摘要：Many current water planning and management problems are riddled with high levels of complexity, uncertainty,and conflict, so-called "messes" or "wicked problems." The realization that there is a need to consider a wide variety of values,knowledge, and perspectives in a collaborative decision making process has led to a multitude of new methods and processesbeing proposed to aid water planning and management, which include participatory forms of modeling, planning, and decisionaiding processes. However, despite extensive scientific discussions, scholars have largely been unable to provide satisfactoryresponses to two pivotal questions: (1) What are the benefits of using participatory approaches.; (2) How exactly should theseapproaches be implemented in complex social-ecological settings to realize these potential benefits. In the study of developingsocial-ecological system sustainability, the first two questions lead to a third one that extends beyond the one-time applicationof participatory approaches for water management: (3) How can participatory approaches be most appropriately used to encouragetransition to more sustainable ecological, social, and political regimes in different cultural and spatial contexts. The answer tothis question is equally open. This special feature on participatory water management attempts to propose responses to thesethree questions by outlining recent advances in theory, practice, and evaluation related to the implementation of participatorywater management. The feature is largely based on an extensive range of case studies that have been implemented and analyzedby cross-disciplinary research teams in collaboration with practitioners, and in a number of cases in close cooperation withpolicy makers and other interested parties such as farmers, fishermen, environmentalists, and the wider public
关键词：adaptive management; collaborative decision making; evaluation; interactive planning; participatory modeling;participatory research; process design; public participation; social learning; stakeholder participation; water resources;management
