The emergence of global conservation funds over the last 20 years has been driven by donor governments’ priorities. These priorities include pacifying Western green and scientific lobbies, expanding economic growth through big business as- usual, and the rebranding of old public institutions like the World Bank to chime with new agendas – particularly climate change and biodiversity conservation. Without an accompanying strategic framework to drive global trade and investment into more ecologically and socio-culturally sensitive developments, billions of dollars and any number of excellent projects – and quite a few less than excellent – have not created the substantive ‘global environmental benefits’ promised through innovations like the Global Environment Facility (GEF; Young 2002). While exploring the allocation of GEF’s billion or so US dollars a year, often as a ‘sweetener’ to ‘green’ development finance, I also found that research that did not treat marketisation of nature as given – but rather explored the roots, flaws and impacts of this ‘new green order’ – was not particularly welcome in donor and allied circles.

One of the first projects GEF funded in the Bank was a Programme for measuring the Incremental Costs of the Environment (PRINCE).PRINCE offered a framework for setting economic terms on global environmental value, to facilitate donor treasuries’ restriction of GEF to protecting only ‘globally’ beneficial nature. This theoretical approach enables economic consultants to justify others’ geo-political and business decisions on what to fund. It also set the stage for ‘offsetting’ the costs of protection against continued environmental destruction elsewhere.

Some of the more effective and credible critics of the GEF were offered medium sized projects of their own, as well as some small policy concessions, and thus transformed into an ‘official opposition’ that worked within the framework of the GEF. In this emerging ‘win-win-win’ scenario for bankers, donors, conservation big NGOs (BINGOs), project ‘beneficiaries’ and an ‘evaluation community’ (whose terms of reference leave out almost as much as they include), serious questions of cultural difference, human rights, or the effectiveness of conservation projects per se were
effectively sidelined. For if even one ‘economic actor’ rates a river, a lake, a tree, a flower, a frog, a fish, a view or a sacred grove as ‘priceless’, then all sums in an honest economic assessment would be reduced to zero. And by the same token, if any one theoretical gram of carbon (or methane, or methyl bromide…) could be ‘the one’ that takes our atmosphere past a climatic tipping point, who can price our coastal cities and so much threatened more? Through the GEF and related programmes like the EU’S Clean Development Mechanism, the complex reality of our socio-biosphere has been squeezed into small economic ‘black boxes’… where it clearly does not fit; and the attempt has not done much for global conservation goals.

Researching the GEF

Our findings came through extensive desk study, questionnaires, interviews, participant observation and analysis. I found that professionals working with the GEF operate within numerous political, ideological and bureaucratic restrictions, with large gaps between aspiration and reality also attributable to the social, cultural, economic and spiritual distance between the people making funding decisions and those experiencing their impacts. Lacking the necessary time, transparency and accountability to enable effective feedback from the ground, GEF’s promises of ‘public participation’ were often reduced to the directive that ‘you participate in my project’ (Sunita Narain of the Centre for Science and Environment, at the 1998 GEF-NGO consultation in New Delhi). I found that unrealistic targets and the desire to placate diverse constituencies led officials to focus on smooth presentation of progress peppered with promises to adapt and improve in response to regular critical evaluations. Neither was it in GEF’s remit to share out effective control of development finance to some of the world’s most marginalised people, nor to engage substantively with the findings of critical research into the donor-led approach to supporting conservation.

Eco-Development

Our detailed case study was the India Eco-Development project at Nagarhole in Karnataka, South India, visited in 1997 and 1998. This aimed to combine traditional tiger reserve management with ‘ecological’ village level development – bribing locals to stay outside national park boundaries (Young, Makoni and Boehmer- Christiansen 2001; Mathews 2005). I was the guest of the Forest Department for a tour of the park’s newly funded roads, jeeps, watchtowers and fences, plus water pumps and biogas plants in surrounding villages. These officials seemed to be allied to local
representatives of the WCS and WWF; some were openly racist towards adivasi forest dwellers and could not conceive of their playing a meaningful part in conservation on their own terms of the forests they called home. I also visited the people who traditionally lived inside the forest now designated as national park. For the most part they seemed unhappy with the project and its backers, who they felt were more interested in depriving them of land and access to sustainable natural resources, than in understanding the complex forest community and challenging the socially dominant people most involved in smuggling and encroachment. Working with local development NGOs, some adivasis had put together a ‘Peoples’ Plan’ for the park, focused on removing roads and concrete buildings, providing water holes for wildlife and inviting tourists to stay in mud and straw settlements and walk among the wildlife. This proposal was apparently ignored in the Eco-Development process. According to the World Bank’s internal project assessment in 2002, of “twelve biological research studies… awarded under the project… none have yet been completed. A socioeconomic study is generally anecdotal; this report could be improved with more quantitative data on forest dependence.” So even four years after the project started, it lacked the baseline scientific data for effective action.

