Nurturing ecosystem-based adaptations in South Africa’s Garden Route: a common pool resource governance perspective

Increasing human demands for ecosystem services due to climate change, population growth, poverty, lack of employment, tourism,
and concomitant coastal property development threatens adaptive capacity in SouthAfrica’s coastlines.Adaptation strategies frequently
propose ecosystem-based adaptation (EBA) as a model for transformative change. However, several studies point to difficulties
implementing EBA across the world. The aim of this paper is to assess to what extent social-ecological systems approaches and
common pool resource (CPR) governance theories could inform EBA. Data obtained from interviews and surveys with policy makers
and residents in South Africa’s Garden Route District were interpreted using the robustness framework (RF) and the design principles
(DPs), two common tools for analyzing CPR governance.We found that the Garden Route coast is threatened by negative interactions
between hard public and private infrastructures and ecological infrastructures (the cornerstone of EBA) which are driven by weak local
government bodies and asymmetrical power relations. By coding the data for elements/interactions within the RF and then identifying
and mapping the DPs onto the RF, we also revealed ways to leverage transformative EBA in the Garden Route. Our analyses suggest
that the interactions between human-made and ecological infrastructures, as well as power relation, should be at the core of any
development debate. Trade-offs should aim for maximum congruence between sustainability and equity in ecosystem services
provisioning. This paper provides some considerations for researchers and decision makers to leverage transformative EBA that could
potentially apply to areas experiencing similar challenges.