the use of decision support tools in participatory river bas

8/6/2019 The Use of Decision Support Tools in Participatory River Bas

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Pergamon Phys. Chem. Earth (B). Vol. 26, No. 7-8, pp. 535-539, 20010 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd.All rights reserved1464-1909/01/$ - see front matter

PII: Sl464-1909(bl)OOO46-6The Use of Decision Support Tools in Participatory River Basin ManagementM. Welp

ZIT - Center for Interdisciplinary Studies of Technology, Darmstadt University of Technology, Hochschulstrasse 1,64289 Darmstadt, GermanyReceived I.5 May 2000; accepted 21 September 2000

Abstract. There are growing demands for effective publicparticipation in river basin management. These are posedamong others by the proposed EU Water FrameworkDirective as well as international conventions and policydocuments. The demands will raise a need for guidance onexactly how the public is to be involved. In publicparticipation decision support tools (DST) and integratedmodelling can have a role to play. Many computer tools notonly can serve as tools for analysis for experts, but also asvehicles for communication, training, forecasting andexperimentation. Illustrated by selected examples ofsoftware a range of tools and their potential applications arepresented. Essential for the added-value of computer toolsin stakeholder participation, in comparison to othermethods like expert presentations, fact sheets, etc., is theway they are used. Lessons can be drawn from projectswhere computer tools were used in other policy areas.Within an European research project on energy and climatepolicy (ULYSSES) integrated models on global climatechange were used in integrated assessment (IA) focusgroups. A web-based tutorial for the use of computermodels was developed. It gives guidelines for the designand setup of participatory arrangements in conjunction withcomputer models. Besides procedural recommendationslessons can be drawn concerning the kind of output thetools should provide and the early involvement of users ismodelling and software development. o 2001 Elsevier ScienceLtd. All rights reserved

1 Participation in river basin managementIncreasingly citizens expect that they can have a say inissues affecting their lives, including the management ofland and water resources. Also, the role of civil society ischanging. Close collaboration between governments, non-Correspondence to: Martin Welp

governmental organisations, community organisations. andthe private sector is getting more and more important. Theinvolvement of stakeholder groups, but also ordinarypeople can improve the quality and acceptance of plans andmanagement strategies, and eventually the implementationof policies (Priscoli 1999; Coenen et al. 1998; Welp 2000).People should have the choice of selecting appropriateways to influence public policies. These may includeinstitutional public participation. like voting or notificationto a plan, or non-institutional participation, like self-organised citizen activity or NGO campaigning. If plansand programmes are made by public authorities for thebenefit of citizens, this should include meaningful andeffective ways of public involvement. This is especially thecase when the issues at hand are complex and uncertaintiesare high. Problems of river basin management cannot besolved within the confines of one single sector or discipline,neither only within a small spatial unit. This makes publicparticipation at the watershed level such a challengingeffort.Public participation in water management is required inseveral pieces of legislation, conventions and internationalpolicy documents (United Nations 2000). The proposed EUWater Framework Directive explicitly stresses theimportance of public participation (Commission of theEuropean Communities 1999). The proposed directiverequires besides access to background documents andpublic information also active involvement andconsultation. For example, in preparing the River BasinManagement Plans early consultation on the timetable andwork programme is required. The plan must eventuallyinclude a documentation of the public consultationmeasures, their results and the changes made to the plan.An important convention in the field of environmentalplanning and decision-making, including watermanagement, is the Aarhus Convention (Convention onaccess to information, public participation in decision-


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536 M. Welp : Decision Support Tools in Participatory River Basin Managementmaking and access to justice in environmental matters),which was signed in 1998 by 35 countries and the EuropeanUnion. The process of translating it into national legislationis still going on and it has not yet been ratified by most ofthe countries. There is also a number of widely recognisedinternational policy documents, which emphasise publicparticipation in water management (United Nations 2000).One of the most recent is the report of the WorldCommission on Water, which was presented at the WorldWater Forum in the Hague in March 2000. The report notesthat in water policy and management the old model of:This is governments business must be replaced by amodel in which stakeholders participate at all levels(World Water Commission 2000). Local participation isrequired, but on more aggregate level (watershed level) alsosuch new institutional arrangements as user parliaments.The examples above indicate that there are growing policydemands for effective public participation in river basinmanagement in the coming years. These new requirementswill raise a need for guidance on exactly how the public isto be involved (cf. Heathcote 1998). So far there are fewguidelines and handbooks for public participation in riverbasin management published in Europe. In publicconsultation decision support tools (DST) and integratedmodelling can have a role to play. In this paper DST aredefined broadly as computer-based tools designed to assistdecision-makers, managers and other stakeholders increating and assessing management alternatives. They cancommunicate scientific knowledge to broader audiencesand can support the communication between involvedstakeholders. This will be discussed in the followingSection and illustrated by selected examples of software.Instead of focusing on the technical aspects of DST andmodelling efforts, the paper discusses their potential use inconjunction with public participation. Any tool that is usedshould be consistent with the planning and managementstyle of the administration or company. Thus newrequirements for more collaborative plarining will bringalong new requirements for supporting tools. In Section 3 atutorial for the use of computer models in publicparticipation is presented. The tutorial was developed in arecent EU project ULYSSES and it gives guidance on howcomputer models can be used in conjunction withparticipation of ordinary citizens in policy making. Section4 presents lessons that can be drawn from this experienceand prospects for future research.

