Meaningful public participation in the planning and management of publicly owned forests

Foresters responsible for the management of public forests in Canada need a new approach. Multiple resource management and meaningful public involvement in management decision making are the distinguishing characteristics of this approach. This paper examines public participation in the management of public forests by trying to answer three questions; 1. Why involve citizens in resource management at all?, 2. Who may participate?, and 3. How can the public participate? Deciding who may participate is a difficult task, but utilizing the concept of forest constituency may help. We suggest that the public must be involved not only in policy-making decisions, but also in management decisions. Doing so, however, requires the use of computerized decision aids designed specifically for cooperative exploration of management alternatives.