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1 Introduction

The end of tradition and of customary practices is a massive threat to heritage, history and biodiversity (Rotherham 2009a, b, c, 2010). Indeed, it can be argued that the end of traditional land management and the impacts then of cultural severance are as big a threat as climate change to biodiversity and ecology. This book considers the threats to biodiversity from cultural change and the abandonment of traditional management. In recent decades, we have heard much about climate change and the threats that this may pose in the future but in terms of biodiversity ‘The End of Tradition’ is potentially bigger and more current (Fig. 1.1).

Fig. 1.1
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Abandoned coppice

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The threats from global cultural change and abandonment of traditional, landscape management increased in the last half of the twentieth century and ten years into the twenty-first century show no signs of slowing down (Agnoletti 2006, 2007). Their impacts on global biodiversity and on people disconnected from their traditional landscapes pose real and serious economic and social problems, and these must be addressed. The contributions to the book consider fundamental issues of whether we can conserve the biodiversity of wonderful and iconic landscapes and reconnect people to their natural environment. Moreover, if we can, how might we do so and make them relevant for the twenty-first century. We cover the lessons of archaeology, history and ecology and look at the challenges for modern-day management with examples drawn from rural and urban commons, wooded landscapes, heaths, moors, coasts and wetlands. In particular, we raise critically important issues of the loss and abandonment of tradition and customary practice in terms of future sustainability, landscape quality and biodiversity. The book is international in flavour with leading researchers from around the world contributing key chapters. This important text seeks to address issues of landscape and nature conservation informed by an understanding of historical processes. This is not always easy, since as Lowenthal (1985) pointed out, the past is largely a ‘foreign country’. Indeed, this historical context provides the impetus for the book since our cultural memory of past practices is short-lived (Rotherham 2007a) and even the community-based knowledge of traditions is being lost. The scene is set in Part 1 with contributions from Olwig, Rotherham and Green. In Part 2 follows a series of major case studies from around the world. Part 3 presents major contributions on the history and uses of commons and common resources. Then, looking forwards, Part 4 addresses issues and approaches for future commons and cultural landscapes. Finally, Part 5 provides a summary and overview.

The book stems from invited contributions by participants in the major conference held in Sheffield in 2010—‘The End of Tradition? Aspects of Commons and Cultural Severance in the Landscape’ held at Sheffield Hallam University from 15th to the 17th September 2010. The event included nearly fifty lectures plus displays, poster presentations, and extended discussions throughout 3 days. There was a strong community dimension with members of local groups, students, and volunteers, and the organisers involved both academics and practitioners from around the world. There were opportunities to share and compare local, national and international experiences of the important challenges facing biodiversity in the twenty-first century. This was a landmark discussion and debate with key organisations. Participating and supporting institutions included Natural England, English Heritage, the National Trust, the Biodiversity and Landscape History Research Institute, the Woodland Trust, The Wildlife Trusts, the RSPB, BANC, OPAL, the International Association for the Study of Commons, the Ancient Tree Forum, the European Society for Environmental History, and the International Union of Forest Research Organisations, and many others.

2 Conference Topics Included:

  • Conservation at the crossroads

  • The impacts of changes from subsistence, often rural, communities and landscapes to technology driven agri-industry and urbanisation, and the consequences for local people

  • Commons in the urban landscape and community involvement

  • The historical and current uses and management of traditional ‘commons’

  • The ‘common’ uses of landscapes and environmental resources now and historically, from medieval coppice woods to deer parks, from alpine pastures to grazing meadows, from coastal flats to peat bogs and fens

  • The debates around perceived ‘re-wilding’ of natural areas or ‘abandonment’ and

  • ‘Dereliction’ of cultural landscapes

  • The decline of biodiversity and ecology

  • Future visions and actions

3 Conservation at the Crossroads: Cultural Severance and the End of Tradition

We suggest that the global ecosystem is now at a tipping point for historic landscapes and that changes are occurring which are very damaging for the sustainability of the ecological resource (Agnoletti 2006, 2007; Rotherham 2005, 2006). However, the issues are not merely to do with biodiversity but the ecological declines are paralleled, (and in many ways tied to), widespread degradation of entire landscapes. These changes are closely related to declining rural economies, widespread depopulation of the countryside, and importantly in terms of future economic performance, a latent erosion of tourism potential (Doncaster et al. 2006; Rotherham 2008a, b; Rotherham and Harrison 2009). In short, this is the quiet catastrophe in the countryside, with the cutting of humanity’s umbilical cord with nature and a seismic shift from rural to urban living. In many ways, this also suggests an uncertain and unsustainable future with a rift in society, economy and ecology and significant breaks in rural economic functions (Fig. 1.2).

Fig. 1.2
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Ancient open-grown oak now shrouded

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This is a growing crisis of global proportions and it feels as if nobody has noticed. The lack of recognition—by decision-makers, by agencies, by politicians, by the media, and even by many researchers, means there is a lack of a viable future vision.

