ABSTRACT
Although an ecosystem-based approach has much to offer in the form of a broader, more integrated, and more comprehensive view of the forest-and thus contributes to the development of more effective management tools-its defect is its disregard for certain socially approved objectives. In essence, ecosystem management aims to restore forests to some biological condition that reflects fewer human impacts, but just what condition is a matter of arbitrary selection. Because ecosystem management has no real legislative mandate, decisions to seek any one of many possible conditions are being made by the Forest Service rather than by society at large, which makes its wishes known through the legislation of management objectives. More to the point from the perspective of taxpayers, these decisions are being driven almost exclusively by biological considerations, with little attention paid to economic and other concerns. In short, when identifying objectives, ecosystem management ignores the social consensus implicit in the congressionally legislated objective of producing multiple market and nonmarket forest outputs and, instead, attempts to achieve some arbitrary forest condition about which society has little say.
