摘要：Historical range of variation (HRV) has been used as a conceptual tool to determineappropriate management actions to sustain or restore diversity of ecological systems. This concept hascome into question for both biological and social considerations, and the southeastern United States is agood model system to test its utility. Southeastern Coastal Plain upland pine savannas and woodlands andtheir associated wetlands are among the most diverse communities in temperate North America, havingboth high levels of species richness and large numbers of endemic flora and fauna. However, this diversityis intimately linked with disturbance regimes. Maintaining frequent fire, varied in season based on changingmanagement objectives through time, is the most important management tool for sustaining biodiversity.Moreover, the landscape has been molded by a long history of intense land use that has altered both thebiological and the social landscape in which management occurs, and threatens the native diversity.Management must anticipate likely trends and adopt strategies that provide flexibility for managers to dealwith the future, both socially and ecologically. In the Southeast, the most dominant trend is associated withurbanization and forest fragmentation, which results from urban sprawl. This issue joins others—fire andsmoke, logging, access, in-holdings, and the uncertainty of scientific models, for example—as matters ofmajor concern to the public. Ultimately, it is the public that eventually grants or withholds social permissionto manage. We explore, here, the potential and the limitations for how history can inform future management.Rather than being used as a specific management tool, we find that one purpose for which HRV may bewell suited is serving as a broad communication framework to help diverse publics understand the conceptof landscape dynamics. This approach would provide the fundamental background material for stakeholdersto understand how ecological conditions and social acceptability interact through time to mold and constrainfuture possible ranges of variability
关键词：disturbances; fire regimes; historical; social; and future ranges of variability; legacies;rareness; social acceptability; species richness
