Bring the perspectives into the room

A conversation with a consultant helping local councils prepare for rising sea levels left me thinking about how we approach ecological challenges.

Along our coastlines, communities face decisions about protecting homes, infrastructure and places people care deeply about. Do we build protective walls? Plan for retreat? What other possibilities might emerge if we explored the question together?

A few weeks earlier, a conversation in Sydney had raised similar questions about repeatedly flooded homes around Lismore. I heard about people facing the loss of insurance cover and the difficult prospect of leaving their homes. How do you begin a conversation about relocation when someone's home, financial security and sense of belonging are all involved?

These questions ask a great deal of the people affected. They also ask something of those leading the response: a willingness to bring different perspectives together while the answer is still taking shape.

People have something at stake

An ecologist I heard recently spoke about the need to increase biodiverse plantings in the Adelaide Hills. That immediately raises questions about engaging the people who own and work the land.

Farmers need to earn a living. Coastal residents may have much of their wealth tied up in their homes. Governments carry responsibilities for infrastructure, public spending and people's safety.

Each perspective holds part of the picture.

Scientific knowledge helps us understand environmental processes and risks. First Nations knowledge brings understandings of caring for Country, including land and sea. Residents and landholders know things about living and working in a place that may be missing from formal assessments.

I think innovation in how we bring these perspectives together belongs within the response itself.

When authorities develop a preferred answer and then invite community feedback, people encounter a proposal whose assumptions they have had little opportunity to examine. Bringing them into the thinking earlier creates room to explore what matters, what is changing and what responses might be possible.

Start with a picture of success

My Perspectives to Progress model offers a way to approach this work.

For coastal adaptation, I would begin by asking whose perspectives we need. Scientists, First Nations people, local residents, planning authorities and local government all come to mind. State government representatives responsible for infrastructure and long-term investment also need to participate.

Who else will live with the consequences? Whose knowledge or experience could change how we understand the challenge?

We then invite those people to develop a vision story together. What would success look and feel like for the people who live and work here? What would they notice in their everyday lives?

This is different from agreeing on a preferred solution. We are not yet choosing between protective walls and planned retreat. We are exploring what matters and what we hope our response will make possible.

Differences will emerge. Whose future are we imagining? What does that future offer people with fewer resources? How does it support healthy ecosystems and future generations?

Working through those questions helps make our values visible. The vision story gives us a reference point for considering possible responses and, later, assessing what we are learning.

What kind of work is needed?

With that vision in view, we can examine the technical and adaptive work involved.

Technical work draws on existing knowledge and expertise. Coastal risk modelling, engineering assessments and infrastructure costings can help us understand what is possible and the consequences of different options.

Adaptive work involves reprioritising values and examining the mental models shaping people's actions. More information alone will not do that work for us.

In an ecological challenge, this might mean exploring what people understand by protection, ownership, responsibility or a viable livelihood. It may involve reconsidering what needs to be preserved and what we might need to let go of.

These challenges usually involve both kinds of work. Scientific and technical expertise remains essential, alongside conversations through which people examine what matters and what may need to change.

These conversations can be demanding. A discussion about coastal retreat may touch someone's memories, identity and financial future. A conversation about biodiversity may raise genuine concerns about a farm's income. Those concerns deserve time and attention.

Facilitators also need to hold their interpretations lightly. In a complex system, we are always developing hypotheses about why the system responds as it does.

If someone strongly opposes an option, we can ask what informs their position and what they believe is at stake. We can develop several possible explanations and test them through listening and further inquiry.

That discipline helps us stay curious about people whose responses we find difficult to understand.

Let the response emerge

We do not need to settle the whole response before taking action.

With a vision of success to guide us, we can identify something to try and what we need to learn. This might be a small, safe-to-learn experiment. Where a response requires greater investment, we might develop and test a prototype before committing more substantial resources.

Together, we establish boundaries appropriate to the risks, agree who will take responsibility for what, and decide how we will monitor what happens.

We then return to our vision story. Are we moving towards the success we imagined? What effects are we noticing? What have we learnt that should shape our next step?

The response emerges over time through this ongoing work of making sense, acting, learning and responding.

Some decisions will still sit with elected representatives or statutory authorities. Being clear about those responsibilities, available resources and the scope for influence gives the conversation a firmer footing.

For your next ecological challenge, begin before a preferred answer has been settled. Ask:

·         Whose perspectives do we need together?

·         What would success look and feel like?

·         What technical and adaptive work is involved?

·         What could we try, and how will we learn whether it moves us towards that vision?

Write those questions into the engagement brief while there is still room for the answers to shape the work.