Working with Nature in Aotearoa New Zealand

Tackling an issue of crucial importance for human-nature relationships at the coast, this rich ethnography follows the emergence of ›soft‹ coastal protection in practice.

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Working with nature - and not against it - is a global trend in coastal management. This ethnography of coastal protection follows the increasingly popular approach of "soft" protection to the Aotearoa New Zealand coast. Friederike Gesing analyses a political controversy over hard and soft protection measures, and introduces a growing community of practice involved in projects of working with nature. Dune restoration volunteers, coastal management experts, surfer-scientists, and Maori conservationists are engaged in projects ranging from do-it-yourself erosion control, to the reconstruction of native nature, and soft engineering "in concert with natural processes". With soft protection, Gesing argues, we can witness a new sociotechnical imaginary in the making.