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Cultural diversity and conservation

J. Peter Brosius and Sarah L. Hitchner

Reconceptualising the linkbetween cultural diversityand biodiversity: beyond thebiocultural perspective

This article is premised on theassumption that any effort toexplore the links between cul-tural diversity and conserva-tionmust beginwith providinga productive analysis of thelink between cultural diversityand biological diversity. Ouranalysis is premised on recog-nition that diversity can be anelusive concept, particularlywhen attempting to describeit across the parallax of cultur-al and biological definitions.As Magurran notes:

diversity is rather like an optical illus-

ion. The more it is looked at, the less

clearly defined it appears to be and

viewing it from different angles can

lead to different perceptions of what

is involved. (Magurran 1988, p.1)

The semantic range ofthe concept of diversity spansthe gulf from being a numberor index to a value commit-ment, and this semantic rangemust be acknowledged andembraced.

In the last two decadesscholars, practitioners and

policy-makers have recognised that there is botha spatial and conceptual link between culturaldiversity and biodiversity. Though the geneal-ogy of this recognition is complex, a simple vers-ion is that it originates mostly from indigenous

advocates who deployedthis idea as a strategy forvalorising indigenous peo-ple as holders of valuableknowledge and as guardiansof biodiversity (Brush 1996;Burger 1990; Gray 1991;International Work Groupfor Indigenous Affairs[IWGIA] 1993–1994; Kemf1993; Suzuki 1990; Suzukiand Knudtson 1992; Taylor1990). In the interval it hasbecome axiomatic to statethat indigenous peoples

possess, in their ecological knowl-

edge, an asset of incalculable value:

a map to the biological diversity of

the earth on which all life depends.

Encoded in indigenous languages,

customs, and practices may be as

muchunderstandingof nature as is

stored in the libraries of modern

science. (Durning 1992, p.7)

These are the people –often living in out-of-the-way places (Tsing1993), frequently margin-alised politically and eco-nomically – we have cometo valorise as possessing

J. Peter Brosius, is Professor at theDepartment of Anthropology, and Direc-tor, Center for Integrative ConservationResearch at the University of Georgia. Heis past President of the Anthropology andEnvironment Section, American Anthro-pological Association, and in 2005 he wasawarded the Lourdes Arizpe Award inAnthropology and Environment. Hisresearch in environmental anthropologyfocuses on the cultural politics of con-servation at both local and global scales.He is a member of the coordinatingcommittee of theAdvancingConservationin a Social Context initiative, funded bythe MacArthur Foundation.Email: [email protected] Hitchner is a Post-doctoral ResearchAssociate at the Center for IntegrativeConservation Research at the Universityof Georgia. Her dissertation fieldwork,conducted in Sarawak, Malaysia from2006–2009, focused on collaboratively doc-umenting the landscape history of theKelabit Highlands. Her dissertation,‘‘Remaking the landscape: Kelabit engage-ments with conservation and development’’analyses such topics as collaborativeresearch methods, community mapping,participatory geographical informationsystems and technology transfer; commu-nity-based ecotourism; trans-boundaryconservation initiatives and the politicalecology of conservation practices.Email: [email protected]

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richly detailed knowledge representing generationsof observation and experimentation about medic-inal plants, crop varieties, trees, the habits ofanimals and much more.

Perhaps the most prevalent argument, andthe one in which the most direct linkage is madebetween the fate of forests and peoples, is toassert the importance of indigenous knowledgefor preserving biodiversity and to raise thespectre of its loss. According to Ausable:

The extinction of biological diversity is inextricably linked

with the destruction of cultural diversity. With the loss of

native cultures, there is also disappearing the vital and

important knowledge of a way of living in balance with the

earth and the value system in which it is encoded. (Ausable

1994, p.211)

One of the first documents to explicitlymake this connection was the 1988 Declarationof Belem, which recognised the inextricable linkbetween cultural and biological diversity. In1992, Bernard Nietschmann gave further shapeto this link when he proposed what he called‘‘the biocultural axiom’’ (Nietschmann 1992).

The source of what has come to be calledthe ‘‘biocultural perspective’’ lies in a sense ofcrisis – that the world is experiencing unprece-dented levels of loss of both biodiversity andcultural diversity. The biodiversity crisis narra-tive has a very long genealogy (Myers 1979;Wilson 1988), and current expressions ofurgency are an extension of this. John Terborghspeaks of the fact that we are currently facing‘‘the prospect of biological Armageddon’’(Terborgh 1999, p.123). Soule and Terborghdescribe ‘‘a world in pieces’’ and warn that ‘‘eachisolated remnant of nature is caught in atightening tourniquet of civilization’’ (Souleand Terborgh 1999, p.12). The not-so-indirectimplication is that the clock of biologicalextinction is ticking and that even if our methodsare imperfect there is no time left for delay. At thesame time that the biodiversity crisis narrativewas gaining momentum we witnessed a growingglobal concern for the fate of indigenous peoplesthreatened by dispossession and culture loss(Conklin and Graham 1995; Niezen 2003;Varese 1996), exemplified by a transnationalindigenous rights movement and the advocacy ofnon-governmental organisations such asForest People’s Programme, Cultural Survival

International and the International WorkingGroup for Indigenous Affairs.

The biocultural perspective emerged throughrecognition that biological and cultural diversitywere inextricably linked. To many advocates ofboth cultural and biological diversity, workingunder the rubric of biocultural diversity (Harmon1996; Loh and Harmon 2005; Maffi 2005;Sutherland 2003), this is a seductive idea that is‘‘good to think’’ of as a response to the loss ofglobal diversity. The result is that several initia-tives have emerged that attempt to add substanceto this insight by documenting the co-occurrenceof biological and cultural diversity. Proponents ofthe biocultural perspective have declared theemergence of a new ‘‘integrated, transdisciplinaryfield . . . spanning the natural and social sciences,as well as linking theory with practice and sciencewith policy, ethics, and human rights’’ (Maffi2005, pp.612–613).

It is one thing to recognise that a link betweenbiological and cultural diversity exists; it is anotherthing altogether to conceptualise the nature of thatlink in a way that is productive either of newinsights or new forms of practice, and a furtherstep still to understand the implications for policyand governance. In this respect, the bioculturalperspective must be found wanting.

Despite the claim that we are witnessing theemergence of a new trans-disciplinary field, todate proponents of the biocultural perspectivehave devoted an inordinate amount of attentionto identifying indices that allow them to developmaps demonstrating the spatial correlationsbetween biological and cultural diversity at arange of scales. A key actor in the effort to linkthese correlations to conservation policy is thenon-governmental organisation Terralingua(n.d.). These spatialised cartographic imagesare potentially important tools for visualising –and valorising – the link between biological andcultural diversity, but they are of limitedrelevance in advancing a coherent trajectory ofresearch or in promoting policies that supporteither biological or cultural diversity. There are anumber of reasons why this is so.

Firstly, the cartographic and correlativeapproach seems to be guided by the assumptionthat these visualisations speak for themselvesand that their significance to researchers orpolicy-makers is somehow intuitive. As such, abiocultural perspective provides only a vague

142 J. Peter Brosius and Sarah L. Hitchner

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link to action – whether we mean by ‘‘action’’research, interdisciplinary collaboration orengagement in policy, practice or rights issues.To assert that a linkage between biological andcultural diversity exists, and to represent that linkcartographically, is not the same as providing aconceptual roadmap for addressing the threats toeither form of diversity. Thus, in the end it isunclear what these spatial correlations produce.

Secondly, there is a series of fundamentalquestions that must be raised about the relia-bility of the correlations produced, given thatresults are so variable depending on the scale ofanalysis (Manne 2003) and that the indices onwhich these correlations are based use overlyreductive proxies of diversity – for instance,passerine birds as a stand-in for biodiversity.There is an inherent contradiction in usingreductive measures to represent diversity.

Thirdly, the biocultural perspective is oflimited utility because it tends to privilege onlyone part of humanity – those small, diverseindigenous communities living in places of highbiodiversity, thereby rendering them ‘‘spatiallyincarcerated’’ (Appadurai 1988, p.37). Whilesuch communities have certainly suffered fromlong histories of marginalisation and stand tobenefit from projects that privilege them for achange, the biocultural perspective is somethingof a two-edged sword. This unspoken primordi-alism (Appadurai 1996, p.139) implies thatplaces less diverse are sacrifice zones, of lesserinterest to those engaged in promoting eitherbiological or cultural diversity (Cocks 2006).

