The document summarizes a social-ecological case study conducted in central Romania. The overall goal of the study was to understand social-ecological changes in the region and identify avenues for sustainable development. The researchers focused on biodiversity and ecosystem services, local attitudes and preferences, and governance issues. Methods included field surveys, interviews, workshops, and scenario planning with stakeholders. Key findings were that the largely peaceful coexistence of people and large carnivores like bears stems from connected forests, traditional herding practices, and tolerance of conflicts. However, different groups desire different futures for the landscape around prosperity, tradition, modernization, and tourism. Outreach activities included publications, posters, presentations, and social media to communicate

1. Joern Fischer, Ine Dorresteijn, Jan Hanspach, Tibor Hartel, Jacqueline Loos, Andra Milcu, Friederike Mikulcak
(and others)
Email: jfischer@leuphana.de Blog: http://ideas4sustainability.wordpress.com/ Twitter: @ideas4sust
A social-ecological case study in Central Romania

2. Transylvania’s natural and cultural values

3. From de-coupling to re-coupling the SES
Fischer et al. 2012 Conserv Letters

4. From de-coupling to re-coupling the SES
Fischer et al. 2012 Conserv Letters

5. Goal and overview of activities
Overall goal:
to understand social-ecological changes in the region, and
identify avenues for sustainable development
Focus on:
Theme Methods
Biodiversity and ecosystem services Field surveys, mapping of ES
bundles
Preferences and attitudes of local
people
Photo-based Q method, interviews
on human-carnivore conflicts
Governance, barriers to adaptation
and transformation
Policy analysis, stakeholder
interviews
Equity and justice (ecosystem
services)
Workshops, drawing on Daw et al.
2011
Integration (b/w disciplines and with
stakeholders)
Scenario planning with stakeholders

6. Stratified random selection of 30 village catchments

8. Largely peaceful coexistence over centuries stems from: (1) large, connected forest patches,
(2) traditional shepherding, and (3) high tolerance towards occasional conflicts
Coexistence of people and bears

9. Contested landscape preferences
Different groups of people want different
things from the landscape:
tradition, modernisation, tourism, …

10. Contested landscape preferences
Prosperity and wealth Balance and tradition

12. Outreach examples
Booklet
PENSOFT: Open access, ~ 60 pages
Current version Romanian/Hungarian
(English and German coming up!)
Posters
15 posters exhibited at ~ 10 venues
for several weeks each
Postcards
Thousands depicting four scenarios

14. Outreach and communication
Flyers, poster exhibitions, presentations in villages, distribution of
booklets to NGOs & local politicians, postcards
Facebook page (RO): facebook.com/peisaje.sustenabile
Blog: ideas4sustainability.wordpress.com
All research findings: peisajesustenabile.wordpress.com
(under construction!)
Additional papers currently in revision, most likely forthcoming in Frontiers in Ecology and
the Environment, Land Use Policy, Ecology and Society, Ursus, PLoS One, Biodiversity and
Conservation, Landscape Ecology; various others in preparation
Thanks to my PhD students and postdocs, and other collaborators!
Thanks to the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation for funding