PARENT SESSION
Organized Oral Session 24: Conducting global multi-scale integrated environmental management and research using site-specific research: Lessons learned from the ILTER
Organizer(s): H King and P Bourgeron
Tuesday, August 9, 1:30 PM - 5:00 PM, Meeting Room 516 A, Level 5, Palais des congrès de Montréal

Comparative long term ecological research: A European experience.

van der Leeuw, Sander^*,1, ¹ Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona, USA

ABSTRACT- Recently, Long Term Socio-Environmental Research has taken off in Europe. As a precursor to that initiative, the ARCHAEOMEDES research program of the European Union has investigated socio-environmental dynamics in six southern european countries during the 1990's. Bringing together a multi-disciplinary research team stretching from theoretical physics and mathematics , via the earth and life sciences, to sociology and anthropology, the project has focused on the different ways in which, in Southern Europe, different regions have adapted to the general depopulation of rural areas, and which consequences this has had. The results give important insights into the resilience and vulnerability of the areas concerned, as well as into the difficulties of this kind of research, and areas of investigation to be developed. In particular, the paper will accentuate the need to see environmental issues as societal issues, land abandonment as driven by urban and globalization dynamics, and the need to develop a very long term perspective to the themes involved.

Key words: Socio-environmental research, Southern Europe, Comparative approach