Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
ecological/cultural territory, an area of a transition and connection between the
mountains and the marshlands, is minimal. This attitude should undoubtedly be
viewed as one of the factors that gave rise to the mining catastrophe, not in terms of di-
rect responsibility but rather in the sense that a lack of interest in the river could have
influenced the general lack of social concern regarding the state of the Guadiamar
and the accumulation of risk factors.
All these aspects undoubtedly create very powerful obstacles to the active involve-
ment of the vast majority of the local population. Individuals do not get involved or
participate—even though verbally they might defend their right to do so—in some-
thing they do not consider their own, something they live apart from or actively turn
their back on. This attitude may also have been fueled by the intervention of the au-
thorities following the catastrophe, which, perhaps in an attempt to justify their role in
an event for which the media and political repercussions increased exponentially be-
cause of its proximity to Doñana, assumed total responsibility and prominence in
their actions. The scientists, politicians, and technicians never asked for the collabo-
ration of social agents or local institutions, thereby possibly nourishing the passiveness
of the latter, giving them reasons to neglect their own responsibilities and attribute all
the problems to the actions of the authorities.
The case of the Guadiamar River is a good example of a space that has been “re-
stored” from a physical point of view but continues to be highly vulnerable due to the
estrangement of the population. The ecological functioning of the Green Corridor
and the viability of the strategy to recover the function of the Guadiamar basin as a
nexus between the ecosystems of the mountains and the marshlands depend funda-
mentally on the construction of a broad and solid identification between the popula-
tion as a whole and the space it inhabits. Put simply, the task at hand is to construct a
territory in the global and integral sense of the term. This is not something that can be
achieved overnight from outside local society, or through propaganda and image
alone. Yet it is crucial to promote participation as a strategy to develop the social
framework and produce collective identification with the territory and its ecosystems.
Without a heightened level of socioecological resilience, the Guadiamar basin re-
mains susceptible to continued ecological degradation. A case of a more resilient so-
cioecological system, the Coopesilencio farming cooperative, is presented in box 6.1.
While the social, economic, and political contexts of Coopesilencio are vastly differ-
ent than those in the Guadiamar basin, this case is highlighted as an example of a
space that is strongly territorialized, where the connection between people and their
environment is both robust and flexible enough to create a high level of resilience.
Conclusion
The examples presented here demonstrate the fundamental importance of the sense
of belonging and the identification of the local population with the territory in which
they live. This is especially true in cases where this connection plays a role in restora-
tion efforts following catastrophes, whether they are of natural or human origin. Thus
the participation of local citizens is a critical factor in creating a sense of territory and,
