**5. Conclusions**

So, finally, during the many years of research, repeated presence, and outreach on the island, activities in the sense of a "real world lab", what did we actually achieve? One answer is relatively easy: We generated salient descriptions and, in some cases, even solid causal explanations of the social and ecological realities and made them bear on public awareness.

For example, one of the locally popular explanations for the obvious decrease of vegetation had been scapegoating the nuclear accident in Chernobyl (in 1986), and not the goats—quite an absurd theory, but widely believed. With another popular explanation we had more di fficulties, and almost believed a wrong attribution ourselves: That the rapid increase in livestock numbers was mainly the fault of EU-CAP subsidies. It took us a while to dismantle this assumption and show that reasons were more complex and strongly linked to Greek national, regional, and local regulations (some of them quite at odds with EU-CAP). Another message we could probably ge<sup>t</sup> across was that climate change in the Mediterranean meant a higher incidence of extreme weather events and thus a higher risk of landslides, particularly in steep areas lacking vegetation. Reforestation and appropriate infrastructure would be needed to mitigate these risks. Our research probably also reinforced the lowering of expectations for growing tourist numbers and appreciating the income they achieve from campers.

We are less sure that the core insight from the socio-metabolic paradigm go<sup>t</sup> across: Namely, that all material input into the economic process finally ends up as wastes to be dealt with, and that the benefits achieved with sales and purchases would one day need to be balanced by e fforts and costs for waste managemen<sup>t</sup> and removal. These days have already come—but are still poorly recognized.

The scientific descriptions and explanations may not have fully penetrated the minds of the inhabitants and created a dominant public awareness, but they have at least reached many entrepreneurs and the local intelligentsia, our core communication partners, and the public administration. In 2016, the Municipality of Samothraki decided on a "Strategic Plan" according to the following principles [50]: (1) Environmental protection and improvement of the quality of life, (2) strengthening social policy and education, culture, and sport services, (3) economic growth and employment, and (4) improving the administrative capacity of the municipality. This plan also acknowledges the necessity to attract "high quality, alternative tourism". The guiding policy priorities for the Municipality of Samothraki (2016) include: Improving maritime transport and port infrastructure (extension of Kamariotissa port, creation of a marina at Therma); improving solid waste management, constructing waste water treatment plants; expanding, improving, and maintaining the water supply network; restoring the road network; improving health infrastructure; promoting high-quality agricultural and livestock products; and various other goals. How far these plans are related to our research activities and outreach is hard to say—but they reflect many of our policy intentions. The ambitions of the local government, though, are often not matched by higher levels of the Greek governance system, so the final establishment of the Natura 2000 areas in Greece has again been delayed, blocking the island's pathway towards becoming accepted as a Biosphere Reserve by UNESCO—the initial policy goal of our research, and still a policy goal of the municipality.

Another answer extends beyond what to typically expect from science: Our work, and our regular presence, seem to have brought encouragement. They encouraged a number of people not to resign and settle with what was given, but to trust that something better could be achieved. They gained in ability to organize themselves, to raise funds, and to initiate processes. This refers particularly to the members of bottom-up initiatives, but it also applies to several members of the public administration (four di fferent mayors, for example, to varying degrees), interested partners in the regional governments, and a number of local farmers and tourism entrepreneurs. Such an encouragement, if not followed by successes, can easily generate excessive demand upon the leaders, wear them out, and end up in resignation. Thus, it is important to keep up a certain momentum and secure at least a minimal flow of resources and fresh manpower, be it in the form of enthusiastic students who want to learn about the island every year.

**Author Contributions:** Conceptualization, M.F.-K., P.P.; methodology, M.F-K., M.L., D.N., N.S.; validation, M.F-K., N.S.; formal analysis, M.F.-K., M.L., D.N.,N.S.; investigation, M.F.-K., M.L., D.N., P.P., N.S.; M.F.-K., N.S.; data curation, D.N.; writing – original draft: M.F.-K., M.L., N.S.; writing – review and editing, M.F.-K., D.N., P.P., N.S.; visualization, M.L., D.N.; supervision, M.F.-K.; project administration, D.N.; funding aquisition, M.F.-K., P.P. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

**Funding:** This research received external funding from the Austrian MAB-committee at the Austrian Academy of Sciences, contract UF2013 (SamoMAB) and the Austrian National Science Fund, grants number F15P27951-G27 (SUSAKI) and - F15TCS00022 CiSciSusaki).

**Acknowledgments:** The Alpen Adria University contributed to this research, within the master's program on Social and Human Ecology, by supporting annual summer schools on the island 2012–2019; other supporters of these summer schools, in providing teaching and advice, have been the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research in Athens, in particular Anastasia Lampou, as well as Simron Singh from Waterloo University, Canada. We thank Tiago Domingos (University of Lissabon) for advising us on Biodiverse Sown Pastures and Terraprima (Marjan Jongen, Antonio Martelo) for performing the experiments. Georg Gratzer and Carina Heiling (University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna) designed and performed the dendrological part of our study. Much of the diversity and quality of the research is due to the e fforts of many highly engaged students and local "citizen scientists" (see various entries at www://sustainable-samothraki.net). Throughout the process, we have been supported by the consecutive Mayors Petroudas, Chanos, Vitsas and Galatoumos, and members of the local administration. Finally, we need to thank numerous local initiatives for their trust and practical help, in particular the president and vice president of the association Sustainable Samothraki, founded in 2016, Carlota Marañon and Giorgos Maskalidis.

**Conflicts of Interest:** The authors declare no conflict of interest.
