Restoring authority: Neoliberal governance, ecological restoration, and seeding politics in the Chicago region

This article analyzes how fiscal austerity led to the fragmentation of authority in a local government agency mandated to protect nature, instigating scientific and political conflict over how to conduct seeding. In a situation characteristic of neoliberalism, the Forest Preserve District of Cook County (FPDCC)—which protects more than 70,000 acres around Chicago, Illinois—was an underfunded government body that leveraged partnerships to undertake ecological restoration. While FPDCC staff had nominal authority over the entire district, volunteers, federal officials, and non-profit organizations had various levels of actual control over individual forest preserves, creating a contested landscape of intersecting jurisdictions in the metropolitan system. Although they all used the same reference book to guide their seeding practices, FPDCC staff and their partners had contrasting goals for plant diversity at project sites, revealing how seeding is a cultural—and indeed political—practice. When one practitioner denigrated another’s botanical approach, they were also challenging their dominion over forest preserve land. Seeding disputes fueled tensions, interfering with ecosystem recovery that governments at all levels have recognized as critical to biodiversity conservation as well as climate mitigation and resilience. All restoration, like all politics, is local. But this example from the Chicago region is instructive for any restoration project that brings together multiple partners, by showcasing how disagreements over restoration methods reflect and reproduce power relations and institutional differences.