In 1998 a complaint about India Eco-Development at Nagarhole was submitted by adivasis to the World Bank’s independent Inspection Panel, which found it to be justified, but (lacking consistent BINGO pressure on the issue in Washington) the process fizzled out. I later found that the damning IP report was not translated into the local Kannada language; it was not available in the Bank’s India office even in English. By 2004 however, the Nagarhole project had been discontinued anyway, and some forest officials arrested for corruption. In 2005, Forest Park Press concluded a survey of GEF-funded projects in India with the claim that Eco-Development failed to address the actual causes of deforestation; alienated indigenous communities from their traditional habitats and cultures; promoted ‘unsustainable, unwanted and culturally inappropriate alternative livelihood activities’; and comprised ‘a huge wastage of funds’ that created ‘social conflict’.

Filming the GEF

While undertaking the research I found that very few people knew what GEF was doing, or why. In this context I joined Dylan Howitt to make a documentary about the GEF, making complex conservation finance issues accessible by showing the human side of stories usually confined to dry reports or promotional gloss. Our film, ‘Suits and Savages – Why the World Bank Won’t Save the World’ was made on a shoestring budget from the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council’s (then) Global Environmental Change Programme. It takes a long zoom – and a ‘video letter’ – from Indian forest dwellers to the World Bank in Washington DC, via a heated GEF-NGO consultation about Eco-Development in New Delhi.

The then GEF CEO Mohamed El-Ashry had promised full co-operation with our work. So after we filmed the consultation, I was surprised when, without warning, I was bundled out of the Governing Council meeting for discreetly filming the proceedings. GEF Secretariat staff told me ‘Council members need confidentiality an had agreed not to allow filming in the chamber’. Yet three Council members independently said they had no objection to being filmed, and suggested that any ban came from the Secretariat. The following year we arranged numerous on camera interviews with GEF officials in Washington DC, and planned to film a screening of a ‘video letter’ that we had brought to the World Bank from some of the adivasis at Nagarhole forest. But after we arrived, our interviews gradually dried up. Officials’ children were suddenly sick, a Bank vice-president claimed we had ‘never mentioned anything about a camera’ when we came to film him as arranged. When I sought clearance to film a GEF reception in the lobby of the World Bank’s main building, the GEF Secretariat’s CEO, Mohamed El-Ashry asked me to check with Bank security; they gave permission, so we started shooting. A member of the GEF Secretariat then stopped us, claiming we were going ‘against instructions’. When I went to speak to El-Ashry again, he waved me away, refusing to communicate further. (A few days later we filmed another social event in the same grand atrium which appears in the film).

Eventually we learned indirectly that El-Ashry had disliked an article I had written on the GEF’s relationship with NGOs (I sent him a draft for comment the year before – and received no reply. This was later published as Young 1999). In the end, only a couple of the more confident (and, interestingly, fellow British) staff of the World Bank would appear in the film. One said he had retorted to those who would lean on him that ‘it is better to be upfront about what we are trying to do than to invite suspicion by hiding away’.

