Planting Nature-based Solutions in Latin America: How Decolonial and Dialectical Approaches Can Make Paradigm Shifts Flourish

“NbS”, short for Nature-based Solutions, is a term coined by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, encompassing “actions to protect, sustainably manage, and restore natural and modified ecosystems that address societal challenges effectively and adaptively, simultaneously providing human well-being and biodiversity benefits” (Cohen-Shacham et al., 2016).

Rain gardens, vegetated roofs and walls, wetlands, urban agriculture, and street trees are examples of NbS that can be applied to cities. These solutions can promote a variety of Ecosystem Services, better known as “ES.” As defined by the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA, 2005), these services “are the benefits people obtain from ecosystems” which involve tangible and intangible services. They can be clustered into four categories: (i) provisioning services, such as timber extraction; (ii) regulating services, such as water purification; (iii) supporting services, such as nutrient cycling and (iv) cultural services, such as recreation. NbS, via its Ecosystem Services provision, can contribute to addressing the New Urban Agenda (UN, 2017) and supporting a number of Sustainable Development Goals (UNEP, 2019). The image presented below represents the categories of NbS and its ES, as put together in the Urban Nature Atlas (ALMASSY et al., 2018):

Categories and examples of NbS and the Ecosystem Services they can promote. Source: based on ALMASSY et al. (2018), adapted by the author.

Ecosystem Services can have a rather utilitarian view of nature, a strand of capitalism which has great environmental consequences in commodity-based economies such as those in Latin America. Nature does not need to provide a commodified utility to humankind, as the indigenous leader Krenak (2020) reminds us. Although ES provides the possibility for different areas of knowledge to inform dialogue and action, it is a concept underpinned by a neoliberal view of the world, which relegates value quantification to market relations (SCHLAEPFER et al., 2017). Assigning a value to nature has the great potential drawback of only taking into account human economic concepts, as the full comprehension of the complexity of nature remains out of humanity’s reach. On the other hand, it can be used for justifying and quantifying benefits of “greener” solutions, or even pointing out the complications of adding only more “grey” infrastructure, which can be extremely positive in terms of reviewing current mainstream technologies.

This shift towards greener solutions is already apparent in the increasing acceleration of financing for NbS. The May 2021 report State of Finance for Nature (UNEP, 2021) indicates that in order to meet climate mitigation, biodiversity and land restoration targets, the world needs triple the investment of NbS by 2030 and quadruple by 2050. These structures, though, have specific places to be allocated which need planning and have specific design guidelines for addressing local natural pressures and social needs. Hence it is imperative to discuss how designers and planners can make good use of these financing opportunities towards adequate NbS application in the Latin American reality. In this discussion, decoloniality and dialectics can make a great contribution.

SOWING DECOLONIALITY: CREATING EMANCIPATION

Any physical artifact a human being builds, they plan first. Be it a painting or a city traffic network, it is first visualized in their imagination. As Marx argues in the first volume of Capital, “A spider conducts operations which resemble those of the weaver, and a bee would put many a human architect to shame by the construction of its honeycomb cells. But what distinguishes the worst architect from the best of bees is that the architect builds the cell in his mind before he constructs it in wax” (MARX, 1990). A key to perceiving decoloniality is recognizing how human imagination, where thoughts shape technological and scientific production, is largely influenced by history, culture, and its immediate context.

The world’s current socioeconomic system, now in its neoliberal expression, tends to homogenize this same imaginary and by extension disable the human capacity of perceiving diversity. Shiva (1993) described this phenomenon as a “mind monoculture.” In this context, there is a structural possibility of putting aside local needs when planning and designing NbS. Because Latin America has been a colonized territory, it does end up often directly reproducing what has been developed in Europe. As a result, practitioners may ignore that every new physical structure has to be in harmony with its immediate sociocultural and biogeophysical environments.

This direct reproduction of European designs without local adaptation is a common mistake. The fact that colonized countries are now independent does not make them fully emancipated territories, even centuries after their colonizing processes. Developed countries, known as the “Global North,” still apply great influence over the imaginary of developing countries, known as the “Global South,” and still expropriate tangible and intangible resources from these territories. Historical aspects underpin the present and are thus reflected in humanity’s technologies. Feenberg (2010) shows, for example, how child labour in textiles was largelly accepted during the Industrial Revolution in England under arguments such that employing adults for some tasks could be inneficient for society. Technology, in this sense, is never a neutral product (WINNER, 1986) but always a byproduct of its time and context.

