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Public Understanding of Science
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The (im)balance of nature: a public perception time-lag?

Richard J. Ladle

Oxford University Centre for the Environment, Oxford University, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3QY, UK, Richard.ladle{at}ouce.ox.ac.uk

Lindsey Gillson

Plant Conservation Biology in the Botany Department at the University of Cape Town

The last two decades have seen a conceptual shift within environmental and social sciences from an emphasis on ecosystem stability and balance to an acknowledgement of the importance of flux and change in the natural world. This has profound implications for conservation management and policy and has driven an (incomplete) transition from managing to maintain (bio)diversity and ecological stability at some historically derived "optimum" to managing to maintain important ecosystem and evolutionary processes such as nutrient cycles and migration. Here, we investigate whether this change from a "balance of nature" metaphor to a more dynamic perspective ("flux of nature") is reflected in the representation of conservation and ecosystem management in the news media, the Internet, and the academic literature. We found that the media and the global Internet community still portray the aim of conservation science and of conservationists as being one of maintaining stability, harmony and balance.

This version was published on March 1, 2009

Public Understanding of Science, Vol. 18, No. 2, 229-242 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/0963662507082893
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