Governing parks and protected areas Raoul Beunen

Park: social-ecological systems that distinguish themselves from their environment. A network of actors, organisations, institutions, discourses, objects, subjects and space What are parks?

Governance: coordination of collective binding decisions in a community Spatial planning: the coordination of practices and policies affecting spatial organisation How to conceptualise governance and planning?

Parks are influence by, and are influencing, many societal dynamics (e.g. reflected for example in land use activities) Governance (park) is evolving, changing influenced by existing configuration of actors, institutions and discourses. Polyvocal: many different and competing perspectives on parks and on the way these should be governed Polycentric: many actors on different levels trying to steer Complexity and non-linearity Some reflections

Capacity of parks to innovate and to adapt its structure, role and identity in accordance with dynamic contingences (internal and external; social and ecological). Adaptive or reflexive governance

Diverging and shifting approaches, arrangement and practices Context sensitive Social learning: network of people and experiences Spatial planning and governance