ABSTRACT
The purpose of this chapter is to propose a novel approach to the design of human disturbance * regimes in forests. Human’ disturbances are sudden changes in forest composition and structure caused by forest management, while natural disturbances are those caused by natural agents such as storm, snow load, and bark beetles. The dynamics of managed forest ecosystems need to be restricted to those system states where desired products and services are continuously provided. These restrictions need to be both sufficiently narrow to ensure that human demands are met, and sufficiently large to allow for ecosystem dynamics to occur. Implementing a strict regime to control ecosystem dynamics has led, in some examples, to long-term management failures (Holling, 1987). To what extent such failures generally occur is an open question.