Fourthly, the biocultural perspective isentirely a product of the crisis narrative. Whilethere are certainly very good reasons to beconcerned about the rapid erosion of bothbiological and cultural diversity on a global scale(Redford and Brosius 2006), a perspective that isdefined entirely with regard to crisis ignores thedynamic, creative possibilities that can emergefrom human agency and processes of hybridity.

Finally, the biocultural perspective suffersfrom

the assumed isomorphism of space, place, and culture . . .

[in which] space itself becomes a kind of neutral grid on

which cultural difference, historical memory, and societal

organization are inscribed. It is in this way that space

functions as a central organizing principle in the social

sciences at the same time that it disappears from analytical

purview. (Gupta and Ferguson 1992, p.7)

As we argue in the following, it is crucialthat we acknowledge the creative dynamism ofculture and its autonomy from space and place.

It is clear that in order to productively linkcultural diversity and conservation we require analternative approach to thinking about the linkbetween cultural and biological diversity. Abiocultural approach which relies so heavily onthe visual representation of spatial correlationsbetween biological and cultural diversity is clearlyinadequate to the task. The following is an attemptto define a more generative conceptual approachto understanding this link and to provide aframework for research, policy and practice.

We provide two ways of addressing the linkbetween cultural and biological diversity. Firstly,in response to a biocultural perspective based onthe crisis narrative, we suggest that we can moreproductively link cultural diversity and conserva-tion through the recognition of a broaderspectrum of processes impinging on diversity.While the loss of diversity is a matter of majorconcern, there are also processes at work whichproduce diversity. It is important to recognise thebroad spectrum of processes rather than focusingon only one end of the spectrum. Secondly, weattempt an analysis that links cultural diversityand conservation through an understanding oftrends in conservation. Conservation is not astatic enterprise. On the contrary, it is charac-terised as an ongoing series of changing prioritiesand practices that shape the way conservationactors address the human element. Thus, devel-oping new strategies for linking cultural diversityand conservation is not simply a matter ofrecognising patterns of distribution of culturaland biological diversity. It lies in recognising howa series of shifts in conservation policy andpractice has positioned human social and culturalconsiderations in their practice past and present,and defining alternatives for the future.

Between homogenisation andhybridity: reconsidering thelink between culturaldiversity and conservation

In the effort to seek conceptual integrationbetween cultural diversity and biological diver-sity, and thus between cultural diversity and

Cultural diversity and conservation 143

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conservation, we need to understand a spectrumof contemporary processes that not only reducediversity but also produce or modify it. Recog-nising that a spectrum exists between homo-genisation and hybridity is not a repudiation ofthe crisis narrative and is not intended to denythe threat that exists to diversity throughprocesses of homogenisation. As Redford andBrosius note:

the forces promoting diversity and the forces promoting

homogeneity are playing their endgame on a global scale

with the outcome all too apparent. Almost everywhere in

the world diversity is being lost to homogeneity. (Redford

and Brosius 2006)

Rather, it is an attempt to supplement it witha broader appreciation for the diversity of pro-cesses that both erode and create global diversity.

Homogenisation

One of the key conceptual links between culturaland biological diversity is the recognition thatboth are today being diminished through a diverseset of processes that fall under the rubric ofhomogenisation. As Redford and Brosius note:

In recent years across a variety of domains – science,

advocacy, and academia – we have witnessed an extra-

ordinary proliferation of commentaries on the loss of

diversity and the threat of homogenization. The dimen-

sions of this diversity loss extend throughout the cultural

and natural realms in complicated, interconnected ways.

Starting from the purely human side they include destruc-

tion of old urban centres in the Middle East and small

villages in Japan, the loss of pilgrimage routes in Europe,

the extinction of languages and, with this, the rich tapestry

of cultural diversity throughout the world. Poised between

the human realm and the natural realm are eroding

dimensions of diversity that include dramatic loss of

livestock breeds and agricultural varieties as well as

traditions for raising them, and erosion or obliteration of

regional cuisines and foodways. At the more biological end

of this spectrum can be counted the extinction or erosion of

genes, populations, species and ecosystems as well as the

loss of migratory routes, and ecological interactions.

(Redford and Brosius 2006)

In looking for conceptual linkages betweenthe loss of both forms of diversity, an obviousquestion is whether the same set of forces isresponsible or whether we observe differentkinds of process at work. As Redford andBrosius also note:

Whichever forms of diversity wemight wish to focus on, the

drivers of homogenization are much the same: the

hypermobility of capital, increasingly unfettered free trade

policies driven by neoliberal agendas, structural violence

and physical violence; all those things we gloss under the

label ‘‘globalization’’. No matter the cause, this cascading

homogenization produces the same result – a simplified

world. In fact, in the biological literature a name for

this impending epoch has emerged – the homogocene

(Rosenzweig 2001). (Redford and Brosius 2006)

In recent years we have witnessed a pro-liferation of commentaries on the subject ofglobalisation, and it is clear that we haveincreasingly come to lump those processes underthe broader rubric of globalisation are responsiblefor much of the homogenisation we observe.Explaining homogenisation as a result of globa-lisation, however, obscures three importantthings. Firstly, globalisation is not a singularprocess: it is a plural one, a phenomenon underwhich we must include things as diverse asneoliberal economic ideologies, global commod-ity markets, transnational religious fundamental-ism and indigenous social movements. Many ofthese processes have been the product of extensivecommentary and debate andwe have a substantialpublished record of how a range of processesoperate in the domains of language loss (Crystal2000; Dalby 2003; Harrison 2007; Nettle andRomaine 2000; Wurm 2001), development(Banuri 1990; Giddens 1990; Nederveen Pieterse1995), resource extraction (Perreault 2006;Roe and van Eeten 2004), market integration(Cox 1992; Peterson 2004), religious conversionand the growth fundamentalisms (Heimbrock2001; Moten 2005; Wessels 2008) and education(Matthews and Sidhu 2005; Robertson 2006),among others. All have implications fordiversity and homogenisation, but in very differ-ent ways.

Secondly, we must recognise that the driversof homogenisation are to be found across a rangeof scales. Certainly, in many historical instances,the nation-state has been a key agent in theproduction of homogenising processes. Numer-ous scholars have explored this process in thecontext of the making of national subjects and theestablishment of ‘‘the national order of things’’(Malkki 1995, p.1) (Anderson 1983; Fox 1990;Rosaldo 2003; Scott 1998; Weber 1979). Thepublication of Imagined communities (Anderson1983) was a watershed in scholarly interest in the


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study of nations, nationalism and the constitutionof national political cultures.

Such national political cultures have astrong environmental component to them. Onthe one hand, they have as their basis particulartopologies: not just the larger national ‘‘geo-body’’ (Thongchai 1994) but zones of inclusionand exclusion within that geo-body. What arethe appropriate spaces (intensively cultivatedplains versus sparsely populated upland rain-forests) and occupations (urban dweller, peasantfarmer, shifting cultivator, hunter-gatherer) forcitizenship in the nation-state? To what extentare government decisions about mines, dams,plantations or timber concessions premised onassumptions about the communities that exist inthose areas? At the same time, nation-statesproduce national spaces and subjects throughthe establishment of grids of legibility. Ininvoking the idea of legibility we are drawingon the work of James Scott in Seeing like a state(1998). For Scott, legibility – achieved through aseries of state simplifications designed to reducethe opacity of the local – is the central problemof statecraft. Anna Tsing’s discussion of margin-ality in Indonesia (1993) is perhaps the bestethnographic treatment of a national topologyof citizenship to date. Recent work on whatRosaldo (2003) has termed ‘‘cultural citizen-ship’’ also holds great promise for understand-ing national topologies.

Another aspect of national environmentalideologies concerns the matter of blood and soilessentialisms. To what degree and in what waysdo national governments purvey images of time-less rootedness, and towhat extent do such imagesserve to include or exclude certain categories ofpeople in ways that reduce diversity? At a timewhen conservation is increasingly tied up withidentity politics and the line between the poten-tially emancipatory and the potentially reaction-ary is no longer clear, understanding this aspect ofthe discursive linkages made between nationalcommunities and natural communities is critical(Malkki 1992; Zimmerman 1994).

From homogenisation tohybridity: three broad trends

While globalisation is certainly implicated as amajor agent of homogenisation, it is simultaneously

a source of creativity, invention, difference anddiversification. Thus, against the discourse ofhomogenisation, the last couple of decades havewitnessed a series of conceptual developments thatcompel us to interrogate the crisis narrative. Theseare (a) decentring primordialism and essentialism,(b) the politics of knowledge and (c) in the domainof the natural sciences, the emergence of the ‘‘newecologies’’. Each of these, taken separately andtogether, renders the conventional bioculturalperspective problematic.

