N Backhaus

Biographic Data

ID2817
NAMEN Backhaus
GIVEN NAMESN
FAMILY NAMEBackhaus
SIGNATUREBACKHAUS N
AFFILIATIONSUniversity of Zurich
ORCID0000-0002-9911-4272
VERIFIEDYes
TOTAL WORKS33
TOTAL CITATIONS17
AUTHOR COUNT33
EDITOR COUNT0
FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR1993
LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR2026
H-INDEX3

  • Valuing birds: A quantitative approach to explore relational values

    Open AccessZélie Stauffer, N Backhaus et al.ARTICLEEcosystems and People2026

    This study examines the concept of environmental relational values (RVs) by exploring the case of the human-nature relationships of birdwatchers. Because RVs are context-sensitive, they are difficult to capture quantitatively. This research uses a statistical analysis of a micronarrative-based SenseMaker® survey to identify some of the main constituents of birdwatchers’ RVs. Besides context-sensitivity, a give-and-take between the valuer and the …

  • Aesthetic values as relational values: Environmental aesthetics in go‐along interviews

    Open AccessRafael Zinnenlauf, Annina Helena Michel et al.ARTICLEPeople and Nature2026

    Aesthetic values are often categorised as a type of relational values, yet their shared characteristics with other relational values remain largely unexplored. To address this gap, we turn to Emily Brady's theory of environmental aesthetics; her interpretation of aesthetic value exhibits important parallels with the concept of relational values. We then build on this framework when analysing go‐along interviews conducted in rural Switzerland. In …

  • Uneven illumination: Light masterplanning and the infrastructural politics of neoliberal urbanisation in Zurich

    Open AccessNitin Bathla, N BackhausARTICLEEnvironment and Planning D…2026References: 29

    This paper traces the mutually constitutive relationships between nocturnal illumination and urban transformation in Zurich, arguing that light masterplanning, rather than merely being a passive urban infrastructure, has actively produced new spatial and temporal frontiers of neoliberal urbanisation through the nocturnalisation of urban form and the diurnalisation of the night. Drawing on archival records, planning documents, expert interviews an…

  • Natural processes and natureculture – A relational understanding of nature amongst local stakeholders in Swiss parks

    Open AccessAnna Deplazes-Zemp, Anna Deplazes‐Zemp et al.ARTICLEEcosystems and People2024

    Various scholars have criticized that formal Western thinking was dichotomous and substantialist, leading to an alienation from nature and to its exploitation in industrialized societies. Critics argue that a relational turn towards a more holistic, process-based and relational approach to address the world would be an important step to overcome these problems. Such a relational turn involves a shift towards more flexible and inclusive concepts. …

  • From Tradition to Innovation: The Pioneers of Mountain Entrepreneurship in the Lesser Caucasus

    Open AccessGvantsa Salukvadze, Annina Helena Michel et al.ARTICLEMountain Research and Development2024

    In recent years, Georgia has witnessed a shift in its general policy orientation from agricultural to rural development, resulting in a transformation of household-based economic activities. Mountain areas have emerged as key focal points for promoting innovative approaches and practices for various reasons, such as lacking access to markets, outmigration, climate change, and generally difficult contexts for small-scale entrepreneurship. Many hou…

  • Boost in Visitor Numbers Post Covid-19 Shutdown: Consequences for an Alpine National Park

    Open AccessSonja Wipf, Annina Helena Michel et al.ARTICLEMountain Research and Development2023

    The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic changed recreation patterns worldwide. Increases in protected areas' visitor numbers were reported along with associated challenges. Changes in visitor numbers, composition, and motivation remain mostly unrecorded due to a lack of baseline records for comparison. We aimed to fill this gap with a study in the Swiss National Park (SNP), an International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) strict …

  • The pesticides burned the grass and the know-how”: Farmers’ oral history and chemoethnography of Swiss Jura slowly violent waterscapes

    Open AccessRémi Willemin, N BackhausARTICLEGeoforum2023Cited by: 1References: 39

    Farmers and beekeepers of the Swiss Jura mountains have been exposed to toxicity and socioeconomic vulnerability. Based on a combination of oral history and chemo-ethnographic interviews, research participants explore how water, chemicals, and social activities are interacting and intra-acting to melt into what we call ‘hydrochemosocial hybrids’. They narrated their histories of practices affecting the quality of water and ecosystems. Their testi…