2 The use of DST and integrated models in aparticipatory wayBesides close collaboration with various stakeholdergroups, expert knowledge is required more than ever toaddress todays complex river management problems. Whatrole can decision support tools play in creating a linkbetween science and policy making? Computer models,which were developed mainly for scientific purposes, helpto organise knowledge and gain insights into complex

problems. But integrated models are often cryptic and oflittle direct value for policy-makers. Efforts have beenundertaken to increase the relevance of integratedmodelling to policy issues for example by the earlyinteraction of model developers with policy makers(Alcamo et al. 1996). Embedded in an applicable DST,integrated models can serve as a tool for jointly finding anagreement about the main problems and strategies forsolving them. According to van de Ven et al. (1998)decision support systems (DSS) are a particular kind ofDST with emphasis on simulation and prediction by meansof models. In the following the more general category ofDST is used. Decision support tools not only can serve astools for analysis, but also as vehicles for communication,training, forecasting and experimentation. DST can alsohave the potential to inject ordinary knowledge intomodelling efforts. Often this knowledge is rather qualitativethan quantitative, which poses a further challenge tomodelling.A number of decision support tools have been developed inrecent years for purposes of river basin management(Loucks and Gladwell 1999). They can be divided intoseveral categories, including: scenario simulation &modelling systems (most commonly understood as DSS).expert systems, GIS applications & databases. visualisation,role plays & gaming. Examples of simulation andmodelling systems include for example Water Ware.SimCoast is a rule based fuzzy logic expert system forcoastal management (McGlade 1999). The interestingfeature of this system is that it can combine expertknowledge and local knowledge with a set of reasoningtools. GIS applications and databases have so far beenmainly used in terrestrial environments, which is anintrinsic part of river basin management, but not so much inmanaging adjoined coastal and marine environments.However, this is changing rapidly. Visualisation caninclude virtual reality, for deciding e.g. the location ofwater reservoirs or for water landscaping. Visualisation alsorefers to the output of models. Up to now. most modelshave relied mainly on graphs and maps as visual output ofmodel scenarios. While such an output is well suited forscientific audiences, additional visual aids may beimportant for stakeholder audiences, especially if theseaudiences should not only include policy makers but alsowider stakeholder groups, including citizens (Kasemir et al.1999). Two examples of role plays & gaming are Storm orCorona which have been developed by Resource Analysisin Delft. Some recently developed tools combine differenttypes of DST. Some software applications combine GISand modelling, like Streamdelta, or simulation tools whichare combined with a role play. In recent years groupdecision support systems (GDDS) and network distributeddecision support systems (NDDSS) (Jonoski 1999), whichsupport collaborative work and decision-making, havereceived growing interest.The geographic area to which a DST is tailored plays animportant role too. There is growing acceptance that water


