Making Connections: Leopold’s Land Health, Indigenous Ways of Knowing, Social-Ecological Resilience, and One Health

Abstract

Abstract Leopold’s land health concept provides a holistic view of the relationship between human health and ecosystem health. Significantly, a similar view is found in the traditional wisdom of Indigenous peoples, as exemplified by the concept of “healthy country, healthy people”. A contemporary formulation of land health is provided by social-ecological resilience, which refers to integrated complex adaptive systems that include social (human) and ecological (biophysical) subsystems in a two-way feedback relationship. Resilience is dynamic and provides the tools for dealing with change and disasters proactively. Building resilience and using social/institutional learning for adaptive governance are relevant to One Health, as are Indigenous concepts for the maintenance of healthy relationships between humans and the ecosystem. One Health Impact Statement The One Health approach centers on the interdependence between the health of humans, animals, and the ecosystem. However, relevant ecosystem concepts have not been developed sufficiently for a comprehensive One Health approach, as pointed out in the editorial by Zinsstag and Crump. The basic idea behind One Health not only goes back many decades in Western science but also to the environmental perception and wisdom of traditional societies. The consideration of these connections is relevant for the development of a solid theoretical basis for One Health.

Keywords

• social-ecological resilience
• Aldo Leopold
• land ethic
• land health
• Indigenous peoples
• traditional knowledge