Screening the Film

I sent the completed film to all those who were interviewed, and arranged various screenings internationally. When translated and dubbed, we screened the film to acclaim at adivasi settlements in and around Nagarhole forest. Forest officials set up road blocks on our route, but we took detours, brought journalists and gathered friendly crowds. Officials also threatened to arrest me if I showed the film at their offices. They claimed this was because we had filmed inside the park ‘illegally’ – even though the film shows them escorting us in the park and granting interviews in their own offices. The UK representative on the GEF’s governing Council in the 1990s was a civil servant in the Department for International Development who had officially supported my colleague’s funding application for research on the GEF, and expressed interest in using our outputs. However, his successor in the post declined to participate in any screening or discussions once the research and the film were completed. Invitations to the World Bank went unanswered, but some years later I learned – off the record – that Bank staff had been making their own copies (without our copyright consent) for internal training on responding to NGO critics. GEF is still presented to the world as a source of innovation in transparent, accountable, effective environmental finance and the World Bank has been given many more environmental funds to run. Our research showed that while some kind of learning was certainly going on, the natural forests of India, the ever scarcer tigers, and the human cultures that have dwelled there for centuries without the desire to buy and sell the earth for private gain, were not the ones benefiting from those lessons.

References:

‘Suits and Savages – Why the World Bank Won’t Save the World’; A Conscious Cinema production by Dylan Howitt and Zoe Young is available on DVD in English, Spanish and Kannada; extras include ‘5 Years On’ a short film. An excerpt can be viewed online at https://www.ifiwatch.tv/en/video/2010/01/suits-and-savageswhy-world-bank-wont-save-tiger.

Griffiths, T. 2005. Indigenous Peoples and the Global Environment Facility (GEF) Indigenous Peoples’ experiences of GEF-funded Biodiversity Conservation. Forest Park Press.

Mathews, S. 2005. Imperial Imperatives: Ecodevelopment and the Resistance of Adivasis of Nagarhole National Park, India. Law, Justice and
Global Development.

World Bank. 2002. Supervision mission India Eco-development Project (credit 2916-in/gef tfo 28479-in)

Young, Z. 2002. A New Green Order? The World Bank and the Politics of the Global Environment Facility. London: Pluto Press.

Young, Z., G. Makoni and S. Boehmer- Christiansen. 2001. Green Aid in India and Zimbabwe – Conserving Whose Community? Geoforum 32: 299-318.

Young, Z. 1999. Friendly Foes: GEF and the NGOs. In: Social Movements: Local, National and Global (ed. Chris Rootes). London: Frank Cass.

Peoples’ Plan for Preservation of Adivasi and Nagarhole Forests in Karnataka. 1998. Mimeo. Nagarhole Hadi, Karnataka, India.

Among the responses to Chapin’s ‘Challenge to Conservationists’ in World Watch was a letter from Dr. Patrick Bergin, CEO of the African Wildlife Foundation (AWF). It stated that AWF would not be joining the debate surrounding Chapin’s article, because it was more concerned with becoming a ‘different kind of conservation organisation.’ According to Bergin the AWF was a forwardlooking organisation which meant that it should not be concerned with past mistakes and problems that might hinder its forward motion. He further described Africa’s wildlife and wild lands as essential to building a sustainable future (Igoe and Croucher 2007).

This confident letter reflected an evolution of AWF’s public image and self-imagination, consistently portrayed as an unmitigated success story. AWF more than doubled its operating budget between 1999 and 2006, from USD 8,274,170 to USD 20,022,394 (Sachedina 2008: 328). It thus became one of the most important conservation NGOs operating in Africa, eclipsed only by the Wildlife Conservation Society, Conservation International, and WWF-International (Scholfield and Brockington 2008: 43). In 2006 AWF entered into a partnership with The Nature Conservancy (TNC, the world’s largest conservation NGO), which coincided with a three-year (2005- 2008) campaign to raise USD100 million dollars and double AWF’s presence in Africa. The partnership was strengthened in 2008 by a USD10 million gift from philanthropists Dennis Keller (chair of AWF board of trustees) and his wife Connie Keller (chair of the TNC Illinois Chapter). This remarkable growth resulted from the AWF’s ability to tap growing US government and corporate funding.

In the late 1990s, AWF was the most privileged recipient of money from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) operating in Tanzania, receiving USD10.5 million in 1998 (Sachedina 2008: 326-330). AWF has also been relatively successful in securing partnerships with the corporate sector. The organisation entered into a major partnership with Starbucks Coffee Company; received in kind support from Clear Channel Communications, Inc. in the form of airport advertising worth millions of dollars; and partnered with Disney to save wild dogs, as well as a smaller
company called Endangered Species Chocolate.3 AWF’s interventions in Eastern and Southern Africa have been featured as ‘success stories’ by the Green Living Project through a multimedia presentation that tours REI and LL Bean Stores throughout the United States.

