AN ECOSYSTEM APPROACH TO THE INTEGRITY OF THE GREAT LAKES IN TURBULENT TIMES Proceedings of a 1988 Workshop Supported by the Great Lakes Fishery Commission and the Science Advisory Board of the International Joint Commission edited by Clayton J. Edwards USDA Forest Service Rhinelander, Wisconsin 54501 Henry A. Regier Institute for Environmental Studies University of Toronto Toronto, Ontario M5S 1A4 Citation (general): Edwards, C.J. and H.A. Regier, [ED.]. 1990. An ecosystem approach to the integrity of the Great Lakes in turbulent times. Great Lakes Fish. Comm. Spec. pub. 90-4. 299 p. Citation (example for individual paper): Kay, J.J. 1990. A non-equilibrium thermodynamic framework for discussing ecosystem integrity, p. 209-238. In C.J. Edwards and H.A. Regier [ed.]. An ecosystem approach to the integrity of the Great Lakes in turbulent times. Great Lakes Fish. Comm. Spec. Rub. 90-4. GREAT LAKES FISHERY COMMISSION 1451 Green Road Ann Arbor, MI 48105 July 1990 Support of this publication by the Great Lakes Fishery Commission and the Science Advisory Board of the International Joint Commission does not imply that the findings or conclusions contained herein are endorsed by either body. PREFACE A "Workshop on Integrity and Surprise" was convened in Burlington, Ontario, on 14-16 June 1988 under the auspices of the Great Lakes Fishery Commission's Hoard of Technical Experts (GLFC/BOTE) and the International Joint Commission's Great Lakes Science Advisory Hoard (IJC/SAB). The Workshop was supported by funds from the SAB and BOTE. In addition, the Donner Canadian Foundation supported the contributions of several Canadian collaborators. This workshop was a sequel of two earlier initiatives. One of these was the Ecosystem Approach Workshop, convened in Hiram, Ohio, in 1983 under the auspices of IJC/SAB, GLFC/BOTE, the International Association of Great Lakes Research, and Great Lakes Tomorrow. The other was the third series of Canada-U.S. Inter-University Seminars (CUSIS III) of 1983-4, which concluded with a meeting in Racine, Wisconsin. The 1983 Hiram Workshop emphasized practical aspects of ecosystem politics. 1 The CUSIS Seminars emphasized ecosystemic governance. 2 This 1988 Burlington Workshop emphasized scientific and conceptual aspects of ecosystemic policies in the context of great practical uncertainty. Two working groups were convened to explore the implications for policy and for theory and testing of ecosystem integrity and surprise in the Great Lakes basin. With the exception of the introductory paper providing a range of individual perspectives on ecosystem integrity, the papers in these proceedings are categorized according to the two above- mentioned working groups. The first paper in each category provides an overview of that working group's discussions and conclusions. This workshop was organized and convened by a joint committee of the SAB and BOTE. A. P. Lino Grima and Richard A. Ryder represented BOTE; Timothy F. H. Allen and Clayton 1 J.R. Vallentyne, "Implementing an Ecosystem Approach to Management of the Great Lakes Basin, Workshop Held at Hiram College, Hiram, Ohio, March 22-24, 1983," Environmental Conservation 10:3 (1983): 273-274 and W.J. Christie et al., "Managing the Great Lakes as a Home," Journal of Great Lakes Research 12 (1986): 2-17. 2 L.K. Caldwell, [ED.], Perspectives on Ecosystem Management for the Great Lakes (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1988). J. Edwards represented SAB: and Henry A. Regier represented GLFC and SAB. Clayton Edwards and Henry Regier had major editing responsibilities, but all authors assisted with reviewing and editing of papers. Randy L. Eshenroder and Madeline Haslam of GLFC and Martha L. Walter of Ann Arbor, Michigan, helped with the publication process. TABLE OF CONTENTS Preface........................iii Perspectives on the Meaning of Ecosystem Integrity in 1975, by Henry A. Regier and Robert L. France . 1 Implications For Policy Integrity and Surprise in the Great Lakes Basin Ecosystem: Implications for Policy, by Henry A. Regier, George R. Francis, A.P. Grima, Andrew L. Hamilton, and Sally Lerner . 17 Values in Integrity, by Sally Lerner . 37 Rehabilitating Great Lakes Integrity in Times of Surprise, by Rafal Serafin. 45 Ecosystem Integrity and Network Theory, by Robert E. Ulanowicz . 69 Integrality, Context, and Other Industrial Casualties, by Willem H. Vanderburg. 79 Evaluating the Benefits of Ecosystem Integrity, by Walter E. Westman . 91 Implications for Theory and Testing Integrity and Surprise in the Great Lakes Basin Ecosystem: Implications for Theory and Testing, by Lloyd M. Dickie and Bruce L. Bandurski . 105 Integrity and Surprise in the Great Lakes Basin Ecosystem: The Perspective Hierarchy Theory, by Timothy F.H. Allen. 121 Thermodynamics and Ecosystem Integrity, by Joel L. Fisher. 131 Trophic Dynamics and Ecosystem Integrity in the Great Lakes: Past, Present, and Possibilities, by Thomas D. Fontaine and Donald J. Stewart. 153 Theoretical Framework for Developing and Operationalizing an Index of Zoobenthos Community: Application to Biomonitoring with Zoobenthos Communities in the Great Lakes, by Robert L. France. 