Handling a messy world: Lessons learned when trying to make the ecosystem services concept operational

Abstract

The concept of ecosystem services (ES) is widely used in the scientific literature and increasingly also in policy and practice. Nevertheless, operationalising the concept, i.e. putting it into practice, is still a challenge. We describe the approach of the EU-project OpenNESS (Operationalisation of Ecosystem Services and Natural Capital), which was created to critically evaluate the concept when applied to real world problems at different scales and in different policy sectors. General requirements for operationalization and lessons learnt from 27 case study applications are synthesized in a set of guiding principles. We also describe some integrative tools as developed in OpenNESS supporting the implementation of the principles. The principles are grouped under three headlines: “Defining the problem and opening up the problem space”, “Considering ethical issues” and “Assessing alternative methods, tools and actions”. Real world problems are seldom clear-cut and well-defined, but often complex and subject to differing interpretations. We take account of that complexity and emphasise that there is not one simple and straightforward way to approach real world problems involving ES. The principles and tools presented are meant to provide some guidance for tackling this complexity by means of a transdisciplinary methodology that facilitates operationalisation of the ES concept.