  • How puzzles are shaping our understanding of biodiversity: A call for more research into biodiversity representation in educational games

    Open AccessM A Parreño, Sara Petchey et al.ARTICLEGAIA - Ecological Perspectives…2022

    Games as a didactic tool (e. g., puzzles) are gaining recognition in environmental education to promote skill development, but also to develop a specific understanding of the natural world. However, a children’s puzzle containing representations of nature may unwillingly lead to “misconceptions” of biodiversity themes and processes, and an over-simplification of the relationship between people and nature. To solve this problem, positive connotati…

  • A glimpse of the Cluozza-valley in the Swiss National Park

    Open AccessN BackhausARTICLERevue de géographie alpine2022

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  • The Role of Trust in the Participatory Establishment of Protected Areas—Lessons Learnt from a Failed National Park Project in Switzerland

    Annina Helena Michel, Lyn Ellen Pleger et al.ARTICLESociety & Natural Resources2021Cited by: 4References: 8

    This article explores the reasons for the local rejection of a proposed national park in Switzerland. Using a mixed-methods approach and resorting to qualitative and quantitative data, we follow the thread of trust issues in the participatory planning process of a protected area. Different rationales and discourses, both project-specific but also more general, influenced the opinions of local stakeholders. Connecting these different opinions was …

  • Community perceptions of co-managing Tajik National Park

    Open AccessQobiljon Shokirov, N Backhaus et al.ARTICLECentral Asian Survey2021References: 48

    Tajik National Park struggles with overgrazing, illegal hunting and ill-managed tourism. The designation of the park as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2013 was meant to ease some of these struggles, but improvements are thus far difficult to identify. We conducted a case study to understand how local people perceive and interact with the park to probe how these struggles could be mitigated. Interviewees and participants proposed solutions that r…

  • Future waterscapes of the Swiss Jura: Using Speculative Photo-Response Fabulation Techniques With Farmers

    Open AccessRémi Willemin, N BackhausARTICLEGeographica Helvetica2021Cited by: 4References: 25

    In response to global change and biodiversity loss caused, inter alia, by agricultural practices, our speculative photo-response fabulation project with farmers and beekeepers in the Jura region co-develops perceptions of the future of Switzerland's waterscapes. Research participants imagine and narrate the most probable and most desired futures of waterscapes in 2222. The technique of speculative photo-response fabulation uses photographs to eli…

  • Is Tourism the Beginning or the End? Livelihoods of Georgian Mountain People at Stake

    Open AccessGvantsa Salukvadze, N BackhausARTICLEMountain Research and Development2020

    This study is an attempt to empirically understand the transformation of rooted livelihoods after the arrival of tourism in the Greater Caucasus. A case-specific methodology combining qualitative and geographic information methods enabled us to identify 4 types of tourism-led livelihood change: (1) expanding nonagricultural activities; (2) reducing agricultural activities; (3) developing agritourism activities; and (4) increasing agricultural act…

  • Mapping meaningful places: A tool for participatory siting of wind turbines in Switzerland

    Open AccessStefanie Müller, N Backhaus et al.ARTICLEEnergy Research & Social Science2020Cited by: 2References: 17

  • Integrating landscape services into policy and practice – a case study from Switzerland

    Roger Keller, N BackhausARTICLELandscape Research2020Cited by: 1References: 28

    Like ecosystems, landscapes provide vital services to people. However, often those services are not or only partly incorporated into landscape policy. This applied research project explores how stakeholders in landscape policy work with a Landscape Services (LS) approach. Our LS definition builds upon the Ecosystem Services (ES) definition and includes four LS with high relevance to Switzerland. We explicitly use the term ‘landscape’ instead of ‘…

  • Integrating hunter knowledge with community-based conservation in the Pamir Region of Tajikistan

    Open AccessQobiljon Shokirov, N BackhausARTICLEConservation Ecology2020Cited by: 2

    Shokirov, Q., and N. Backhaus. 2019. Integrating hunter knowledge with community-based conservation in the Pamir Region of Tajikistan. Ecology and Society 25(1):1. https://doi.org/10.5751/ES-11253-250101

