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Practical experience from the Ukuvuka Campaign, a short-term initiative in the governance of fire in the Cape Peninsula, Cape Town, South Africa offers insights that may have an application in enhancing ecosystem governance. Effective ecosystem governance requires many behaviour changes among citizens, both individual and institutional. Ukuvuka explored, facilitated and catalysed a number of these changes. The lessons learned are also used to look specifically at the interaction between government and society in ecosystem governance. Finally, the paper evaluates the model of ecosystem governance prepared as a basis for discussion at the international symposium on ecosystem governance held at KwaMaritane in October 2005.

Ukuvuka Operation Firestop Campaign was a four-year partnership set up to address the issue of fire in the Cape Peninsula. The initiative was triggered by a crisis caused by serious veld fires that burnt some 30% of Table Mountain National Park which Cape Town surrounds, and also damaged or destroyed some 60 homes and buildings. In addition, the campaign was challenged to focus some attention on the on-going problem of fires in informal settlements.

The governance lessons learned were that:

South African political reform coincided with a global trend in the reform of water resource management. Consequently, South Africa is an excellent case study in the role of water in addressing historic socio-economic inequity while at the same time trying to legislate for sustainable development. Undoing the legacy of more than a century of institutionalised discrimination is a complex undertaking made even more problematic by the fact that water scarcity constraints limit the future South African economic potential. Getting it right is therefore a political necessity and also a necessary condition for the future wellbeing of a country that plays a vital role as the engine of growth on the African continent. This chapter charts the evolution of a fledgling democracy in which water resources management is seen as a vehicle for social and environmental justice as well as a tool for deepening the democratic experience. The case of the Phongolopoort Dam is used to illustrate these complexities.

Complexity and, by implication, change and uncertainty, are inherent features of ecosystems. In managing ecosystems, or linked social-ecological systems, decisions are often based on insufficient or uncertain data and information. Appropriate and sufficient knowledge, which essentially resides in people, is a critical factor for making informed decisions under such circumstances. Informed action is a function of what we know, and our knowledge is a product of what and how we have learned.

Because of the central importance of learning, this chapter proposes that the development of an appropriate learning capability should not be left to chance but should be the result of deliberate intervention to establish the conditions for an organisation to operate in a learning mode. Focusing on organisations or agencies with mandates for ecosystem governance, the chapter sets out to identify the principles that will enable the creation of such learning environments.

Firstly, the key concepts of knowledge, learning and ecosystem governance are defined. Secondly, the chapter identifies main issues of concern regarding (a) the type of knowledge that needs to be created for good ecosystem governance; (b) the desirable processes for learning or knowledge creation; and (c) the characteristics of good learners. Thirdly, these main issues (10 in all) form the basis for formulating nine principles intended to enable the setting up of appropriate learning environments for ecosystem governance.

The proposed principles are summarised as follows. Good ecosystem governance requires positively persistent and adaptive people with a culture of empathy for other knowledge systems and levels. Their knowledge must be trans-disciplinary, moulded by a common future focus, acquired by patiently engaging their prior knowledge and learning by doing, in an environment of social knowledge sharing.

It is concluded that good learning practice would promote the achievement of some of the principles underlying the practice of good ecosystem governance, notably effective stakeholder engagement, adaptability and transformability. The proposed learning principles could be used as a framework to assess the learning proficiency of ecosystem management agencies and to develop learning strategies for such agencies.

Within South Africa, active public participation in decision-making processes and policy development is a requirement for governance to be successful. Similarly, ecosystem governance requires active public participation in environmental issues. For the public to become progressively more involved in decision-making, an increase in public understanding of, active involvement in and engagement with science, is needed. This emphasises the importance of sound science communication strategies that will lead to informed responses to environmental issues.

This Chapter describes the role of communication between the components of the ecosystem governance Trialogue Model, namely science, society and government. The focus is directed particularly towards the role of communication in the society-science interface, highlighting the lessons learnt and communication challenges arising from the South African River Health Programme’s State-of-Rivers reporting component.

Integrated river management in the state of Victoria, Australia has evolved considerably over the last fifteen years on a range of fronts, including the policy framework, level of community involvement, the technical base and the institutional arrangements. The Victorian River Health Programme is now regarded as the most successful river management and restoration programme in Australia. This chapter describes that programme, looks at how it has evolved over the last fifteen years in particular, and analyses some of the key factors influencing this evolution. It then examines the Trialogue Model for ecosystem governance in the light of the Victorian experience, concluding that, whilst the Trialogue hypothesis is correct at a very high level, it needs to build in a third dimension — that of . This recognises that action at any one point in time can only occur to the extent supported by the three components taken together, and that evolution will occur only incrementally, building on past achievements and knowledge.

Sustainable development is recognised as being core to the concept of good ecosystem governance, as is the amity of the relationship between government and society in the co-management of the environment. This relationship between government and society is a complex one, influenced by certain factors, including political and socio-economic systems, societal culture and science and technology. Science is believed to play a fundamental role in (i) understanding the relationship between government and society; (ii) capacitating society to enable them to engage effectively with government; and (iii) supporting government in the development of scientifically- sound policies and programmes, which aim to find a balance between development and ecosystem protection.

The Trialogue that develops between government, society and science and the engagement of the three partners along the Trialogue interfaces, is a dynamic and complex interaction, influenced by the political system of a country, the maturity and age of its democracy, the culture of the government departments and the conditions of society. Three models which look at the strength and rate of engagement along the Trialogue interfaces in an undemocratic society, a fledgling democracy and a maturing democracy are briefly discussed.

Governance as a concept has been interrogated in the various chapters of this book. A definition of governance was suggested along with a series of hypotheses that together formed the Trialogue Model of Governance. This new definition is revisited and the different hypotheses are evaluated against the empirical background provided by the respective case studies presented in this book.