4 Cultural Severance and Climate Change

The impacts of cultural severance (Rotherham 2007a, b, 2009a, b, c), of human-induced climate change and natural climate change, each individually and in combination, present great challenges to environmental sustainability (Rotherham 2010). Cultural severance and associated land-use changes have impacted on and influenced climate—through destruction of vegetation, of soils, and particularly the loss of fens, bogs, heaths, moors, and other lands with extensive organic soils. These losses have released massive quantities of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Moves to petrol-chemically driven technologies and urban living have released huge amounts of carbon dioxide and massive quantities of waste energy as heat into the environment. With cultural severance from traditional landscapes, and fuelled by petrochemicals, agri-industry and industrial forestry have combined with urbanisation to destroy and fragment habitats and to bring about gross transformation of entire landscapes (Rotherham 2010; Rotherham 2012a, b).

These transformed landscapes and their fragmented habitats have only limited ability to respond to climate change—to moderate impacts and to mollify adverse trends—so species cannot move or adapt and biodiversity is threatened. The landscapes no longer respond to climatic pressures or for example, to extreme weather events and both floods and droughts have become commonplace. Basic ecosystem services and functions are under stress and increasingly under threat.

5 As yet Unrecognised and Unspoken

There needs to be recognition of the issues, their causes, the historic context, and the scale of the consequent challenges. The historic problem and its causes are indeed rooted in the past but at the same time, over time change is inevitable. The severity of the problem faced today relates to the scale of change, the time-periods of the changes, and the global nature of the effects. The associated declines in ecology and biodiversity are massive and so no sign of abating. It is worth considering particular national case study examples.

So in Britain alone, during the twentieth century we have seen:

  • Catastrophic loss of lowland heaths and commons

  • Almost the entire destruction of lowland wet fens, raised bogs, marshes and wet woods

  • The collapse of populations of most butterflies, many farmland birds, bats, reptiles and amphibians and more

  • The extinctions of huge numbers of flowering plants and ferns in many regions

  • The removal of most medieval parks and their veteran trees

  • The drainage of most upland moors and bogs

  • The loss of most ancient unimproved pastures and meadows

  • The cessation of traditional coppice management of woods and the loss of about half the ancient woods in the last 50 years

  • And creeping urbanisation or gentrification of much of the countryside—the ‘greying of the green’

  • Massive spread of invasive species and especially of invasive exotic or alien species

  • A comprehensive failure to address the wider issues of decline beyond the cosmetic or the desperate—and no wider evidence of any recovery by key indicator species or groups of species

  • The severance of people’s contact with nature to a point where many can no longer recognise or identify even commonplace species

We can see the impacts and changes through history as communities interact with nature to modify, manage, and sometimes destroy the resource. Across the globe, human impacts are deeply etched into the landscape; in many cases, over centuries, there have evolved sophisticated systems to manage the resources sustainably. However, in recent times, but varying across the world, the management have become more intensive and less sustainable. The effects are seen from the developed, industrial Western countries and now increasingly in the emerging economies too. For many ecosystems and their associated habitats and species, such as woodlands and forests, peatlands, bogs, fens and heaths, and grasslands of various sorts, impacts can be tracked through time (e.g. Rotherham 1999, 2009a, b, c, 2010, 2011; Webb 1986, 1998) (Fig. 1.3).

Fig. 1.3
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Overgrown commonland SSSI with abandoned wood

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The same processes are now happening across the globe and at an accelerating rate. From tropical rainforests to Mediterranean grassland and maquis, traditional uses and customary management practices are abandoned, communities leave the rural areas, and landscapes become derelict. Consequences include rapid build-up of biomass and vulnerability to wildfires (Pyne 2001), loss of unique biodiversity, and depression of the rural economy. Furthermore, these landscapes and their ecologies are contested spaces. Insidious processes of globalisation overturn and replace local, long-term traditions and customary practices, rapidly displacing indigenous communities that have long-term associations with distinctive places. Some of these complex issues are beyond the immediate scope of this book, but for the first time, we have attempted to provide a broad overview of the issues and to illustrate and illuminate this with pertinent examples and case studies from around the world.

6 Conclusions

In terms of policies and decision-making, a number of key steps are essential. We need to: (1) Recognise the ‘Eco-Cultural’ nature of landscapes and their biodiversity and (2) Re-establish links with nature. Then in order to prevent or at least limit extinctions we must: (3) Mimic traditional management methods and their impacts in conservation sites such as nature reserves; and (4) Establish social and economic links between nature, landscape and ecology. However, this will require a political shift in thinking and planning and a paradigm shift in conservation and environmentalism.

Future visions for a sustainable environment must recognise the lessons of human history and the impacts of culture and of history. Most importantly, for future hopes of improved sustainability we need to maximise ecosystem function benefits to humanity not diminish them and as climate change happens, natural and human-induced, help nature to respond and to minimise the damage.