  • There are new species’: Indigenous knowledge of biodiversity change in Arctic Yakutia

    Stanislav Ksenofontov, N Backhaus et al.ARTICLEPolar Geography2018

    Climate change, nutrient pollution, land conversion, overexploitation, and invasive species and diseases – the ‘big five’ global drivers of ecosystem change – are altering biodiversity in the Arctic. Changes in biodiversity have implications for local people since they depend on biodiversity for their traditional activities. Remote Arctic areas lack scientific records of biodiversity status and trends. Indigenous knowledge (IK) can help fill in t…

  • Integrative research efforts at the boundary of biodiversity and global change research

    Open AccessSamuel Abiven, Florian Altermatt et al.ARTICLECurrent Opinion in Environmental…2017References: 10

  • To fish or not to fish?’: Fishing communities of Arctic Yakutia in the face of environmental change and political transformations

    Open AccessStanislav Ksenofontov, N Backhaus et al.ARTICLEPolar Record2017Cited by: 3References: 31

    This paper assesses the vulnerability of Arctic fishing communities. We hypothesise that climate change related trends, such as increasing temperature and altered seasonality, and shocks, such as the breakdown of the Soviet Union or new fishing regulations, increase vulnerability of local Arctic peoples and compromise the sustainability of their livelihoods. Research shows that over recent decades local people have observed environmental changes …

  • "Institutional Shopping" for Natural Resource Management in a Protected Area and Indigenous Territory in the Bolivian Amazon

    Flurina M Wartmann, Tobias Haller et al.ARTICLEHuman Organization2016

    Focusing on an overlapping protected area and indigenous territory in the Bolivian Amazon, this article discusses how indigenous people continue to negotiate access to natural resources. Using the theoretical framework of New Institutionalism, ethnographic data from participatory observations, and interviews with Takana indigenous resource users and park management staff, we identified four phases of institutional change. We argue that under the …

  • Die Konstruktion der Landschaft: Phänomen und Diskurs

    Open AccessN BackhausARTICLEGeographica Helvetica2015

    No abstract available

  • Renewable Energy, Authenticity, and Tourism: Social Acceptance of Photovoltaic Installations in a Swiss Alpine Region

    Open AccessAnnina Helena Michel, Matthias Buchecker et al.ARTICLEMountain Research and Development2015

    With the increasing emergence of renewable energy sites in Switzerland, new impacts on the landscape can be observed. Above the Alpine village of Bellwald, a pilot project testing avalanche barriers as a possible site for photovoltaic installations was inaugurated in 2012. This study focused on social aspects of the project and asked questions about local residents' and tourists' perceptions of and attitudes toward the installations. Its findings…

  • Worlds of difference, different worlds: Geographies of globalization

    Open AccessN Backhaus, C Berndt et al.ARTICLEGeographica Helvetica2012

    No abstract available

  • Landschaften wahrnehmen und nachhaltig entwickeln: Ein transdisziplinäres Modell für Forschung und Praxis

    Open AccessN BackhausARTICLEGeographica Helvetica2010

    Landschaften sind eine wichtige Ressource, die von verschiedenen Interessengruppen mit unterschiedlichen Ansprüchen genutzt werden will. Unterschiedliche Wahrnehmungen der Landschaft und Ansprüche an sie können zu Konflikten führen, vor allem dann wenn nicht erkannt wird, dass die eigene Wahrnehmung eine von vielen ist und es keine absolute Sicht der Landschaft gibt. Das im Beitrag vorgestellte Landschaftsmodell soll Transparenz schaffen, indem e…

  • Alkoholkonsum von Jugendlichen als Praxis der Raumaneignung am Beispiel der Stadt Zürich

    Open AccessLandolt, S Landolt et al.ARTICLEGeographica Helvetica2009

    Vor dem Hintergrund öffentlicher Debatten, die Alkoholkonsum von Jugendlichen mit fehlender «Sauberkeit und Ordnung» im öffentlichen Raum verbinden und Restriktionen fordern, werden aus einer konstruktivistischen Perspektive die in Verbindung mit Alkoholkonsum stattfindenden Raumaneignungen Jugendlicher untersucht. Die empirische Basis bilden Gruppengespräche mit Jugendlichen. Es zeigt sich, dass Jugendliche unterschiedlicher Schichten an verschi…