"Because Latin America has been a colonized territory, it does end up often directly reproducing what has been developed in Europe. As a result, practitioners may ignore that every new physical structure has to be in harmony with its immediate sociocultural and biogeophysical environments."

In this sense, the Global North will not always be the solution for struggles in the Global South, as it has historically been the main promoter of these. For instance, while improving their own climate indicators, countries from the Global North keep their corporations extracting resources and depleting natural ecosystems in the Global South, as Russau (2016) exposes.

This same decolonial care of considering technologies locally should be applied to Nature-based Solutions. Regarding nature, answers should be found close to where questions are posed. Local people, the ones that have been effectively managing local biodiversity for centuries, should therefore lead the way. Indigenous communities show that the paradigm of development, which aspires for growth, resource extraction, and control of nature, can be shifted. For that, Acosta and Brand (2018) demonstrate that a post-extractivism needs to be taken up in the Global South. The authors also argue that de-growth should be a mandatory perspective for the Global North, which in many cases also suits big cities in the Global South.

Açaí berry harvester Edil looking upward for bunches to collect in the Marajó Archipelago, at the Amazon Rainforest, in a traditional Extractive Reserve. Source: the author, 2017.

Decolonial approaches for urban Nature-based Solutions that take into account the reality and originary heritage of Latin America include (1) social technology, (2) science and innovation, (3) communitary work and solidarity, (4) aesthetics, and (5) different types of NbS.

As previously mentioned, technology is not neutral. Vegetated roofs, for example, may fall into expensive and specialized structures, demanding costly retrofittings only accessible to consumers with significant purchasing power. On the other hand, examples of vegetated roofs are being applied as social technologies in which practitioners, scientists, and citizens come together to learn in a participatory way. As Freire (1967) states: “No one liberates himself by his own efforts alone, neither is he liberated by others. Men are liberated in communion.” There is a great difference between thinking of a product to generate profit and thinking of a product to address socio-environmental issues. Intensive vertical gardens, for example, can be extremely costly; they are profitable businesses but generate limited Ecosystem Services. When taking this difference into account, Nature-based Solutions can foster transformative practices that bring low-cost alternatives and strengthen neighborhoods. 

In the scientific industry, investments should be made so that scientists can empirically quantify the tangible and intangible impacts of NbS in Latin American cities. Scientific research can involve monitoring the efficiency of these structures and producing data so that local governments and policy-makers can decide on how best to apply NbS across their cities. Research can also provide technological innovation and guidelines for planning and design, also applying pressure on local governments for mainstreaming NbS and provisioning technical assistance for communities to manage these structures.

For NbS applied at small scale, group work for participatory construction or maintenance can be a decolonial practice towards an economy of solidarity. In El Buen Vivir, Acosta (2016) emphasizes elements of economic relations from indigeous communities in the Amazon and the Andes which can be directly applied to NbS practices: (i) Minka, a practice of mutual and reciprocal communitary help; (ii) Ranti-ranti, a solidary exchange of labour without money; (iii) Makipurarina, gathering hands together for work on something that can benefit many; (iv) Uniguilla, an exchange of food between producers of different geographical zones to diversify their diets and have food security in times of seasonality.

Aesthetic aspects and botanical choices also play a part in colonized territories: from reproducing nature domination by controlling plant growth and using pesticides, to selecting which plants are considered welcome and which are considered weeds. Even the sense of bringing “nature back” comes from a modernist heritage (BRAUN, 2008, as cited in MIKATI, 2020). There are movements from naturalist gardeners incentivizing the use of native species in plant based structures such as NbS; raising awareness to the importance of underestimated ecosystems such as savannas and their grasses, instead of focusing ecosystem restoration into solely trees (see VELDMAN et al., 2015, and O’SULLIVAN AND POON, 2021).

Under a colonized practice of Nature-based Solutions, practitioners in Latin America have also been giving too much attention to the design of new ecosystems (type 1 of NbS, see EGGERMONT et al., 2015), rather than addressing other types of NbS. These other types are relevant to countries where there is still preserved land, which can be the better management of reminiscent natural areas or restored ecosystems (types 2 and 3). The creation of new ecosystems and biodiversity is necessary, especially in cities, but it cannot divert the political attention to the still existent patches of green that are consumed everyday by cities' growth and densification. In this sense, dialectically thinking of cities as part of a greater unity of nature can be useful.

