The role of sense of place in community-based natural resource management : internalising the human-nature relationship to develop sustainability
Creators: name: Dunball, Mark Edward
Publisher: name: Southern Cross University
Year: 2020
Subjects: Human-nature relationship
Gardens
Internalisation
Sense of place
Territoriality
Social-ecological systems
Sustainable development
Grounded theory
Post-qualitative inquiry

description: The increasingly recognised nature/society duality in western culture has been said to contribute to a loss of sense of place. This loss of sense of place has been blamed for many of the environmental issues now facing humanity and inhibits progress towards a linked social-ecological system. Thereby preventing modern society from becoming truly sustainable. Taking an experimental approach to the qualitative research method of grounded theory, this study investigates the process of internalisation as a central role in people’s relationship with nature and place. This research uses the home garden as a signifier of the human-nature relationship, and as a place of personal significance where encounters and interactions with nature are most common. From this research, a conceptual model of the human-nature relationship developed, through the application of grounded theory methodology, from emergent categories of structure, process, and pattern of relationship. The model understands the human-nature relationship as internalisation processes that influence the external place and contact with nature through behaviour, and, in turn, how nature and place are experienced through internalisation constructs. Both the experience of nature and contact with nature are mediated through the individual lens. The model provides a tool to improve human relationships with nature that may enhance personal and ecological wellbeing in place. By aligning embedded internalisation scales of nature with the realities of nature, it is possible to align the experience of nature with the contact that occurs through behaviour. Findings suggest the importance of the interplay between cognisant (personal) and operational (scientific) perspectives of nature play a key role in the human-nature relationship, with the salient meanings behind an individual’s perceived dependence on nature being a critical factor in the internalisation process. Using the concepts of sense of place and territoriality, the model is scaled up to provide a tool that may enable/inspire/support change in community perspectives of nature to improve community-based natural resource management and social-ecological outcomes. It is anticipated that the model may be applicable to all human-nature relationship contexts. Unexpectedly, from the conceptual model’s principles and constructs, emerged a perspective of development within the sustainable development, and human-nature, paradigm. That is, to maintain and enhance social and ecological wellbeing through an internal process to enhance an external relationship developed in place over time. This adds to the concept of sustainable development and suggests that internalising the human-nature relationship may contribute a potential pathway towards an ultimate goal of sustainable development: a harmonious human-nature relationship.