Solidity and fluidity in the quantification of nature recovery: wild bird indicators in the UK

Abstract

Purpose Putting nature on a path to recovery is a vital grand challenge facing humanity. Pursuing this challenge demands a clear, concrete sense of what such a path looks like, what it means to progress in building a “nature-positive” future. In this study, we aim to understand the quantification processes involved in defining and measuring progress towards nature recovery. Design/methodology/approach The UK Government’s wild bird indicators purport to represent the state of nature in the UK. Nature recovery, a “nature-positive” future for the UK, thus becomes understood in quantitative terms, as a future with increasing abundance of wild birds. We trace the cascade of inscriptions involved in this quantified future-making. Findings To help us analyse our case, we turn to a set of studies in the science and technology studies literature postulating fluidity as a corollary to the solidity of networks. In contrast to the immutable stability of network relations, the relations comprising fluid spaces are adaptable, malleable. We draw on these ideas to show how objects representing complex social-ecological arrangements are created and sustained through interplays of solidity and fluidity. Originality/value Fluidity, being other to solidity and stability, can be perceived as a failing, as a threat to calculation. We show, however, that, alongside stable network relations, successful quantification of the complexities of nature recovery can simultaneously necessitate production of adaptable, malleable relations. Quantification results from cascades of inscriptions that flow through intersections of network and fluid spaces.