Decentring primordialist andessentialist notions of culture

One of the key developments in social theory inthe last two decades – from across a range ofacademic disciplines – has been a proliferationof commentaries challenging conventionallyspatialised primordialist and essentialist notionsof culture (Appadurai 1996; Bhabha 1994;Gupta and Ferguson 1992, 1997; Hannerz1996; Malkki 1992; Rosaldo 1989; Tsing 1993).The sources of this challenge are diverse – post-structuralism, feminist theory, post-colonialtheory, border theory, critical race theory, queertheory and other allied perspectives concernedwith de-essentialising difference. What this bodyof work has challenged is the idea that culture isalways and everywhere something that is fixed,timeless, and bounded in space (Garcıa Canclini1995). Gupta and Ferguson, for instance,challenge the traditionally ‘‘assumed isomorph-ism of space, place, and culture’’ (Gupta andFerguson 1992, p. 7). Rather than focusing oncores of assumed purity, this body of workreminds us of the need to recognise that cultureis dynamic, that humans exercise agency, andthat it is at borders, margins and through zonesand processes of hybridity that processes ofcultural production are manifested. From thisperspective, culture is not a timeless entity, butsomething that is actively produced throughprocesses of articulation (Appadurai 1996;Gupta and Ferguson 1992; Pemberton 1994;Rosaldo 1989; Tsing 2004). Further, culture isno longer viewed as simply something that isshared. Rather, contemporary theorisations ofculture view it as contextual, polyphonic,disjunctive, negotiated and contested in waysthat acknowledge human agency and recognise


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that ‘‘loss occurs alongside invention’’ (Guptaand Ferguson 1992, p.8).

This effort to problematize conventionalprimordialist and essentialist ideas of culture hasproceeded along a series of more specificconversations about globalization (Feather-stone 1990; Jameson and Miyoshi 1998;Kearney 1995; Robertson 1992; Tomlinson1999; Waters 1995; Wilson and Dissanayake1995), hybridity (Bakhtin 1981; Bhabha 1994;Garcıa Canclini 1995; Gilroy 1993; Hall 1990;Young 1995), mettisage (Glissant 1981; Hill2002;Mary 2005; Verges 1999), transculturation(Ortiz 1978; Pratt 1992), creolization (AmericanEthnologist 2006; Khan 2007; Stewart 2007;Young 1995), diaspora and transnationalism(Brah 1996; Clifford 1994; Gilroy 1993; Hall1990; Lavie and Swedenburg 1996; Ong 1999;Ong and Nonini 1996; van der Veer 1994),deterritorialization/delocalization/displacement/migration (Appadurai 1990; Bender and Winer2001; Brettell 2003; Brettell and Hollifield 2000;Garcıa Canclini 1995; Giddens 1990; Gupta andFerguson 1992; Kaplan 1996; Lull 1995; Matte-lart 1994;Mlinar 1992;Morley andRobins 1995;Latouche 1996; Smith 1994; Thompson 1995;Tomlinson 1999), borders (Alvarez 1995; Anzal-dua 1987; Arteaga 1994; Calderon and Saldivar1991; Michaelsen and Johnson 1997; Rosaldo1989; Rouse 1991; Saldıvar 1997) and the politicsof authenticity (Friedman 1996; Griffiths 1994;Hanson 1989, 1991; Jackson 1989, 1995; Jolly1992; Keesing 1989; Keesing and Tonkinson1982; Lattas 1993; Linnekin 1991, 1992; Ramos1994; Rogers 1996; Zerner 1994). Equallysignificant in this regard has been a proliferationof interest in the concept of agency (Archer 1988;Bhabha 1994; Bourdieu 1977; de Certeau 1984;Giddens 1979; Johnson 2003; Ortner 2001;Spivak 1985; Sztompka 1993), a ‘term referringto the role of the human actor as individual orgroup in directing or effectively intervening in thecourse of history’ (Brooker 1999, p. 3).

For all the advances that have been made in theorising

culture, Ashcroft et al. warn that the emergence of certain

fixed, stereotypical representations of culture remains a

danger. The tendency to employ generic signifiers for

cultures that may have many variations within them may

override the real differences that exist within such cultures.

Markers of cultural difference may well be perceived as

authentic cultural signifiers, but that claim to authenticity

can imply that these cultures are not subject to change. The

use of signifiers of authenticity may be a vital part of the

attempt by many subordinated societies to argue for their

continued and valid existence as they become inevitably

hybridized and influenced by various social and cultural

changes. But too rigid a definition can militate against such

resistance if they are used to police and license the

determining boundaries of the culture by the dominant

group. (Ashcroft et al. 1998, p. 21)

Considered within the context of conserva-tion, what this passage points to is the inherentdanger in primordialist and essentialist notionsof culture. Conservation programmes guided bysuch notions deny communities agency andmake the extension of rights contingent onadherence to externally mandated standards ofwhat constitutes tradition.

Politics of knowledge

In the last few decades scholars have come torecognise that the contours of power are moreconvoluted and more implicit than we oncethought. Across a range of disciplines, thetheoretical landscape is defined by a concernwith the links between knowledge and powerand the boundaries between epistemology andpolitics are much more problematic than onceassumed. We recognise that who we are has agreat deal to do with what we can claim to knowandwith how valid others take our knowledge tobe. As a result, we can no longer take ourcategories, our knowledge-making practices orour representational conventions for granted.

This body of scholarship on the politics ofknowledge (Agrawal 2002; Cohn 1996; Escobar1995; Ferguson 1994; Foucault 1972, 1973, 1980;Haraway 1988, 1991; Nadasdy 2003; Rabinow1984; Said 1978; Stehr 2005) is premised on therecognition that all forms of knowledge areinherently political and it challenges the assump-tion that there is any such thing as objectiveknowledge. Scholars working in this area havedemonstrated this in the context of medicine,education, development, environment and tech-nology and in numerous other domains. Theyexamine how knowledge is produced and who isempowered to produce it, how it circulates, howsome knowledge is taken to be authoritative whileother knowledge is marginalised and how someforms of knowledge are taken to be credible bycertain categories of actors or contested by others.


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They have also explored how various forms ofknowledge are represented – through narrative,statistically, cartographically and otherwise – andhow various technologies of visualisation haveunexpected implications. What is important forthe present discussion is understanding the way inwhich various forms of knowledge productionconstruct and deploy a discourse of crisis and theways in which this discourse in turn creates theground for various forms of intervention.

Nature, the new ecologies and thecritique of wilderness

In recent decades a number of developmentsboth in the domain of theory and in the domainof scientific research have converged towards aseries of insights that call into question conven-tional ways of thinking about the relationshipbetween humanity and nature.

Firstly, we have witnessed a sustained effortto challenge and dismantle that fundamentalwestern intellectual construct dividing and dichot-omising nature and culture, nature being ‘‘thatwhich is opposed to, prior to, or simply outsidehuman society and culture’’ (Edgar and Sedgwick1999, p.256). This work has challenged thenature–culture construct by showing both that,at a theoretical level, this dichotomy is discursivelyconstructed and, at an empirical level, theboundaries between these two domains areconstantly crossed, rarely as discreet or absoluteas we once presumed them to be (Braun 2002;Braun and Castree 1998; Castree 2005; Castreeand Braun 2001; Ellen and Fukui 1996; Haraway1991; MacCormack and Strathern 1980; Ortner1974; Soper 1995, 1996; Whatamore 2001;Williams 1976, 1980; Wolch and Emel 1998).

Secondly, in the past two decades many ofour conventional assumptions about how eco-systems work have been overturned by whatScoones (1999) has called the new ecology.Against assumptions about balance, order,stability, homeostasis and equilibrium, the newecology stresses uncertainty, non-linearity, inde-terminacy, surprise and complexity operatingacross scales, and notes that non-equilibriumprocesses are a more representative way to viewecological process than equilibriums (Botkin1990; Scoones 1999; Zimmerman 1994). Thisshift in perspective has had profound effects inthe field of ecosystem management, at least in

some circles (for instance, environmental man-agement in the USA) and has given rise to thefield of adaptive management (Holling 1978).