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M. Welp : Decision Support Tools in Participatory River Basin Management 537and land use problems can only be solved in an integratedway. Integrated river basin management (IRBM) (Mostertet al. 1999) and integrated coastal management (ICM)(Sorensen 1997; Welp 1999) are management approacheswhich share this notion. One step further is integratedcoasf2LI wea and riveT basin mmagemenl {IQ&M), whichexplicitly addresses the integration needs of bothmanagement areas (UNEP 1999). Existing information anddata is more often than not organised by political or mapboundaries, instead by watersheds, including coastal waters.Thus DST should be capable to be used in different kinds ofnatural environments, including terrestrial, coastal andmarine. Depending on the issue at hand the problems aresolved on different scales. If the geographic area is larger,issues tend to become more complex and subsequently thenumber of affected stakeholder groups increases. Thus thesize of management area poses further requirements to DSTdevelopment.It is &2.&X& @ &X&P &.55&n mpp* s&ul~~+ in aparticipatory way. A challenge in modelling and in DSTdevelopment is the early involvement of users (stakeholdersincluding decision-makers), in order to know theirinformation requirements and expectations. For example indeveloping the SimCoust expert system, a series ofworkshops was organised together with end-users frompublic authorities and the research community from theEurope and ASEAn countries. Models, which are used inconjunction with management should provide informationon the issues which are considered important. Subject-oriented software development (SOS-D) is a recentlydeveloped approach, which applies ordinary language(understandable also for lay persons) and a facilitatorbetween the software developer and the organisation orcustomer who eventia11y needs tie Gnat application(Wen&anh 1%%. XX coherence between tie rechr;lc&(functional) model of the system and the usersrequirements is produced on the basis of the shared,,Lebenswelt of the participating people.A &&her &aXeczge for seiecztis&s and DST develqoers ishow to cope with the differences between integratedmodelling and the conceptual approaches used in DST. Thelattter usuaX7 require a somewhat iirnp%%eb physic&representation of the natural and social system. Eventhough DST development and scientific modelling so farhave been quite disjointed, the difference between DST andscien6fic models seem5 not to be as sharp as it used to be.Advancements in graphical interfaces, programming etc.has made embedding scientific models in DST anddeveloping user shells for model results more easy (Jolma1999).River basin management is increasingly political and value-lad&. Dsi ana integratea models can De a source 0% pu~give insights, but they are no truth machines. They can beused jointly with stakeholder groups and ordinary citizens,but even the most easy-to-use DST often require outsidefacilitation: a so called ,,model moderator (Kasemir et al.

2000). The user may be able to use the system, but equallyimportant is to understand uncertainties and underlyingassumptions. The following Section presents how this canbe done in discussing complex issues related to climatechange. Equally well the method can be applied in otherpoticy weas too, surh as Tiver basin management.

3 ULYSSES Web TutorialIn a recent EU project ULYSSES (Urban Lijkgyfes,Sustainability and Integrated Environmental Assessment)opinion formation of citizens on climate policy was studiedby means of group discussions (Kasemir et al. 2000).Randomly selected lay persons were provided with thelatest scientific knowledge and integrated computer modelson global climate change. Approximately 600 citizens, fromseven h~Dpf3~1 chks, ZODk pm in t i e exexhe, w t i c ) , cmbe characterised as an exploratory project. The groups werec+X& X?Z..g?&& Af~&??&?~Z (?lQ Fucff~ Gf0ffPS and rhecomputer models used in the project included: IMAGE(Alcamo 1994), TARGETS (Rotmans and de Vries 1997).Polestar (Raskin et al. 1996) and a Personal CO2 -Calculator (Schlumpf et al. 1998). The results of theproject including an analysis of citizen recommendations toclimate policy have been presented by Kasemir et al. (1999;Kasemir et al. 2000). This paper focuses on the implicationsfor the use of computer tools in participatory processes.Equally well the IA Focus Group method can be applied inother policy areas such as river basin management. usingfor example some of the DST mentioned in Section 2.In the Ulysses project a web-based tutorial for the use ofcomputer models in participatory integrated assessment wasdeveloped @mp:~iwww.zit.tu-darmstadtdelulyssesltutorial.bun), 11 &es 13etajsed g~.~&%n~s 3~7 fin dpSj,g, and XJap 01participatory arrangements in conjunction with integratedmodelling. The tutorial gives guidance in the recruitment ofparticipants: How to set up a heterogenous group which isdiverse with respect to age, gender. income, education leveland _a_ticud!! .towa.& cn!&nnnXr&? _X..~%ti~ .ir _s&+$groups tend to contain richer material on interactionsbetween different viewpoints, than is the case with morehomogenous groq~s &m wi r e ) A , 2DDD> T)IP .&J.!&zJ~lsczgives guidance for group moderation and modelmoderation. The group moderator is in charge of guidingthe focus group discussions, while the model moderatorpresents the computer model including tie possibilities.limitations, underlying assumptions and uncertaintiesinvolved in the model. The model moderator also guidesthe specific discussions during the computer interactionperiod. The separation of the two roles enables the groupmoderator to maintain the requirement of the focus grouptechnique of avoiding that the group moderator has anexpert r&g. %JaXy, tie bJk kJ_a~ @w s 20 m. .Jikw 49 Lb.etraining and documentation needs involved in such aneffort. Manuals and work packages were developed formodel moderators and training was organised for model


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538 M. Welp : Decision Support Tools in ParticipatoryRiver Basin Managementmoderators. Support material for the participants was alsoto be developed.Since IA Focus Groups were carried out in seven Europeancities, ULYSSES emphasised the explicit consideration ofdifferent cultural contexts in European climate policy. AFocus Group design as developed by ULYSSES, helps tounderstand cultural. and social differences which are ofgreat importance for an effective implementation ofenvironmental and resource use policies in Europe.Policies, such as the EU Water Framework Directive, mustrecognise the great diversity in regional practices anddifferent traditions of water management. These need to betaken into account, when applying both participation anddecision support tools.

