Adaptive collaborative management of community forests in Asia ...

Chapter 2.
Adaptive Collaborative Management:
A Conceptual Model
Ravi Prabhu, Cynthia McDougall and Robert Fisher
In the previous chapter we discussed the importance of
flexibility in decision making, management and action, and we argued
that this is especially critical in the sphere of forests because so much is
unknown and changing. John H. Holland (1998: 248), who popularised
genetic algorithms and is one of the world’s leading researchers of complex
adaptive systems—such as forests—formulated the following question to
guide his own investigations into the behaviour of such systems: ‘How can
the interactions of agents produce an aggregate entity that is more flexible
and adaptive than its component agents?’
Although Holland used the question as a frame within which to explore
the phenomenon of emergence, it could easily serve as the driving question
for forest management in the new millennium. It was in response to this
question that the CIFOR and partner research teams explored concepts,
processes and tools for flexibility, innovation—and ultimately effectiveness
and equity—under the heading of an adaptive collaborative management
(ACM) approach to forestry.