Finally, we have witnessed a series ofinfluential critiques of the idea of wilderness.Until recently much conservation thinking hasbeen guided by the idea of that the places mostworth protecting are those that exist untouchedby human presence. Humans have been viewedprimarily as an invasive species, encroachingon otherwise pristine areas, their activitiesleading inexorably to the erosion of biodiversity(Brockington 2002; Terborgh 1999). Thisassumption has had two major consequencesfor the practice of conservation. Firstly, con-servation planning and implementation hasmostly been based on models that mandate theexclusion of humans from biologically diverselandscapes or that restrict livelihoods of localpeople in such areas (Borgerhoff-Mulder andCoppolillo 2005; Brown 1998; Colchester 1992,2005; Peluso 1994; Sheil and Lawrence 2004).Secondly, anthropogenic landscape processeshave been viewed almost exclusively as threats tobiodiversity. Conservation research has focusedoverwhelmingly on elements or patterns ofbiodiversity while largely ignoring histories ofland use in areas of conservation interest (Brosiusand Russell 2003; Foster et al. 2003). As a result,many ways in which previous generations of localpeoples have shaped current patterns of biodiver-sity composition have been overlooked. In short,the identification and creation of protected areashas not been much informed by a historicalperspective (Borgerhoff-Mulder and Coppolillo2005; Foster et al. 2003).

In recent years this assumption has beenchallenged on several fronts. Firstly, a substan-tial body of critical scholarship has emergedchallenging the idea of the pristine wilderness onconceptual grounds (Cronon 1995; Guha 1989;Guyer and Richards 1996; Nash 1967; Proctorand Pincetl 1996). Secondly, archaeologists,geographers, ecologists and conservation practi-tioners have produced empirical studies demon-strating the anthropogenic nature of much ofwhat had been deemed to be pristine naturalareas (Adams and McShane 1992; Balee 1992;Denevan 1992; Hitchner 2009b; Nyerges 1996;Roosevelt 1989; Schwartzman et al. 2000a, b).Actions taken in the past without thoroughknowledge of historical patterns of land use have


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resulted in the exclusion of humans from areaswhere management has shaped species composi-tion and density over millennia (Adams andMcShane 1992; Neumann 1998; Raffles 1999).Thirdly, against assumptions that anthropo-genic landscape modifications are inherentlydestructive, researchers have demonstrated thathuman modification of landscapes can actuallyenhance soil and water quality and maintain orincrease levels of biodiversity (Fairhead andLeach 1996; Gadgil and Guha 1992; Guyer andRichards 1996; Michon et al. 2000) and thatagro-ecological biodiversity as a result of land-scape management by local communities may bean important means of in situ conservation(Marjokorpi and Ruokolainen 2003). Fourthly,indigenous communities have increasingly chal-lenged the assumptions of conservation practi-tioners as latter-day manifestations of the ideathat indigenous lands are terra nullius (Martin2000; Wright et al. 1995). Taken together, thesestudies and critiques have questioned the strictseparation between pristine nature and humansand argued for a recognition of the role ofhuman history in the creation of landscapes.A key challenge for contemporary conservationpractice is to acknowledge histories of humanpresence and anthropogenic modification byincorporating landscape history into conserva-tion planning and implementation.

Linking cultural diversity andconservation through a seriesof trends

In seeking a productive conceptual link betweencultural diversity and conservation, we need torecognise three fundamental characteristics ofthe conservation enterprise. Firstly, conserva-tion is never static. Rather, it is a constantlychanging configuration of institutions, initia-tives, funding streams, alliances, practices, buzz-words and critiques. Secondly, conservation is anexus of relationships between large organisa-tions and donors, between organisations andnational governments, between national govern-ments and local people and more. All of theserelationships are negotiated in various ways,with some actors privileged and some actorsmarginalised to varying degrees in the process.

Thirdly, conservation is inherently political in allthe ways in which it involves institutions, localcommunities, livelihoods, legal codes, knowl-edge-making practices and more – establishingand enforcing boundaries, curtailing subsistenceactivities, negotiating benefits, making eco-regional maps, applying reserve selection algo-rithms. However, different actors – and differentanalytical perspectives – locate the politics indifferent domains of conservation practice.Many conservation practitioners clearly seepolitics at local sites of conservation interven-tion. But politics occurs in other places too: inthe adoption of categories like ‘‘stakeholder’’, inthe use of reserve selection algorithms, in theproduction of eco-regional maps, in the applica-tion of tools for monitoring and evaluation, inthe expectation that conservation can only beachieved through the application of manage-ment plans and in a thousand other ways.

In the present discussion we examine aseries of broad historical developments in theconservation field as a series of discursive andscalar shifts. We begin by tracing two ways inwhich community, locality and indigenousnesscame to be valorised in conservation; followedby a move to conceptualise conservation at abroader, more strategic scale.

Valorising cultural diversity inconservation: participation andcommunity-based conservation(CBC)

Against a long legacy of fortress conservation inthe 1980s (Brockington 2002), various models ofconservation began to emerge that incorporatedor claimed to incorporate the needs and prioritiesof local communities under the rubrics of CBC,community-based natural resource management(CBNRM) and other participatory, livelihoods orstakeholder-based approaches (Brosius et al.1998, 2005; Kemf 1993; Lynch and Talbot 1995;McNeely 1995; Pye-Smith et al. 1994; Stevens1997;Western andWright 1994). As Brosius et al.observe, such approaches

are based on the premises that local populations have a

greater interest in the sustainable use of resources than does

the state or distant corporate managers; that local

communities are more cognizant of the intricacies of local

ecological processes and practices; and that they are more


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able to effectively manage those resources through local or

‘‘traditional’’ forms of access. In insisting on the link between

environmental degradation and social inequity, and by

providing a concrete scheme for action in the form of the

CBNRMmodel, NGOs and their allies have sought to bring

about a fundamental rethinking of the issue of how the goals

of conservation and effective resource management can be

linked to the search for social justice for historically

marginalized peoples. (Brosius et al. 1998, p.158)

These models emerged in part in responseto a steady series of critiques, primarily bySouthern (that is, Third World) intellectualsand activists, aimed originally at internationalagencies concerned with development and,increasingly, with the larger project of ‘‘sustain-able development’’. It was also the result of thework of practitioners such as Robert Chambers(1983) and Michael Cernea (1985), who werereacting against the waste and inequity oftraditional development project research, designand implementation.

In the conservation realm, advocacy forcommunity must be seen in the context of a seriesof other panaceas that were being proposed inthe late 1980s and early 1990s: extractivereserves, debt-for-nature swaps and the like. Aconsensus began to emerge (in some quarters atleast) that top-down approaches to conservationwere likely to be successful only in limited cases,that conservation biology alone was inadequateas an exclusive framework for the developmentof conservation paradigms and initiatives andthat conservation organisations must make everyeffort to foster meaningful community participa-tion in conservation and resource management.By the mid-1990s, in a variety of guises, CBC hadbecome established as the norm and so-calledintegrated conservation and development pro-jects proliferated rapidly (Brown and Wyckoff-Baird 1993; Peters 1996).

At a time when many donors, non-govern-mental organisations, conservation practi-tioners and indigenous advocates were laudingthe emancipatory potential for CBC, questionswere also being raised (Brosius et al. 1998, 2005).How, for instance, do communities get con-stituted as the abode of harmony and equity? Inwhat ways are ideas of community made genericin the process of scaling-up conservation initia-tives? What is the potential for community-based initiatives to be coercive while beingdiscursively configured as civil, consultative,

participatory and democratic? Seen from thisperspective, participation represents a regime ofcivility intended to contain and domesticatedissent by creating a somewhat inauthentic placeat the table (MacDonald 1995; Rahnema 1992;Ribot 1996).

No sooner had CBC and CBNRM becomewidely accepted approaches to conservationpractice than a series of trenchant critiquesappeared in a concerted backlash (Brechin et al.2002, Wilshusen et al., 2002). Many conserva-tion biologists felt that the emphasis on partici-pation, development and equity diluted themain goal of conservation: saving species andhabitats. Oates described community-basedapproaches as an alternative romantic myth(Oates 1999, p.xi). What most concerned criticsof CBC and CBNRM was that conservationorganisations allowed donors to shape theiragendas (Oates 1999; Soule and Terborgh 1999;Terborgh 1999). Critics have been unsparing intheir condemnation of conservation organisa-tions that have embraced CBC. Terborgh arguesthat

[w]hen conservation organizations begin to advocate sustain-

able use of tropical forests, it is a signal that conservation is

on the run. Starting down the slippery road to sustainable use

is stepping back from that crucial line in the sand that defines

one’s beliefs and principles. Sustainable use represents a gray

zone where politics, economics, and social pressures, not

science, decide what is good for humans, with scarcely a nod

to nature. (Terborgh 1999, p.140)

With this critique have come calls for areturn to more authoritarian, top-downapproaches: what Peluso (1993) has termed‘‘coercive conservation’’. Oates, for example,calls for a return to the ‘‘reserve concept’’ andadvocates strong policing to safeguard protectedareas (Oates 1999, pp.239–240). Themost ardentproponent of authoritarian conservation isTerborgh, who advocates ‘‘building a bulwarkof security around the last remnants of tropicalnature’’ (Terborgh 1999, p.17) and who believesthat ‘‘A national parks agency with the best ofintentions remains powerless without the back-ing of those who carry the guns’’ (1999, p.163).Terborgh further advocates the creation of‘‘internationally financed elite forces withincountries . . . legally authorized to carry armsand make arrests’’ (1999, p.199).


