Implementing Ecological Integrity

The concept of ecological integrity is used in environmental policy but is usually left undefined, the definition proposed by the Integrity Group focuses on a nature that has been impacted by human activity as little as possible, emphasizing and protecting its self-organizing capacities for life as a product of the natural history of ecosystems. The demand is for an ethical reverence for life in all its manifestations. The representatives of Central and Eastern European countries are less wary of human intervention than their North American counterparts. They consider low input agricultural ecosystems as acceptable candidates for ecological integrity, on condition they contain some unproductive components. This study of ecological integrity is multidisciplinary, grounded in ecology, thermodynamics, ethics and complex systems approach. It covers a broad international terrain, and documents geographically wide ranging case studies. It is applied in character and does not remain at the purely conceptual level.