Making Intangibles Tangible: Identifying Manifestations of Cultural Ecosystem Services in a Cultural Landscape

Wei Jiang and Rainer Marggraf
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Wei Jiang: State Key Laboratory of Urban and Regional Ecology, Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100085, China
Rainer Marggraf: Department of Agricultural Economics and Rural Development, Georg-August-University Göttigen, 37073 Gottingen, Germany

Land, 2021, vol. 11, issue 1, 1-14

Abstract: The assessment of cultural ecosystem services (CES) has proved challenging due to their intangible, non-material and invisible characteristics. A number of methods for evaluating CES have been developed, which depend mostly on subjective perceptions and behavior. An objective direction for considering CES is proposed based on the assumption that making use of CES leaves visible manifestations in the physical landscape and human society. The approach developed in this paper attempts to follow this direction by identifying a large amount of manifestations that reflect a wider range of CES types. This approach is applied to a case study of the Weser River in Germany, showing that the local people along the river have benefited from multiple CES of the Weser and created various manifestations of those CES. In the future researches, the identification and documentation of manifestations can be used to map the delivery of CES, to develop indicator systems for CES, to assess heritage value and identity, to indicate spatially explicit preferences on ecosystem characteristics and visual aesthetic qualities, to estimate the economic value of educational and inspirational service, to investigate sense of place, as well as to make better informed landscape management and nature protection.

Keywords: cultural ecosystem services; river ecosystem; manifestations identification; human-nature interactions; Germany (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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