Abstract
This thesis theoretically assesses ecological restoration from the point of view of environmental ethics. I explore how ecological restoration might affect the perspectives and assumptions we have about nature that allow or encourage the activities that drive processes of exploitation and degradation of nature. My focus is on how ecological restoration may affect the relationship between humans and nature by raising questions about the place of human agency in nature, and the possibility of an ethical and constructive, rather than destructive, relationship. Does ecological restoration encourage damaging by repairing damage, thus implying a promise that destruction is reversible? Is it a way of quieting our conscience while we continue to consume our environment? Restoration may potentially contribute to the idea that environmental problems can be solved by technological fixes and do not require change in behavior or restrictions on our consumption of nature. However, restoration also encourages active participation in nature and can possibly be a way encouraging closeness to nature on an ethical as well as practical level. The practice of restoration may also imply blame for destruction and ascribe humans the responsibility for anthropogenically degraded ecosystems. It may therefore encourage ethical consideration of nature. My overarching question is whether ecological restoration entrenches the ethical boundaries between humans and nature by enacting our superiority, or loosens them by allowing ethical engagement with nature. Within environmental ethics, ecological restoration has been controversial. Through a critical review of the existing debate, I will address both objections to, and arguments in favor of, ecological restoration, and analyze them to determine the root of this ambivalence. I argue that a shared assumption of many objections to restoration is a metaphysical dualism separating humans from the rest of nature. If this dualism is assumed, the positive value of restoration as more than management of resources is nearly impossible to grasp, because human intervention in nature, even when assisting recovery, is interpreted as unnatural and dominating. At the same time, ecological restoration may be a way of overcoming this dualism’s ethical implications, by encouraging active engagement and normative relationships. Through assessment of arguments for and against restoration, I argue for interpreting ecological restoration as a way of negotiating a mutually beneficial relationship between humans and the rest of nature, and for incorporating insights from ecological restoration into environmental ethics.