{"id":11986,"date":"2016-10-14T08:00:31","date_gmt":"2016-10-14T12:00:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/esa.org\/esablog\/?p=11986"},"modified":"2016-10-14T08:00:31","modified_gmt":"2016-10-14T12:00:31","slug":"envisioning-good-anthropocene","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/esa.org\/esablog\/2016\/10\/14\/envisioning-good-anthropocene\/","title":{"rendered":"Envisioning a good Anthropocene"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Elena Bennett<\/a>, associate professor at the McGill School of Environment and Department of Natural Resource Sciences in Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue, Canada. Bennett and colleagues\u2019 Concepts and Questions article \u201cBright Spots: Seeds of a Good Anthropocene<\/a>\u201d appeared in the October 2016 issue of ESA Frontiers<\/em>.<\/h4>\n
\"An<\/a>

An ancient thatched-roof farm house in Ogamachi, Japan, is typical of the traditional Japanese Satoyama<\/i> agricultural landscapes, which benefit both people and nature. Farm stay programs\u00a0bring\u00a0urban residents to live in\u00a0depopulated rural areas\u00a0and spend time\u00a0participating in daily farm life. These expanding\u00a0programs are bright seeds of potential for a better Anthropocene.\u00a0Credit, Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment<\/i>.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

We are constantly being bombarded with negative visions of the future, which may inhibit our ability to move towards a positive future for the Earth and humanity.<\/p>\n

My coauthors and I are soliciting, exploring, and developing positive visions of futures that are plausible, socially and ecologically desirable, just, and sustainable. We develop these visions of \u201cGood Anthropocenes<\/a>\u201d starting with \u2018bright spots\u2019 \u2014 real places that demonstrate one or more elements that\u00a0might serve as seeds of a better Anthropocene.<\/p>\n

One example of a bright spot is the Health in Harmony<\/a> project, which partners with local communities in Indonesian Borneo to provide low-cost health care in exchange for a commitment to reduce deforestation. Over the past 5 years, they\u2019ve seen a 68 percent decrease in illegal logging along with improvements in health indicators in local communities. Through our project<\/a>, we aim to initiate wider global discussions about the kinds of futures people desire.<\/p>\n

To learn more, you can watch a talk about the project<\/a>, or participate in a webinar<\/a> on the 19th<\/sup> of October at 17h00 CEST.<\/p>\n

\n

Bennett, E.M., M. Solan, R. Biggs, T. McPhearson, A. Norstrom, P. Olsson, L. Pereira, G. D. Peterson, C. Raudsepp-Hearne, F. Beirmann, S. R. Carpenter, E. Ellis, T. Hichert, V. Galaz, M. Lahsen, B. Martin-Lopez, K. A. Nicholas, R. Preisser, G. Vince, J. Vervoort, and J. Xu. 2016. Bright Spots: Seeds of a Good Anthropocene<\/strong>. Frontiers in Ecology and Environment<\/em> 14(8): 441-448.\u00a0doi:10.1002\/fee.1309<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Elena Bennett, associate professor at the McGill School of Environment and Department of Natural Resource Sciences in Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue, Canada. Bennett and colleagues\u2019 Concepts and Questions article \u201cBright Spots: Seeds of a Good Anthropocene\u201d appeared in the October 2016 issue of ESA Frontiers. \u00a0 We are constantly being bombarded with negative visions of the future, which may inhibit our ability…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":50,"featured_media":11987,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[85,2],"tags":[930,979,1791,1797,1806,477],"class_list":["post-11986","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-guest-posts","category-research","tag-anthropocene","tag-deforestation","tag-esafrontiers","tag-frontiersfocus","tag-future","tag-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/esablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11986","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/esablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/esablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/esablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/50"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/esablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11986"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/esablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11986\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/esablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11987"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/esablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11986"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/esablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11986"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/esablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11986"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}