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Valorising cultural diversity inconservation: indigenous knowledge(.IK/TEK)

As they are used by ethno-ecologists, conserva-tion practitioners and others, the terms ‘‘indi-genous knowledge or traditional ecologicalknowledge’’ (often designated by the acronymsIK/TEK) are generally applied to discussions ofindigenous understandings of the natural world:systems of classification, how various societiescognise or interpret natural processes, what suchgroups know about the resources they exploitand so forth (Agrawal 2002; Brosius 1997, 2001;Brush and Stabinsky 1995; Sillitoe 1998;Warrenet al. 1995). Brush has suggested that the formsthat the study of indigenous knowledge hastaken have changed considerably, and that fourdistinct, historically situated approaches can bediscerned: descriptive historical particularism,cultural ecology, cognitive anthropology andhuman ecology (Brush 1993, p.658). Each ofthese presupposes a different set of startingassumptions regarding the nature of indigenousknowledge and the purposes and epistemologi-cal bases for studying it. Central to the latter twoapproaches in particular has been a concern withthe structural or systemic nature of indigenousknowledge (Brush 1993, p.658) and its utilitarianor adaptive significance (Brush 1993, p.659).

Brush also describes how, after 1980,addition of the word ‘‘indigenous’’ produced amore politicised discourse concerned with theissue of rights, which has culminated in con-temporary controversies over indigenous intel-lectual property rights (Brush 1993, pp.659–660). Politicised though it was (and is), thediscourse of indigenous intellectual propertyrights has adhered strongly to the objectivistconception of knowledge. This is necessary giventhe goal of defining indigenous knowledge as anentity subject to statutory recognition andframed with reference to metropolitan forms oflegal textualisation.

One of the factors that sustain academic andpractitioner interest in IK/TEK is the belief that ithas instrumental value in conservation andresource management (Agrawal 1995; Berkes1999; Brosius 2006; Ellen et al. 1998; Foale2006; Nadasdy 1999, 2003). Recent research hasdemonstrated the relevance of indigenous/localknowledge to successful conservation outcomes

(Berkes 2004; Colchester 2000; Sheil andLawrence 2004). In the last two decades we havewitnessed a proliferation of research initiatives,programmes and policies that are premised on theinclusion of IK/TEK in environmental decision-making. Numerous conservation initiatives haveshown how projects in biologically diverse regionscan improve and steer conservation practices byincorporating local knowledge and land usesystems into science-based conservation plans(Colchester 1994; Colfer and Soedjito 1996;Colfer et al. 1997; Hitchner 2009a).

The strategic turn in conservation

Today we are confronted with two apparentlycontradictory trends in the domain of environ-mental governance. On the one hand, we havewitnessed a trend toward valorising commu-nities, participation, and indigenous and localforms of knowledge. On the other hand, in thelast few years we have also witnessed a seriesof four linked developments in what we callthe strategic turn in conservation: (a) a decisivemove by major conservation organisationstowards cartographically enabled regionalland-use planning approaches under the rubricof eco-regional conservation, (b) the emergenceof the field of conservation finance, (c) moni-toring and evaluation and (d) the proliferationof social science-based metrics and modelsdesigned to manage social and political pro-cesses in conservation. These four are linkeddiscursively, strategically and institutionally in abroader process of consolidation and togetherthey are reshaping the way conservation isconceptualised, planned and administered.

Eco-regional conservation

In the last decade we have witnessed a decisivemove towards cartographically enabled regionalland-use planning approaches under the rubricof eco-regional conservation. While the back-lashes against CBC need not necessarily lead inthe direction of eco-regional conservation, thereis a degree of complementarity between themwith respect to defining a successor projectto CBC, especially as a strategy to increasefunding for conservation: eco-regional conser-vation is, after all, first and foremost concernedwith identifying and prioritising places for


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protection. The eco-regional approach displaysseveral general characteristics:

& It entails an effort to envision conservation ata larger scale than in the past, movingbeyond the protected area paradigm in orderto provide a representative perspective forthe development of effective conservationstrategies.

& It relies on powerful cartographic technologies(participatory geographical information sys-tems (GIS), remote sensing imagery) that allowfor the development of multiple data layers.

& It expands the temporal scale of conservationplanning, providing practitioners with themeans to approach conservation strategi-cally by establishing priorities for futureconservation investments.

& It is deeply imbricated with advances in thescience of conservation biology, particularlywith regard to issues such as fragmentation.

& It is guided by biological rather than politicalcriteria. Political boundaries are not irrele-vant – merely secondary.

The best-known such eco-regional programme isThe global 200, an initiative undertaken by theWWF Conservation Science Programme to iden-tify ‘‘the Earth’s most biologically outstandingterrestrial, freshwater andmarine habitats’’ (Olsonet al. 2000). WWF characterises The global 200initiative as ‘‘a map guiding conservation invest-ments so that a comprehensive plan eventually canbe achieved by the global conservation communityand the world’s nations’’ (Olson et al. 2000, p. 21).The Nature Conservancy’s (TNC) strategic visionfor eco-regional conservation is termed Conserva-tion by Design. According to TNC PresidentSteven McCormick, Conservation by Design

directs us to systematically identify the array of places

around the globe that embrace the full spectrum of the

Earth’s natural diversity; to develop the most effective

strategies to achieve tangible, lasting results; and to work

collaboratively to catalyze action at a scale great enough to

ensure the survival of entire ecosystems. (TNC 2001, p.1)

It would be a mistake to assume that thehistory of eco-regional conservation could betold only with reference to its technical andscientific foundations or with reference tothe conceptual and ideological shifts inthe conservation community. The history of

eco-regional conservation is also the history ofinstitutions that became aware of the possibi-lities it presented for attracting donor support.In the pursuit of sustained funding, expressionsof urgency are no longer enough. Conservationorganisations need to give shape to that urgencyand demonstrate that they are guided by astrategic vision that will allow them to directtheir efforts effectively and efficiently in the taskof saving nature. Donors, for their part, demandnot only strategic visions but also structures ofaccountability and ways of measuring thesuccess of initiatives they fund. Eco-regionalconservation provides all these and more: acomplete and highly marketable package.

There are a number of reasons to beconcerned about the proliferation of eco-regio-nal conservation initiatives. Firstly, we need toconsider the consequences of the assertion ofcartographic naturalism. At times it seems thatthose who produce eco-regional maps take themto be unmediated representations of biophysicalreality. For example, the description of one eco-regional initiative on the TNCwebsite is headed.‘‘When nature draws the maps’’ (n.d.). TheWildlife Conservation Society describes its Liv-ing Landscapes initiative as setting ‘‘prioritiesfor conservation by looking through the eyes ofwildlife’’ (Wildlife Conservation Society n.d.).The many strategic mediations involved in themaking of eco-regional maps, each subject toextensive commentary by their designers –decisions about scale, bio-geographical bound-aries and ‘‘potential natural vegetation’’ – aremade to disappear in the final product, which isthen taken to represent the actual or potentialnatural state of the world. Secondly, there is theproblem of the effacement of history as eco-regional maps overwrite human presence in thelandscape. There are several ways this isachieved. One is through the aforementionedcartographic privileging of natural boundariesover political boundaries. Another is the over-writing of human use of the environment in theproduction of both maps and the strategic plansthat they generate, whether in the guise of landclassification categories, assumptions aboutpotential natural vegetation, re-wilding or theestablishment of corridors. Reflect, for example,on the implications for local populations of thedesignation, ‘‘Congo Basin Wilderness Area’’,as depicted in a Conservation International Hot


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Spots map. Another form of effacement is thecoding of people as threats. What happens whenall the cartographic and algorithmic visualisingpower I have described is turned on theassessment of threat and when ‘‘disturbed’’establishes itself as a stand-in term for ‘‘inhab-ited’’? Each of these raises the question of howassumptions about human communities becomecoded or elided cartographically in eco-regionalmaps and how this in turn produces capillaryprocesses of power by which visualisations aretransferred from map to ground.

We are entering a new era of environmentalenclosure and the enclosures being produced areemerging from a series of proprietary maps anddatabases designed and constructed by a smallnumber of practitioners in the North. As oneproponent of eco-regional conservation remarkedto me, somewhat tongue-in-cheek, ‘‘The future ofthe planet is being mapped out by about sevenguys in Washington DC’’.

