Landscape planning and community participation

Local lessons from Mullaghmore, the Burren NationalPark, Ireland

Bibliographic Data

ID11168652
AuthorsEileen O’rourke (0000-0001-5367-2343, University College Cork, corresponding author), Eileen O'Rourke
Year2005
Volume30
Issue4
Pages483-500
Publication date2005-10-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueLandscape Research (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0142-6397 • E-ISSN: 1469-9710
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/01426390500273205
OpenAlexW2105037597
LanguageEN
Citations received13
References cited36

Issues relating to community participation in landscape management, as well as the manipulation of the community for political ends, are addressed. It is argued that the current fashionable participatory model of development and policy formulation requires closer scrutiny and may be unrealistic in certain contexts. A case-study approach is adopted, whereby the role of the community in attempts to construct a visitor interpretative centre at the foot of Mullaghmore Mountain, within the Burren National Park, Ireland, is analysed. The complexity of the term community is exposed, and important questions about who speaks for the community are raised. It is concluded that local development, including ecosystem and landscape management, is best approached neither from a ‘top-down’ nor a ‘bottom-up’ developmental model. It is suggested that insights from adaptive co-management models, which promote a multi-level management approach, whereby local knowledge and experience are incorporated within enabling local and extra-local institutional structures, may provide a viable alternative. Finally, it is argued that human–environmental interaction in a specific place, including the management of common pool resources, needs to be situated within the historical, ecological and cultural narrative of its human ecology. Key Words: MullaghmoreBurrencommunity participationlandscape planningadaptive management Acknowledgements This research was funded by a European Marie Curie Fellowship. The host institute was the Department of Natural Resource Management, University College Dublin. Notes 1 The ‘Celtic Tiger’ refers to the Irish economic boom of the 1990s. 2 Graber (Citation1976, p. 10) argued that one goes to wilderness in an attempt to transcend one's ordinary world, self and manners of perception; in other words, to have a transcendent, religious experience. 3 The man in question was given several prior warnings. The large-scale removal of limestone pavements, often for use in rockeries in both the UK and Ireland, is a big issue in the Burren

Environmental planning · Environmental resource management · Geography · Landscape planning · Political science · Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management · Cultural Heritage Management and Preservation · Environmental Science · Land Use and Ecosystem Services

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub