-based Solutions (NbS) requires interventions to work with and for society, acknowledging and integrating stakeholder views in all aspects of NbS in landscapes. However, existing guidance on NbS does not fully reflect all the insights and guidance available from an extensive literature on stakeholder…
Navigating or adding to complexity? Exploring the role of catchment partnerships in collaborative governance
An enduring challenge for environmental governance is how to coordinate multiple actors to achieve more collaborative and holistic management of complex socio-ecological systems. Catchment partnerships are often thought able to achieve this, so here we ask: do such partnerships actually help navigate complexity, or merely add to it? We answer this question by analysing the experiences of four voluntary UK catchment partnerships. Our data combined…
Implementing post-normal science with or for EU policy actors
There is increasing recognition of the wicked nature of the intertwined climate, biodiversity and economic crises, and the need for adaptive, multi-scale approaches to understanding the complexity of both the problems and potential responses. Most science underpinning policy responses to sustainability issues, however, remains overtly apolitical and focussed on technical innovation; at odds with a critical body of literatures insisting on the rec…
It’s on the ‘nice to have’ pile”
Green Infrastructure (GI) research tends to focus on the need for GI to enhance ecological processes, its potential to provide health and economic benefits, and on the barriers preventing its uptake. Yet there has been inadequate focus on the social aspects of GI. In the United Kingdom (UK) the need for GI is well established, such that policymakers and planners are now turning to the question of how GI should be implemented. Drawing on a mixed m…
Can scenario-planning support community-based natural resource management? Experiences from three countries in Latin America
Waylen, K. A., J. Martin-Ortega, K. L. Blackstock, I. Brown, B. E. Avendaño Uribe, S. Basurto Hernández, M. B. Bertoni, M. L. Bustos, A. X. Cruz Bayer, R. I. Escalante Semerena, M. A. Farah Quijano, F. Ferrelli, G. L. Fidalgo, I. Hernández López, M. A. Huamantinco Cisneros, S. London, D. L. Maya Vélez, P. N. Ocampo-Díaz, C. E. Ortiz Guerrero, J. C. Pascale, G. M. E. Perillo, M. C. Piccolo, L. N. Pinzón Martínez, M. L. Rojas, F. Scordo, V. Vitale,…
Value chains for sustainable mountain development
Post-normal science in practice
Post-Normal Science (PNS) emphasises the need for scientists and policy-makers to iteratively co-analyse and learn together, as part of an extended peer community. However, the roles and implications for scientific experts when interacting with policy-makers are not well understood. Informed by insights from science and technology studies (STS) on modalities of interaction and the multiple potential roles of experts, we reflect on our experiences…
Governing the Cairngorms National Park – Revisiting the neglected concept of authority
Sociology, Science and Sustainability
This paper considers the application of the sociological imagination during the analysis of data collected during an ethnographic study of an environmental regulator, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA). SEPA is tasked with implementing the European Water Framework Directive (WFD) in Scotland, which will radically alter the regulation of water use. Applying a sociological imagination allowed the researcher to advocate for a more int…
A critical look at community based tourism
Community based tourism (CBT) could be one way of creating a more sustainable tourism industry. This article critically reviews the CBT approach in light of fieldwork in a North Queensland tourism destination. The literature on CBT has three major failings from a community development perspective. Firstly, it tends to take a functional approach to community involvement; secondly, it tends to treat the host community as a homogeneous bloc; and thi…
Dementia care provision in rural Scotland
There has been global neglect of service users' and carers' experiences of dementia care provision in rural areas. The present paper draws on a qualitative study of service provision for people with dementia and their carers in remote and rural Scotland. It draws on interviews with 15 people with dementia and 16 carers to explore their views about health and social dementia care service provision in rural Scotland. A further 14 carers of people w…
Living with dementia in rural and remote Scotland
Sociology, Science and Sustainability
This paper considers the application of the sociological imagination during the analysis of data collected during an ethnographic study of an environmental regulator, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA). SEPA is tasked with implementing the European Water Framework Directive (WFD) in Scotland, which will radically alter the regulation of water use. Applying a sociological imagination allowed the researcher to advocate for a more int…
Developing and applying a framework to evaluate participatory research for sustainability
Operationalising sustainability science for a sustainability directive? Reflecting on three pilot projects
The implementation of the Water Framework Directive (WFD) will challenge traditional single discipline or single issue approaches to research, requiring instead new forms such as 'sustainability science'. Sustainability science requires the integration of multiple perspectives to resolve place-based problems. This paper will illustrate some of the challenges and emergent understandings that were observed during three research projects that could …