4 Lessons learned and future prospectsThe experiences gained in ULYSSES show that mostcomputer models used in the project currently are far frombeing so easy to use that they can be applied withstakeholders without proper preparations, including trainingand the production of support materials. In ULYSSES someof the used models were designed for lay users (e.g.CLEAR), but most models needed the facilitation of amodel moderator (e.g. TARGETS) (Dahinden et al. 1999).The participants called for greater transparency and onlinedocumentation providing additional information onquestions that might arise during the model use. Also bettervisualisation and graphic outputs were required.The findings also suggest that the computer modelsused inULYSSES were successful in giving insights into thecomplex climate system, but were less successful for theexploration of policy options (Dahinden, Querol et al.1999). With some models however (Polestar) theparticipants were able to develop own scenarios, rather thanbeing confronted with predefined expert runs. A furthersuggestions for computer model design, based on theULYSSES experience, was to include the aspect ofuncertainty in model development (Dahinden et al. 1999;Kasemir et al. 2000).The lessons above should be taken into account whendesigning new research projects using computer tools inparticipatory management. In a future research projectcoordinated at ZIT different decision support tools areassessed and tested for their potential to translate qualitativeexpert-knowledge (developed by stakeholders in scenarioworkshops) for modelling purposes - and vice versa - todemonstrate results of model runs in an understandable andvisualised way to these groups. The project will look intodifferent methods which can be used to solve this problem,such as the use of metadata and object-oriented orotherwise more advanced data structures. The requirementsfor developing DST for integrated river basin managementwill be analysed comprehensively, taking into accountecological, water quality, and other issues in addition to

hydrology and land use change. Early collaborationbetween stakeholders, modellers and tool developers seemsto be essential in order to know the expectations of end-users. This will help to address open questions concerningpublic participation in river basin management in Europeand provide support for the sound implementation of theproposed EU Water Framework Directive.ReferencesAlcamo, J. (Ed.) 1994. I~UAGE 2.0: hltegruted Modellmg of Global

Climate Change. London, Kluwer.Alcamo,J., Kreileman,E. & Leemans,R. 1996.G/oba/ mode/s meetglobalpolicy. Global Environmental Change6(4): 255-259.Coenen, F. H. J. M., Huitema, D. & OToole. L. J. Jr. (Eds.) 1998.

Participation and the Quality qf Envrronmental Policy llakrng,Environment & Policy. Dordrecht. Kluwer Academic Publishers. 33 I p.

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Kasemir, B., Dahinden, U., Swartling, A.G., Schiile, R., Tabara, D. 8:Jaeger, C.C. 2000. Citizens perspectives ou climate change and energyuse. Global Environmental Change. 1O(3 ): I69- 184.

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Loucks, D. P. & Gladwell, J.S. (Eds.) 1999. Sustainability Crrterra firWater Resources Systems. International Hydrology Series. Cambridge.Cambridge University Press. UNESCO. 144 p.

McGlade, J. 1999. SimCoast: An Expert System for Sustainable CoastalZone Management. Interdisciplinary Scientific Methodologies for theSustainable Use and Management of Coastal Resource Systems.SimCoast: ASEAN - EU Workshop on Major Environmental Inputs.Singapore.

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M. Welp : Decision Support Tools in Participatory River Basin Management 539Ptiscoli, J. D. 1999. What is public participation in water resourcesmanagement and why is it important? Participatory processes in watermanagement. Satellite Conference to the World Conference on Science.,Bu~a~,~un~~,~~~,.~~rn~~~~~~~~~~~~~~D~~~~.Technical Documents in Hydrology No. 30: I - 12.Raskin, P., Heaps, C., Sieber. J. & Pontius, G. 1996. PoleStar SystemManual, StoctioIm Environment Indlule. Buslun.Rotmzans. 3. & be Yries, 8. tsf35. IerIecrivees on Global change: Tne

TARGETS Approach. Cambrigde, Cambridge University Press.Schlumpf, C., Behringer, 1. Diirrenberger, G. & Prim-Wosrl, C. 199%. nePersonal COZ-Calculator - A Modelling Tool for ParticipatoryInn..& #.%%?.%vox &x+.&s. Environmen