Journal of Landscape Architecture (Journal)

Lima, F. (Editor)
Usue Ruiz Arana (Editor)
Maria Hellström-Reimer (Editor)
Burcu Yiğit-Turan (Editor)
Sonia Keravel (Editor)
Alia Fadel (Editor)
Anaïs Leger-Smith (Editor)

Activity: Publication peer-review and editorial work types › Editorial activity

Description

As editor of JoLA, I have led a double special issue dedicated to the theme of wildfires published in December 2025 (volume 20, 2025). This is the product of a collaborative work of all the editorial group for more than 1,5 year culminating in a

Period	May 2024 → Dec 2025
Type of journal	Journal
ISSN	1862-6033
Degree of Recognition	International

Documents & Links

[Wild]fires: eruptions of over exploitation is a JoLA’s special issue and an exhibition reflecting on the increased number, expansion and duration of free-burning fires that occur due to anthropogenic causes. While often referred to as ‘Wild’, these fires are overwhelmingly the direct or indirect result of human ignition or land-use practices. Such anthropogenic wildfires have an strong consequence for human communities, but also for ecosystems, and for our future environmental balance. We witness endless discussions on these devastating and desperate events. In public media interviews, experts list thecommon culprits: weather conditions, land use, fuel availability, policies of fire suppression, mistakes in fire combat, etc. However, a frequently dismissed thread of thought regards over-exploitation; a thread that our authors bring to the fore and that is common in very disparate geographies. This thread runs through the episodes offered here, from theexploitation of hardwood in Amazonia, Chile’s mining extraction, and the extensive young-even-age-low-diversity eucalyptus forests for paper production, to clearances for cattle production and real estate speculation. As we have learned from this exhibition and special issue, these culprits need to be revised, and over-exploitation brought to centre stage. Understanding fires in their worldwide communalities and specificities is critical for better future landscape design andmanagement. We are attempting to contribute to that effort, by opening a discussion platform with world leading scholars from our profession, extending interdisciplinary scholarship in this field. This exhibition and special issue explore how landscape design can contribute to the overwhelming challenge created by mega fires in the last decades and in the face of climatic change. Throughout the world, millions of hectares have been consumed by fire in the last few years with some impact on public awareness, but the recent loss of approximately 23,000 ha of homes and 150.000 people displaced in Los Angeles has seemed to finally bring to common consciousness the thread that this issue poses. Most of the media consumers are urban dwellers detached from the realities of the forests and foresters. What the episode of January 2025 in Los Angeles might have brought to the fore is the certainty that wildfires do not distinguish between wealth and poverty and do not seem to be ‘wild’, probably never were. Nor do fires seem eager to stay ‘in the wild’.

Journal of Landscape Architecture (Journal)

Description

Documents & Links

Related content

Research output

Common house in flames: Eruptions of over-exploitation