The explanatory frameworks enabled the construction of a conceptual framework, proposed to explain the dynamic relationship between meaning of water and sense of place. The conceptual framework shows how a local reciprocity found in this relationship is consistent with the interaction between people, water, and place in the context of local communities. This relationship appears in particular settings and local contexts: in this case, where forest was meaningful as the pivotal physical setting and water was a part of forest. Additionally, economic well-being of local communities relied on both the forest and water, and people’s interaction influenced the nature of both water and forest. Together, sense of place or belongingness to a physical setting (forest) and the recognition of the meaning of water are vulnerable to loss. This responds to changing economic needs in local communities which themselves rely upon ecological conditions and connect with cultural and socio-political circumstances. Leadership plays an essential role, when such vulnerabilities are present, to
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evoke a sense of place and make explicit the meaning of water, driving the collective requirement for, and actions to protect and manage, water and place.