Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK)

TEK is the cumulative body of knowledge, practice, and belief about living beings and their environment, evolved by adaptive processes and transmitted through generations. Fikret Berkes defines four levels: empirical local knowledge (Inuit sea ice classification); resource management systems (Polynesian rahui -- temporary harvest bans); social institutions governing resource use; and worldview framing human-nature relationships. TEK is local rather than universal, qualitative rather than quantitative, holistic rather than reductionist, and embedded in moral-spiritual frameworks rather than claiming value neutrality. It represents millennia of empirical observation and adaptive management.

When to use it

When managing natural resources in areas with Indigenous presence and historical management. When scientific monitoring data is insufficient. When designing climate change adaptation at local scales. When evaluating whether management failures stem from inadequate data, institutions, or worldview.

How it can help

Provides ecological information Western science lacks -- particularly long-term, place-specific observations. Inuit TEK identified beluga population changes years before scientific monitoring. TEK-informed fisheries produce more sustainable yields than model-based management alone. In climate adaptation, TEK provides baselines predating scientific monitoring and identifies strategies tested over centuries. The four-level framework reveals that effective resource management requires not just data but social systems and values to implement it.