Mechanisms to Improve Integrative Research at the Science-Policy Interface for Sustainable Catchment Management
Macleod, C. J. A., K. L. Blackstock, and P. M. Haygarth 2008. Mechanisms to improve integrative research at the science-policy interface for sustainable catchment management. Ecology and Society 13(2): 48. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-02648-130248
Commentary
This paper explores the interconnections and relative importance of seven determinants implicit in the development of sustainable tourism indicators. These determinants provide a framework for understanding the process of indicator selection for sustainable tourism. This research has suggested that some of the implicit determinants may be interconnected and some may be more important than others. The paper reports findings from twelve stakeholder…
Understanding and influencing behaviour change by farmers to improve water quality
A typology for defining agritourism
Triggering change
Linking process to outcomes — Internal and external criteria for a stakeholder involvement in River Basin Management Planning
The role of map-based environmental information in supporting integration between river basin planning and spatial planning
Landscapes of Challenge and Change
The Scottish model of national parks reflects wider changes in the management of special or protected landscapes. This paper uses Ingold's dwelling conceptualisation of landscape to reflect on how material and cultural processes affect stakeholders' perceptions of the Cairngorms National Park in Scotland, UK. Important to understanding different views, is the separation, unique to the Cairngorms, of ‘the park’ from its management organisation. Th…
Considering the source
Knowledge exchange
There is increasing emphasis on the need for effective ways of sharing knowledge to enhance environmental management and sustainability. Knowledge exchange (KE) are processes that generate, share and/or use knowledge through various methods appropriate to the context, purpose, and participants involved. KE includes concepts such as sharing, generation, coproduction, comanagement, and brokerage of knowledge. This paper elicits the expert knowledge…
Agritourism from the perspective of providers and visitors
Generating public and private benefits through understanding what drives different types of agritourism
Participatory research to influence participatory governance
This paper explores the tensions and opportunities involved in becoming a ‘critical friend’ to government agency planners trying to practise more inclusive forms of governance. It thus tackles two interrelated issues: how to build and manage rapport while retaining a critical research agenda, and how to locate niches for further democratising participation within congested multi‐level governance structures. A five‐year research programme allowed …
How does legacy create sticking points for environmental management? Insights from challenges to implementation of the ecosystem approach
Waylen, K. A., K. L. Blackstock, and K. L. Holstead. 2015. How does legacy create sticking points for environmental management? Insights from challenges to implementation of the ecosystem approach. Ecology and Society 20(2): 21. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-07594-200221
Can scenario-planning support community-based natural resource management? Experiences from three countries in Latin America
Waylen, K. A., J. Martin-Ortega, K. L. Blackstock, I. Brown, B. E. Avendaño Uribe, S. Basurto Hernández, M. B. Bertoni, M. L. Bustos, A. X. Cruz Bayer, R. I. Escalante Semerena, M. A. Farah Quijano, F. Ferrelli, G. L. Fidalgo, I. Hernández López, M. A. Huamantinco Cisneros, S. London, D. L. Maya Vélez, P. N. Ocampo-Díaz, C. E. Ortiz Guerrero, J. C. Pascale, G. M. E. Perillo, M. C. Piccolo, L. N. Pinzón Martínez, M. L. Rojas, F. Scordo, V. Vitale,…
Governing the Cairngorms National Park – Revisiting the neglected concept of authority
Developing Learning Landscape Partnerships
There are many calls for more effective science-policy interaction and knowledge exchange in order to tackle persistent conservation problems; however, more clarity is needed surrounding the roles and practices involved. To address this challenge, we present the outcomes of an iterative, transdisciplinary process between researchers and protected area managers, to identify good practice in the development of what we call ‘learning landscape partn…
The role of metrics in the governance of the water-energy-food nexus within the European Commission
Recent years have witnessed a growing interest in the water-energy-food (WEF) nexus in both academia and policy. This concept draws attention to the link between different environmental and societal domains, and potentially entails substantive shifts in governance processes. As a consequence, policy-makers and scientists have started to develop metrics to make these interactions and ‘trade-offs’ visible. However, it is unknown if current framings…
Transforming knowledge systems for life on Earth
Formalised knowledge systems, including universities and research institutes, are important for contemporary societies. They are, however, also arguably failing humanity when their impact is measured against the level of progress being made in stimulating the societal changes needed to address challenges like climate change. In this research we used a novel futures-oriented and participatory approach that asked what future envisioned knowledge sy…
Political science (25 works) · Business (23 works) · Sociology (21 works) · Economics (19 works) · Environmental resource management (16 works) · Geography (16 works) · Computer Science (13 works) · Public relations (12 works) · Environmental planning (11 works) · Engineering (10 works)