SOWING DIALECTICS: VISUALIZING NATURE AS PROCESS

Perceiving this unity of nature is not easy given that the modern era has exacerbated the human impulse for self-differentiation from the rest of nature (KOVEL, 2003; KOVEL, 2007). But as Krenak (2020) and many indigenous communities demonstrate through their day-to-day relation with their surroundings, humans are part of nature. Biotic and abiotic components exist under the same set of natural physical laws (see SIMON, 1996). This alienation, a specific form of separation under capitalism (MIKATI, 2020), has been fogging (WISNIK, 2018) humanity’s understanding of how humankind and the artifacts it creates, such as NbS, fit in this complex system of life on Earth. To better understand this interdependence, it can be useful to view nature not as a static set of objects, but rather as a network of relations, processes, change and contradictions always in motion (MIKATI, 2020). That is perceiving the dialectics of nature.

As Mikati (2020) shows, dialectics is about process, change, and motion. Hegel expresses these ideas in a beautiful passage of his Phenomenology of Spirit (HEGEL, 1807) illustrating change in nature through stages of a tree: from buds, to flowers, into fruits, each phase represents moments or excepts of an organic unity in motion. Creating cities that facilitate visualizing these natural processes or that hamper it is a political decision.

In large cities, natural processes have been taken aside to give way to progress and development. In a capitalist production of space as elucidated by Harvey (2001), urban development aims to provide profit and capital accumulation. The totality of nature is thus not mandatorily taken into account by urban planners and natural processes are hidden from sight just like rivers are suffocated by avenues.

Nature-based Solutions, as a counterpoint, can become pedagogical structures for the learning of natural processes. Locally managing rainwater runoff through the use of rain gardens represents a shift: from trying to quickly get rid of water by dumping it into water bodies and rivers to trying to infiltrate water locally is a way to complete the hydrologic cycle at plain sight. This brings people closer to the processes of nature and facilitates the understanding of its dialectics.

Cyperus sp., an exotic plant spontaneously growing in the cracks of a concrete pavement over a highline in São Paulo, Brazil. Source: the author, 2021.

Different optics are necessary to perceive nature in its totality. When watching a praying mantis eating a grasshopper, natural relations may be perceived as underpinned by competition. But in a wider scope there lies a very well-tuned orchestra of cooperation and mutual dependence. Cities also fit in this interdependent network of life, but urban planning normally gives too little attention to the natural processes that humanity depends on such as water infiltration, vegetation growth, and pollination. For better incorporating nature’s processes into planning, transdisciplinarity becomes necessary. Every field of knowledge should be dissolved into this green ink in a participatory application of NbS throughout the urban fabric.

CONCLUSION: THE FLOWERS

In this sense, for making good use of the bulk of investments in NbS, Latin America can use decoloniality to help taking into account local needs and its historical, social, and cultural context and dialectics to help incorporate the interdependence and unity of nature in the design and planning of the Nature-based Solutions. 

For incorporating decoloniality and dialectics in NbS for the Global South, the article derived from these two approaches a set of relevant shifts, ideas, and applied references. From a “monoculture of mind” to an “agroforestry of mind,” Latin America needs to perceive the interdependence of its cities' microclimates to other areas of still-preserved ecosystems such as forests and savannas. There is still a lot of forest and grasslands to protect and better manage, which should be the main focus instead of only creating new ecosystems. As the Yanomami shaman Davi Kopenawa (2013) foresees, “when the forests succumb to the reckless devastation and the last shaman dies, the sky will fall over and it will be the end of the world”. Cities, though a human creation, are not separate from the totality of nature: life on Earth exists under the same sky.

For creating new ecosystems, some indicators can be relevant to highlight. The use of social technologies, community work, bottom-up and participatory processes of planning, and learning from native ecosystems should be a must. Besides that, NbS also promotes relevant shifts, such as the decentralization of natural resource management, the pedagogical possibility of learning from natural processes, and the need for applied transdisciplinarity. 

Taking these aspects into account, Latin American cities can become a case of success for the adoption of Nature-based Solutions and enjoy the blossom of diverse colors and shapes that arise from native flowers growing from dialectical cracks in the static concrete and decolonized cracks in the colonized imaginary.

Lucas Gobatti (@g0batti) is a Brazilian Civil Engineer, trained at the Polytechnic School of the University of São Paulo (Brazil) (with a minor in Architecture and Urban Planning by the Faculty of Architecture in the same university), and a graduate MEng degree in Civil Engineering from the University of Sheffield (UK). He is currently reading an MSc in Nature-based Solutions at the Polytechnic School of the University of São Paulo (Brazil) and is an entrepreneur of NbS. He is interested in Nature-based Solutions, Field Science, Biomimicry, Decoloniality, Philosophy of Engineering, Nature Photography, Mountaineering and Microscopy.

E-mail: lucas.gobatti@usp.br.

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