Conservation finance

The recognition of the need for new ways tofinance conservation is not new. Several ele-ments of a conservation finance approach havebeen around for over a decade: such as debt-for-nature swaps, conservation trust funds andcertification schemes. But it is only in the lastcouple of years that we have seen this coalesceinto a coherent new sub-field intended both tobring all of these approaches into a single frameof reference and to develop new approaches asconservation organisations and donors haveincreasingly stressed the need to think aboutfunding for conservation in new ways.

In June 2000 WWF founded the Centre forConservation Finance (WWF 2001), dedicatedto building the next generation of conservation-financemodels – models that can be replicated inevery corner of the world (WWF 2002). Anotherexample of this shift is the Conservation FinanceAlliance (CFA), a partnership between theWildlife Conservation Society, TNC, Conserva-tion International, International Union forConservation of Nature (IUCN), the RamsarConvention and the World Bank. Established inearly 2002, the CFA was created

to catalyze increased and sustainable public and private

financing for biodiversity conservation to support the

effective implementation of Multilateral Environment

Agreements . . . and other commitments to conservation.

(CFA 2002)

A third example is the Critical EcosystemPartnership Fund (CEPF), an initiative ofConservation International, the Global Envir-onment Facility and the World Bank, whichaims ‘‘to invest at least $150million over the nextfive years to advance biodiversity conservationprojects in critical ecosystems that harbour therichest variety of life’’ (CEPF 2001).

One of the most significant aspects ofconservation finance is that it represents anattempt to shift conservation discourse fromromantic, scientific or crisis narratives towards adiscourse of investment. To some extent this isbecause conservation finance adopted some ofthe valorising strategies of ecological economics;forests and other ecosystems are ‘‘naturalcapital’’ that provide ‘‘ecological services’’. Butit goes beyond that. The adoption of a discourseof investment represents an effort to fundamen-tally reframe the conservation enterprise inneoliberal terms. One might thus pose a fewquestions about conservation finance. Whatbecomes of nature when biodiversity is codedas natural capital or comparative advantage?What are the implications when those who claimto speak for nature refer to themselves as‘‘conservation brokers’’? What are the implica-tions for local communities when conservationorganisations must provide measures of thesuccess of their investments over 3-year fundingcycles? When conservation organisations mustbe more accountable to investors, do they notbecome less accountable to local communities?

Monitoring and evaluation

One of the critical tangible manifestations of thestrategic turn is that measuring the success ofconservation investments has become absolutelyobligatory. This has been going on in conserva-tion for some time but the increasing centralityof conservation finance invests this process withadditional momentum. Conservation was drivento adopt such metricised approaches in partbecause of their increasing closeness to majordonors for whom these approaches were nowpart of their mandate – theUnited States Agencyfor International Development, the World Bank


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and others – but also because of a trend towardsunderstanding conservation in terms of ecosys-tem services rather than biodiversity.

These approaches have become increas-ingly programmatic in mandating, for instance,that organisations frame their efforts in terms ofproject cycles that include clear definitionsof goals, objectives, activities, results andimpact. In part this effort is being driven byseveral key actors, the twomost significant beingthe Conservation Measures Partnership andthe Foundations of Success (Margoluis andSalafsky 1998). A key development of late hasbeen a broad effort to create a commonvocabulary and toolkit of approaches.

Conservation organisations have not beenunreflective about this trend, expressing con-cern, for instance, about the impediments toadmitting and understanding failure. There ismuch at stake in assessments of success or failureand it is an intensely political process. There ismuch more at stake for conservation organisa-tions than just success or failure at particularsites. Their institutional credibility may be atstake, along with the lucrative funding streamsthat usually accompany such credibility. Thus, itis important to know, for instance, whethercertain structures of accountability compelconservation organisations to locate causes offailure in the wrong place. The question is howproliferating metrics of accountability imposecertain definitions of failure or success and howdoes this marginalise or privilege certain actorsin the conservation domain.

Social science methods and metrics

As conservation organisations (and the donorswho fund them) have increasingly embracedmore strategic approaches to conservation, wehave simultaneously witnessed an ever-greaterreliance on the use of formal social sciencemodels to manage outcomes. Several featuresdistinguish this approach. Firstly, there is astrong emphasis on, and valorisation of, rapid-ity, achieved mostly through the use of survey-based approaches to data collection. Equallyconspicuous is an emphasis is on replicability:the value of these models, in the eyes ofpractitioners, is a function of their ability toprovide measurable results wherever they areapplied. This is most clearly evident in the

emphasis placed on scaling-up or moving toscale. There is a strong emphasis on producingcredible results in conservation social researchand, through a certain discursive sleight-of-hand, replicability becomes a stand-in forcredibility. Thirdly, as Brosius and Russell haveargued elsewhere, such methods ‘‘focus primar-ily on data concerning proximate threats – thatis to say, actions by local communities – ratherthan on the broader contexts in which thosethreats occur’’ (Brosius and Russell 2003, p.41).All these features are closely tied to theimperatives of short funding cycles and account-ability to donors. And, one might add, they areclearly designed for the convenience of research-ers. Their embrace by conservation practitionersis illustrative of a general shift in conservationorganisations from advocacy to management.

Questioning the strategic turn inconservation

As we have shown, the strategic turn inconservation must be located in the context ofa long series of shifts that have moved throughthe conservation domain over time, shifts thathave at times invoked, and at other timeseffaced, histories of human presence in thelandscape. Eco-regional conservation, in parti-cular, represents nothing less than a new regimeof enclosure, and the consequences of this areanything but trivial. The comprehensive vision itpromotes, the tools it deploys in pursuit of thatvision, the proprietary databases it produces andthe emerging complementarities of spatial plan-ning, investment, monitoring and evaluation, andsocial metrics have the potential to reshape thecontours of the relationship between humanityand nature for generations to come. It thereforebehooves us to consider carefully what is at stake,and for whom, in this proliferation of efforts toclassify and map the eco-regions of the world, toestablish a set of comprehensive blueprints for thefuture of the planet, and to forge a new discursiveorder linking conservation and finance. What wewould like to do now is to lay out some elementsfor thinking about the strategic turn, and toconsider a series of questions regarding itsprospects and its potential.

If we have learned one thing over the recentyears, it is that maps and other technologies ofvisualisation have the potential to be both


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emancipatory and reactionary. As Santosargues, ‘‘Ours is not a simple moment ofoppression and victims; it is a moment of adouble crisis of regulation and emancipation’’(Santos 1998, p.531). And Sachs asks, is ecology

about to transform itself from a knowledge of opposition to

a knowledge of domination . . . reshaped as expert neutral

knowledge, until it can be wedded to the dominating world

view? (Sachs 1993, p.xv)

Put another way, are we witnessing theemergence of a parallel to what Scott termedstate simplifications which ‘‘enable much of thereality they depict to be remade’’ (Scott 1998,p.3)? Are we then, in our critiques, developing ‘‘acase against the imperialism of high-modernist,planned social order’’ (Scott 1998, p.6) which is‘‘calculated to make the terrain, its products,and its workforce more legible – and hencemanipulable – from above and from the centre’’(Scott 1998, p. 2)? As Scott argues:

The clarity of the high-modernist optic is due to its resolute

singularity. Its simplifying fiction is that, for any activity or

process that comes under its scrutiny, there is only one

thing going on. (1998, p.347)

At what point do organisations engaged ineco-regional conservation become agents of‘‘homogenization, uniformity, grids, and heroicsimplification’’ (Scott 1998, p.8)? Taking anothertack, David Harvey has drawn on Hajer’s ideasabout ecological modernisation to argue that

the authoritarian solution [to environmental problems]

rests upon the application of techniques of scientific-

technical rationality within an administrative state armed

with strong regulatory and bureaucratic powers in liaison

with ‘‘big’’ science and big corporate capital. The centre-

piece of the argument here is that our definition of many

ecological problems . . . is necessarily science led and that

solutions equally depend upon themobilization of scientific

expertise and corporate technological skills embedded

within a rational . . . process of political-economic deci-

sion-making. (Harvey 1996, pp.177–178)

What is at stake here is echoed in Hardt andNegri’s Empire:

[W]hat we are witnessing is a new planetary order, the

consolidation of its administrative machine, and the

production of new hierarchies of command over global

space. Who will decide on the definitions of justice and

order across the expanse of this totality in the course of its

process of constitution? . . . Who will be able to unify the

process of suspending history and call this suspension

just?(Hardt and Negri 2000, p.19)

One could cite any number of similar suchstatements of concern about regimes of environ-mental governmentality (Backstrand andLovbrand 2006; Campbell 2007; Luke 1995;O’Malley et al. 1997; Rutherford 2007), andsuch concerns are quite valid. However, there isanother side to this argument that cannot easilybe dismissed. In opposition to the precedingremarks, one could argue that eco-regionalconservation initiatives can be viewed as a kindof counter-mapping exercise against extractiveforms of resource use. Given the low valueconventionally afforded to biodiversity (Bayonet al. 2000), is it not a good idea to use themaster’s tools to preserve it? Is it not better thatmaps, financial instruments and other suchembodiments of power be directed towards theprotection of biodiversity rather than to enrich-ing the shareholders and CEOs of extractiveindustries? In a world increasingly characterisedby corporate hegemony, don’t we want organi-sations like WWF and TNC to be more power-ful? Conservation is expensive and becomingmore so all the time. We should not expectconservation organisations to be effective if theycannot compete in domains where power andinfluence are unapologetically exercised as amatter of course.

