Presentation short abstract

Local rigidities in Xiberoa have historically sustained pastoral adaptation while enabling flexibility. Yet broader market and regulatory pressures now impose geographic and temporal rigidities, challenging the balance of the socio-ecosystem across scales.

Presentation long abstract

In Xiberoa (French Pyrenees), historical local rigidities have been crucial in maintaining pastoral practices that allow for flexible adaptation strategies in the face of multiple stressors. Among these rigidities is an assemblage of local social institutions, varying in their degrees of formalization. The community is regulated by numerous social norms, such as solidarities among inhabitants and a commitment to maintaining pastoral heritage and culture. The summer pasturelands are made of commons (shepherd cabins, Syndicate of Xiberoa) with quite rigid regimes of organization. In fact, the entire socio-ecosystem englobes social and environmental rigidities that influenced the evolution of farming practices in Xiberoa.

Today, pastoralism remains heavily conditioned by dynamics occurring at broader scales. In particular, international markets, the EU, and French regulations highly influence how the pastoral socio-ecosystem is able to respond to contemporary challenges (e.g., influencing the production calendars, the technical administrative language used, the delineated scales of adaptation projects, etc.).

Looking at rigidities and flexibilities through a multiscalar approach highlights that, while there are positive flexibilities and rigidities at the local scale, adaptation support at broader scales introduces geographical and temporal rigidities that constrain pastoral flexibilities. Rigidity at the local level is defined by the capacity to handle uncertainty in a more reactive way than rigidities at other scales. Key questions remain as to whether historical local rigidities can continue to safeguard the pastoral socio-ecosystem into the future, given the scale of unprecedented climatic shocks.