The Evolving Face of Ecosystem Management

Abstract

Environmentalists have long advocated ecosystem management as the choice resource management paradigm. Ecosystem management grew organically from preceding management paradigms, such as utilitarianism, as these regimes failed to satisfy social values. Managers began realizing the importance of managing from an ecosystem perspective and that translated into the government adoption of this paradigm in the early 1990s. Studies have been done to determine how ecosystem management concepts and implementation have been evolving. This study examines the use of the term “ecosystem management” in scholarly literature and by federal agencies who adopted this paradigm. Data suggest that the use of this term has declined since the late 1990s, with change involving primarily etymological and bureaucratic factors.