Through state-of-the art ecosystem modelling supported by ecological
experimental data, the COMTESS Project (funding: German Federal Ministry of
Education and Research) investigates potential synergies and trade offs in
ecosystem service provision under different land-use scenarios in two German
coastal areas till 2100. Overall goal is to explore alternative sustainable
land-use strategies to best adapt to climate change. Two science-based land-
use scenarios were developed for two study regions on the Baltic and North Sea
coasts to contrast a business-as-usual scenario. We focus here on the Baltic
Se case region. The underlying premise of these alternatives is managed
realignment of current dikes inland for: 1) climate mitigation through wetland
re-naturation or 2) multiple land use, including biomass harvesting for
energetic purposes (Baltic Sea). Managed realignment is increasingly
considered as a valid coastal defence strategy to lower long-term costs of
hard coastal defence and restore critical coastal and experiments have been
initiated since the 1990s in a number of northwest European countries. Though
politically highly controversial and facing much public antagonism, managed
realignment is effectively embedded in the current coastal management policy
of the state of Mecklenburg Vorpommern on the German Baltic coast.
Implementation, nevertheless, faces many obstacles. Project-based scenarios
for the Baltic Sea were first evaluated by key regional and local policy,
management and land use practitioners, each expert in their field of activity.
Their evaluation and recommendations were subsequently used to develop a
fourth land-use scenario. Using qualitative empirical social research methods
we analyse divergences and convergences between expert views on the projects
scenarios. We argue that managed realignment is currently being mainstreamed
in science, policy and resource management arenas although representatives of
local land users and inhabitants do not endorse this strategy and still foster
a hard defence approach to coastal zone management. This is best illustrated
in recurrent social mobilisation and resistance to managed realignment
proposals. This points at important perception and preference gaps between
science, policy and land users / inhabitants, which need to be resolved to
formulate and implement sustainable and socially acceptable land use
strategies