169 Flexible Governance, by George Francis . 195 A Non-Equilibrium Thermodynamic Framework for Discussing Ecosystem Integrity, by James J. Kay. 209 Aquatic Harmonic Communities: Surrogates of Ecosystem Integrity, by Richard A. Ryder and Steve R. Kerr. 239 Ecological Bases for an Understanding of Ecosystem Integrity in the Great Lakes Basin, by Robert J. Steedman and Henry A. Regier . 257 Political and Ecological Systems: Integrity?, by Edward Cowan, Tom Muir and John R. Vallentyne. 273 Landscape Ecology: Analytical Approaches to Pattern and ProceSS, by Carol A. Wessman . 285 PERSPECTIVES ON THE MEANING OF ECOSYSTEM INTEGRITY IN 1975 Henry A. Regier and Robert L. France Department of Zoology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario M5S 1A5 ABSTRACT. We have reviewed and analyzed the proceedings of a Symposium on the Integrity of Water convened in 1975 by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. We presupposed that all the participants had at least some minimal commitment to the purpose of the goal of integrity as specified in the U.S. Federal Water Pollution Control Act Amendments of 1972. We perceived a spectrum of interpretations of the term integrity and have divided this spectrum into five classes according to the substance of the goal and supporting strategies with which speakers have invested the term integrity. We have then provided a summary sketch of each of these classes. INTRODUCTION The word integrity figures prominently in Section 304 of the U.S. Federal Water Pollution Control Act Amendments of 1972. To clarify the concept of integrity, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency convened a Symposium on the Integrity of Water in Washington, DC on March 1O-12, 1975. The proceedings (U.S. Government Printing Office Stock No. 055-001-01068-1) were published in 1977. The focus of the 1975 Symposium was on the definition and interpretation of water quality integrity as viewed and discussed by representatives from federal and state government agencies, industry, academia, and conservation/environmental groups. Almost all the participants were American. The Symposium was designed to interrelate two concepts of integrity, 1) as a desirable characteristic of natural ecosystems, and 2) as a moral or cultural principle, and then apply this combined concept to the real-world pragmatic use of integrity for setting regulatory practices. During the Symposium, it was noted (by R.B. Robie) that "from the many interpretations presented, it can clearly be seen that integrity, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder." One way to sort out these differences is to examine the various perspectives of the Symposium participants with respect to the degree of reform deemed necessary to achieve integrity. We discerned five different degrees of reform from the Symposium proceedings and have excerpted text that we consider to be illustrative of each reform objective. We then attempt a general characterization of strategies for each objective. The five reform objectives are: deep reform, partial reform, incremental advances, holding the line, and slowing the rate of retreat. For each of the excerpts that follow we have given the name of the symposium participant and the page(s) on which the statement may be found. We have classified the statements, not the participants, who made those statements. We emphasize that a statement taken out of context should not be used to infer the degree of reform to which a speaker might be committed. Deep Reform Senator Muskie, in the Senate debate on the conference report: "These policies simply mean that streams and rivers are no longer to be considered part of the waste treatment process." And elsewhere: "This legislation would clearly establish that no one has the right to pollute, that pollution continues because of technological limits, not because of any inherent right to use the nation's waterways for the purpose of disposing of wastes." -- R. Outen, p. 217. The goal of the Act is the restoration and maintenance of the "natural, chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the nation's waters" by 1985. The House Report defines "that ecosystem whose structure and function 'natural' [as] one whose systems capable of preserving themselves at levels believed to have existed before irreversible perturbations caused by man's activities." Any change induced by man which overtaxes the ability of nature to restore conditions to natural or original is an unacceptable perturbation. -- T. Barlow and J.G. Speth, pp. 215, 216. The new program [i.e. the 1972 Act]: . ..assumes that man is a component of the biosphere and that the relationship we seek to achieve with the environment is what some have called harmony. Under this view, man is an integral, if dominant, part of the structure and function of the biosphere. The intellectual roots of this perspective are found in the study of evolution. The objective of this concept is the maximum patterning of human communities after biogeochemical cycles with a minimum departure from the geological or background rates of change in the biosphere.