Sustainable environmental management requires a decision support approach that accounts for dynamic connections between social and ecological systems, integrates stakeholder deliberation with scientific analysis, incorporates diverse stakeholder knowledge, and fosters relationships among stakeholders that can accommodate changing information and changing social and environmental conditions. Participatory system dynamics modeling provides such a framework. It supports stakeholder learning about the system and the perspectives of other stakeholders, and can help build social capital among stakeholders. Four cases of participatory system dynamics modeling, which range from no to full participant involvement in model development, support the idea that greater social capital development results from greater participation in model development, but also suggest that even the simplest use of simulation models in a group fosters stakeholder learning about the system through surprise and discovery. To maximize the learning value of simulation models, it is important to allow enough time for debriefing the “aha!” moments that lead to curiosity about system behavior. To maximize social capital development, it is important to build enough time into the problem structuring and model conceptualization phases for stakeholders to articulate their mental models and examine those of other participants.

Some of the only Afromontane forest in northern Ethiopia today is on lands managed by followers of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, where for centuries priests and communities have conserved forest groves around church buildings. The ecological value of the thousands of church forests in Ethiopia has been widely acknowledged, but little is known about the diverse local institutions that govern these resources, or how such institutions might be changing in response to Ethiopia's rapid recent economic development. This study uses a unique panel survey to explore changes in community perspectives on the social and ecological roles of church forests, and rules governing church forest use, in four Orthodox communities over time. Our sample consists of 122 household surveys conducted in 2002 and a further 122 surveys from 2014, with 71 households interviewed in both periods. We find that reported uses of church forests vary across forests and 356 Travis William Reynolds et al. over time, with larger forests more likely to be used for extractive purposes such as firewood and construction timber, while smaller forests have become more restricted to renewable or non-extractive uses such as natural medicines, honey, and prayer. Results of logistic regression suggest church followers' support for preserving church forests increases with age and access to alternative sources of firewood-including exotic Eucalyptus spp. plantations which are increasingly widespread in northern Ethiopia. We also observe a shift since 2002 away from an expectation that church followers themselves hold responsibility for rule enforcement in church forests to a perceived sharing of responsibility by church authorities (i.e. priests) and government (i.e. police) in 2014. Together the progressive introduction of exotic tree species in church forests combined with the erosion of religious norms surrounding local forest governance may threaten the integrity and diversity of these unique social-ecological systems.

While public-sector management problems are steeped in positivistic and socially constructed complexity, public management education in the management of complexity lags behind that of business schools, particularly in the application of simulation-based learning. This paper describes a Simulation-Based Learning Environment for public management education that includes a coupled case study and System Dynamics simulation surrounding flood protection, a domain where stewardship decisions regarding public infrastructure and investment have direct and indirect effects on businesses and the public. The Pointe Claire case and CoastalProtectSIM simulation provide a platform for policy experimentation under conditions of exogenous uncertainty (weather and climate change) as well as endogenous effects generated by structure. We discuss the model in some detail, and present teaching materials developed to date to support the use of our work in public administration curricula. Our experience with this case demonstrates the potential of this approach to motivate sustainable learning about complexity in public management settings and enhance learners’ competency to deal with complex dynamic problems.

Active and abandoned mines may present health risks, especially to children, from environmental exposure to airborne chemical elements, such as Pb, As, and Mn. X-ray fluorescence analysis of tailings at the Three Kids Mine show they contain high levels of: Pb (15,300 mg/kg), As (3690 mg/kg), and Mn (153,000 mg/kg). Soil was sampled along eight transects, radiating from the dried tailings ponds. Concentrations of Mn and Pb to the NE are at background concentrations at 4.8 km, and, As and Sr at 3.2 km from the mine. Going SW to the City of Henderson, all elements are at background at 1.6 cm, with the closest houses at 1.8 km. The United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) Regional Screening Levels (RSLs) are exceeded for Pb, As and Mn at 0.8 km on all transects except one. The RSLs are exceeded for Pb, As and Mn on the NE transects at 1.6 km. Future home sites are on a NE transect between 0.4 km and 2.3 km downwind from the tailings ponds, in an area highly impacted by tailings which exceed the USEPA RSLs. This research demonstrates that there has been the farthest transport of tailings offsite by the prevailing winds to the NE; the closest currently-built homes have not received measurable tailings dust because they are upwind; and that precautions must be taken during the proposed remediation of the mine to restrict dust-transport of Pb, As, and Mn to avoid human exposure and ecological damage.