Rethinking trade-offs in nature-based solutions from a multispecies justice perspective

Publication date

2025-08-18

Authors

Wijsman, Katinka
Pineda-Pinto, Melissa
Sarkki, Simo
Stijnen, CharlotteISNI 0000000512623982
Den Dekker-Arlain, Janneke
Raymond, Christopher M.

Editors

Advisors

Supervisors

Document Type

Article
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License

cc_by

Abstract

Trade-offs in nature-based solutions are increasingly recognized, with novel research interrogating their justice implications. Yet, these trade-offs and justice implications remain entrenched in an anthropocentric orientation, which is problematic in ecological and ethical terms. We discuss four common assumptions on trade-offs in NBS (instrumentalism, neutrality of science, collaborative consensus, and unitemporality) and rethink them through a multispecies justice lens, maintaining that dealing with trade-offs is a form of interspecies politics.

Keywords

Environmental Engineering, Computational Mechanics, Ecology, Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Citation

Wijsman, K, Pineda-Pinto, M, Sarkki, S, Stijnen, C, den Dekker-Arlain, J & Raymond, C M 2025, 'Rethinking trade-offs in nature-based solutions from a multispecies justice perspective', npj Urban Sustainability, vol. 5, no. 1, 67. https://doi.org/10.1038/s42949-025-00261-5