Are we, then, merely stuck with a conun-drum here or can we somehow analyse our wayout of this?We are not sure. But we do think thatwe can at least try to move beyond generalisedstatements of concern about the politics oflegibility and high-modernist ecology and per-haps try to specify a bit more precisely what is atstake in the recent turn towards the place-making (and place-effacing) practices of eco-regional conservation planning.

Conservation, culturaldiversity and the politics ofknowledge

Communities may look very different dependingon the location and scale from which they areseen. Our goal here has been to pose a series of


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questions about this relation between represen-tation and resolution. We have, in a sense, beentrying to understand the consequences for theanalysis of communities and locales when welook at them not, as we are accustomed to, fromthe ground, but through a universalising,pixelated global optic from on high. Certainly,this has important implications for the ability ofconservation practitioners to hear local voices,perceive local realities and take account of localparticularity in the design and implementationof conservation initiatives. Equally consequen-tial, however, such technologies of visualisationentail broader structures of intervention, struc-tures of accountability and structures of defer-ence. They thus have the potential to transfigurethe contours of power in novel ways; ways wecannot yet imagine.

What this points to is a recognition that anyeffort to analyse the contemporary conservationdomain must engage with the issue of knowl-edge. The effort by actors and institutions toaddress the erosion of global biodiversity inter-sects with the production, distribution andapplication of knowledge in myriad ways. Thereare innumerable manifestations of this: virtuallyall major conservation organisations stress thattheir efforts are firmly grounded in, and guidedby, the production of credible scientific knowl-edge; IUCN has followed the lead of develop-ment institutions in promoting more rigorousknowledge management; and numerous indivi-duals and institutions are linked through learn-ing networks dedicated to sharing knowledge ofbest practices. In the global conservation realm,emergent regimes of environmental governmen-tality are mostly produced through categories andknowledge-making practices promulgated bymajor organisations located in the global North.The techno-scientific language of environmentalmanagement, the managerial rhetoric of stake-holder and participation, and the metriciseddiscourse of monitoring and evaluation, togetheryield a seductive configuration of conservationknowledge, principles and practices.

For example, as we show above, in the pastdecade we have increasingly seen a valorisationof indigenous knowledge as being relevant toconservation and resource management deci-sion-making. Reference to indigenous or localknowledge is generally applied to knowledge ofthe natural world: what such groups know about

the resources they exploit and how thesesocieties cognise or interpret natural processes.That we are at last recognising the value of localand indigenous knowledge rather than dismiss-ing it as anecdotal or irrelevant is clearly apositive development. But by limiting ourvalorisation of knowledge largely to that whichpertains to the natural world, we subordinatesuch knowledge to the forms of knowledgepossessed by decision-makers. Furthermore, onecan draw a distinction between indigenous andlocal knowledge mediated by the researchactivities of social scientists and the knowledgearticulated by local and indigenous activists andadvocates themselves. One speaks in the passivevoice of science – translating indigenous ways ofknowing into forms intelligible to practitionersand decision-makers; the other speaks in theactive voice of advocacy.Making this distinctiondraws our attention to the question of how localand indigenous perspectives and ways of know-ing are elicited and translated between scales andhow the link is made between this knowledgeand the policy domain.

Learning how to see: towardspolicies that link culturaldiversity and conservation

If we are to define a new path towards linkingcultural diversity and conservation – a path thatavoids both the potential for oppressive homo-genisation and the unproblematised spatialincarceration of the conventional bioculturalperspective – what is needed is a new politics ofknowledge that takes us from a politics oflegibility (Scott 1998) to a politics of visibility.In speaking of visibility we refer to a whole set ofpotential approaches, both conceptual andpractical, aimed at making multiple perspec-tives, multiple conceptions and multiple claimscommensurable or at least able to converseacross difference. This is something much morethan a toolbox of approaches to be wielded bypolicy-makers and practitioners. It suggests theneed to recognise approaches that acknowledgemultiple forms of agency and that can beemployed by multiple users. It also suggests thatwe need to seek approaches that valorise complex-ity and context over scalability ormoving to scale.


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Numerous efforts are already being made bya range of actors to devise approaches to linkingcultural diversity and conservation in ways thatmeet these criteria, and the present is anopportune time to define more such approaches.The following is an attempt to suggest just a fewelements towards a new politics of knowledge inmaking this link.

Community mapping

In the last decade we have witnessed a rapidproliferation of efforts by local and indigenouscommunities, working in collaboration with non-governmental organisations and other actors(sometimes even the state) to produce maps aimedatmaking their claims to land visible (Alcorn 2000;Chapin et al. 2005; Colchester 2005; Eghenter2000; Flavelle 2002; Hitchner 2009c; Mohamedand Ventura 2000; Peluso 1995; Poole 1995;Rocheleau 2005; Warren 2005). Indeed, the voguefor community-mapping – sometimes also termed‘‘counter-mapping’’ (Cooke 2003; Peluso 1995) –could well be described as a movement. Suchmapping projects obviously hold great promise forlocal or indigenous communities whose historicalland claims have been challenged or extinguishedaltogether or whose presence in the landscape hasbeen rendered invisible by earlier state-sponsoredmapping projects.

At the same time, there are reasons forconcern about the emancipatory potential ofcounter-mapping. The production of such mapsmay empower some sectors of a community atthe expense of others (Hodgson and Schroeder2002), especially when the interest and knowl-edge of some subgroups, such as women or theelderly, are left off the maps (Rundstrom 1995;Russell and Harshbarger 2003). Critics ofcounter-mapping projects using GIS technolo-gies have claimed that GIS requires and imposesa certain logic and way of spatially representingreality that favours western paradigms andtherefore symbolises a scientific, masculine,data-driven and hegemonic worldview thatcannot adequately include the worldviews ofunderrepresented peoples (Goss 1995; Gregory1994; Kyem 2004; Roberts and Schein 1995).Some scholars argue that mapping can intensifyland conflicts within and between communities(Berry 1993; Obermeyer and Pinto 1994) andothers claim that introducing GIS to local

communities can also lead to power imbalancescreated by unequal access to technology (AitkenandMichel 1995; Curry 1994; Obermeyer 1991).Further, as Brosius et al. (1998) ask:

[W]hat are the larger potential legal and social implications of

linking ethnicity to territory? How do maps function as an

instrumentality leading to recognition of ethnically-linked

claims to territory? Community-linked maps are not always

homogeneously accepted. How might they precipitate or

focus disputes? Howmight they lead to reification of cultural

identities or ethnic boundaries? What kinds of rights and

forms of authority are being proposed for communities

within mapped territories? What tensions are there between

images of community, ethnicity and space, on the one hand,

and aspirations to citizenship, mobility and participation in

national life? (Brosius et al. 1998, p.162)

Raising such questions does not suggestthat concerns about the potential dangers ofcommunity mapping should preclude the effortto produce them. Rather, it simply suggests thatthese concerns should be confronted forthrightlyif community mapping is to retain its emanci-patory potential. It also reminds us that com-munity mapping is not a singular panacea forreversing centuries of dispossession. Rather, it isone strategy among many for linking culturaldiversity and conservation.

Emancipatory methods

Two challenges for researchers working with localpeoples in biologically diverse and politicallydynamic areas have been (a) moving beyondpurely extractive research toward inquiry that ismore relevant to the community being studied and(b) addressing critiques by local people that theproducts of research do not adequately representthem (Escobar 1998; O’Neill 2001; Orlove 1991;Peters 1996). As a result, anthropologists andother social scientists working with local commu-nities have developed new hybrid research meth-odologies that better respond to the needs andpriorities of communities where they work (Flocksand Monaghan 2003; Hitchner 2009c; Lassiter2005; Sillitoe 1998; Smith 1999). There are at leastthree elements of the hybrid approach:

& A local definition of research needs. A coreprinciple of this approach is that members ofthe local community should take a lead role


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in defining steps in pursuit of their vision ofconservation and development.

& Local participation in research. While thediscourse of participation has become astandard element in contemporary conserva-tion planning and implementation, it is toooften manifested as a set of managerialpractices designed to make communitiesgovernable. Local participation in researchentails a much more fundamental engagementwith community members, an engagementpremised on the recognition of their status ascustodians of the knowledge and landscapesthat are the focus of research interest.

& Return of research results to the community.Collaborative projects in which researchresults are returned in ways that are salientandmeaningful to communitymembers havehad dramatic results in stimulating commu-nity interest in conservation, documentingland use history and in envisioning land useplanning (Borrini-Feyerabend 1996; Sodhiand Liow 2000). Data produced throughresearch should be processed, archived anddisplayed in forms that are meaningful tomembers of the local community.

Recognising hybrid landscapes

In spite of the multiple challenges to conven-tional ideas of a stable and pristine nature, few inthe conservation community have respondedproactively to critiques of the wilderness conceptor to empirical studies of anthropogenic land-scapes. Indeed, as we have shown, in somequarters we have witnessed a decisive backlashagainst such challenges. While conservationplanners may recognise the validity of evidenceregarding the anthropogenic nature of land-scapes targeted for conservation, this has nottranslated into significant changes in the practiceof conservation planning and implementation.And though the World Heritage Conventionrecognises the link between natural and culturallandscapes, its emphasis on landscapes with‘‘outstanding universal value’’ does little toaddress the rights, livelihoods or well-being ofthe local communities who have created thoselandscapes. In planning and implementing con-servation initiatives the inherent hybridity ofmost landscapes must be recognised and made

visible. A concerted effort needs to be made toincorporate human histories of landscape mod-ification into conservation practice.

Regimes of credibility

As noted, virtually all major conservationorganisations stress that their efforts are firmlygrounded in and guided by the production ofcredible scientific knowledge. For most conser-vation and development practitioners it is takenas an article of faith that if their work is to betaken seriously by the scientific community andby policy-makers it must be credible. By thisthey mean that we must build a firewall betweenscience as the domain of facts and advocacy asthe domain of politics. It is as if credibility were apure, singular, free-floating, abstract entity thatexists outside the human sphere.

An alternative approach is to recognise thatcredibility is plural and contextual rather thansingular and abstract. Thus, the analysis ofconservation and development trade-offs mustbe premised on recognition of the significance ofthe multiple regimes of credibility that exist inthe contexts in which academics, practitioners,state authorities, community members and otheractors work. Many kinds of actors are weighingin on conservation and development decision-making and we can no longer write for a singleaudience even if we wanted to. Thus, researchfindings that are salient and credible to thescientific community, to policy-makers or todonors may not be salient or credible to those inthe communities where we work. Insistence thatcredibility pertains exclusively to the productionof certain kinds of scientific information ignoresor disregards forms of credibility that areimportant to multiple other kinds of actors,including local communities. Credibility cannotonly ‘‘look up’’ to members of the scientificcommunity, it must also look down and aroundto other actors or communities. Accepting thisproposition entails recognising that establishingcredibility requires much more than just doinggood science. Credibility is first and foremost aform of relationship premised on the trust thatone set of actors has in the integrity, reliabilityand legitimacy of information provided byanother. The goal, then, should be to establishcredibility not only with the scientific commu-nity, but with as broad a range of actors as


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possible. Acknowledging the plurality ofregimes of credibility entails an engagementwith the complexities of the multiple contexts inwhich the production and dissemination ofknowledge takes place today.

Conclusion

At the beginning of the twenty-first century, asglobal environmental change is occurring at anunprecedented pace, conservation has emergedas a central element in the civic and politicaldebates in the nations of both the North and theSouth.We are witnessing a rapid proliferation ofefforts to strengthen the links between environ-mental science and management and a transfor-mation of the institutional landscape in whichconservation is shaped and debated. Accompa-nying these shifts, new forms of conservationpractice are continually emerging.

One of the greatest contemporary chal-lenges is acknowledging the complexity thatcharacterises every conservation context. Inconventional decision-making contexts theacknowledgement of complexity is generallyregarded as a source of frustration and paralysis.That is precisely why some academic disciplinesthrive in the domain of policy and practice whileothers do not. When one looks at differentdisciplines, one sees that some are very good atspeaking the language of power. They are able todo so because they valorise clarity over complex-ity. Disciplines like economics and politicalscience are very good at providing models thatare both elegant and precise, and that hold outthe promise of win–win solutions. Meanwhile,all anthropologists can ever seem to tell you isthat things are complicated and messy.

In the years ahead we will see conservationinitiatives unfold across a range of scales, butthey are sure to be based on ever moreeconomistic logics that achieve their effectsthrough abstraction, aggregation and simplifi-cation. In these models, local and indigenouspeoples aremere data points, if they are visible atall. Through things like decision-support modelsand planning algorithms, interests will be tradedoff at many levels of abstraction and throughassumptions about the commensurabilityof values, many layers removed from thelived experience of people, indigenous and

non-indigenous alike. What place is there forany notion of rights in formalistic models thatare designed precisely to overwrite the complex-ity of local contexts for the benefit of decision-makers and that see dealing with that complexityas a transaction cost. In such abstract models,social costs – the collapse of social systems,languages, livelihoods, identities and the loss ofplaces – are rendered invisible or seen ascompensatable. They view the complexity andrichness of local contexts as a problem to beovercome, as obstacles to maximising globalinterests.

Of course, there is danger in clarity andprecision and in all the methodological forms ofreduction, aggregation, pixelization and simpli-fication that enable that clarity and precision.While a lot of things get done in the world bythose who view the world through the resolutepower and clarity of certain lenses, there is acost. When we look at the history of conserva-tion, what we see is an endless cycle ofenthusiasm and disenchantment as one panaceaafter another – debt-for-nature swaps, extractivereserves, CBC, eco-regional conservation, eco-system services, market-based mechanisms –fails to live up to its promise.

We would argue that that cycle of disillu-sionment is a direct result of our desire for clarityover complexity: when conservation practi-tioners see something working in some smallplace, the inevitable temptation is to extractfrom it models for action which are then scaled-up and replicated, forgetting the contextualfactors that made it a success in its originalcontext. And as it proliferates and moves intoother contexts, the complexity of context thatwas treated as an externality in the process ofscaling-up comes back around and presents itselfas a set of fundamental challenges that mayprove impossible to overcome. We suggest thatwhile the clarity and precision gained throughaggregation and abstraction can be crucial, thismust not overshadow the acknowledgement ofcomplexity. An effective response to complexconservation scenarios is not to charge throughthemessiness and complexity with technical fixesthat hide the politics of argument or flatten thecomplexities of local contexts.

These concerns are especially relevant at atime when conservation is undergoing suchrapid change, as conservation practices expand


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beyond small-scale and locally based initiativesto include global issues and processes such asclimate change, declining ocean health andconservation in production and mixed-use land-scapes. We are witnessing the dramatic ascen-dance of ecosystem services as an foundationalorganising principle for conservation, and theproliferation of market-based mechanisms forachieving conservation goals and mitigatingclimate change such as Payment for EcosystemServices, also called Payment for EnvironmentalServices) and Reducing Emissions from Defor-estation and Degradation). Conservation is nolonger just about protected areas but entirelandscapes and the planet as a whole. Subse-quently, it has become increasingly difficult todetermine which groups of people bear the costsor reap the benefits of conservation practices andit is even less clear how conservation organisationscan operationalise their efforts to recognisecultural diversity and respect human rights whilesimultaneously preserving biodiversity and eco-system functioning at multiple scales.

In response, major conservation organisa-tions are busy redefining their missions. This has

been going on for a while but the degree to whichit has now come to the fore in conservation isnothing short of remarkable. We are entering awhole new era. This will surely have a dramaticeffect on the practice of conservation in the yearsahead: one has to ask what the implicationsare for conservation science and for the formsof expertise that are valued in the practiceof conservation. And one also has to askwhat this means for proponents of culturaldiversity.

It is an opportune time to re-envision formsof conservation practice that take account of therichness of human cultural diversity not simply bylooking for cartographically driven visualisationsof the link between cultural diversity and biolo-gical diversity but by amore fundamental effort tointerrogate the ways in which knowledge aboutcultural diversity and biological diversity isproduced, circulated and incorporated into deci-sion-making. Some of the approaches we havesuggested here move us towards that goal butample opportunity remains to define a host ofother creative approaches in making the linkbetween cultural diversity and conservation.

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