The organisation also features an AWF Visa Card that promises the protection of African wildlife and wild lands with every purchase, as well as web sites where supporters are invited to adopt virtual animals (with names and personalities) and virtual acres of landscapes. AWF’s African Heartland Initiative has been central to its success in capturing these opportunities. This was a deliberate attempt to scale up the geographic reach of the organisation by expanding its sphere of operations on the ground. It was also an attempt to make the organisation’s work more appealing to a larger audience.

Sachedina (2008: 329) observes that this initiative was ‘branded’ with the advice of an American consultant. The ‘Heartlands’ brand was carefully chosen because of its association with the culturally significant ‘heartlands’ of the US, as well as for its ‘inspirational value’, which means, in part, its ability to attract funding. Heartlands envisage ‘a conservation vision big enough for Africa.’ They evoke the idea of a large continent, which demands a major initiative and a bigger AWF with a bigger presence in Africa, all of which requires more of funding.6 Accordingly, over the past ten years, AWF has opened new offices in Southern, Central and Eastern Africa, while plans for a ‘West African Heartland’ would extend the organisation’s presence into a part of Africa which has generally received less attention from transnational conservation (cf. Scholfield and Brockington 2008).

The AWF’s approach to growth fits well with anthropologist Anna Tsing’s concept of ‘spectacular accumulation.’ This term normally applied to commercial companies’ strategies for seeking start-up capital to pursue potential opportunities and/or resources. They typically face difficulties in that potential investors are most likely to invest in resources and opportunities that are already well in hand. To overcome this, firms increasingly resort to the use of digital film, GIS technology, satellite imagery, maps, and expert testimony to virtually call into existence the resources and opportunities that they hope to procure once they have acquired the necessary capital. Because of the distance between investors and the resources/opportunities, the spectacular performances of these firms often become effective substitutes for actual opportunities/resources. By these means resourceful firms are able to accumulate capital with which to pursue opportunities/resources.

NGOs can use the same techniques to present potential supporters with compelling virtual opportunities (problems that need to be solved) and resources (e.g., science, experience, and authentic connections to communities). In doing so they enjoy a significant advantage over commercial firms. At some point the firm must deliver a profitable return to its investors. If the resources/ opportunities fail to materialise it may wind up in trouble. When it comes to NGO returns, however, the stock intrade are compelling success stories, and these can be produced by the same means as the spectacular performances that convinced people to support an intervention in the first place. Unlike tangible fiscal returns, such outcomes remain largely unverifiable to the average supporter of a particular intervention.

The AWF’s work demonstrates clearly the techniques of spectacular accumulation. As Sachedina (2008, in press) has shown, AWF’s Heartland campaign has relied heavily on maps and other representations of landscapes in anticipation of significantly influencing conservation in them. Using these representations AWF has come to gain control of specific, and rather small portions of the landscapes in question. As relatively small as they are, however, the control of these landscapes has been essential to building NGO brands. It suits fundraising to be the only visible player in a particularly important conservation landscape, as donors often wish to support programs that are clearly the most established. Moreover, representations of these ‘controlled’ landscapes, are connected to claims about the possibility of influencing far larger landscapes.

These representations also conceal a number of disturbing trends that are consistent with the analysis presented by Chapin in his World Watch article (as outlined in the introduction of this special issue) and dismissed by Bergin in his response to that article. While these trends have not been readily visible to many conservation supporters, their details are well documented in studies that are available online (Igoe and Croucher 2007; Sachedina 2008). They include pressures to use money within a stipulated period of time (colloquially known as ‘meeting the burn rate’), poor financial management and lack of internal accountability, conflicts of interests resulting from Tanzanian officials receiving various sorts of payments and benefits from AWF, ongoing conflicts with various groups at the community level, including the displacement of local people and their livelihoods by Tanzanian officials involved in AWFsponsored interventions and a focus on donors and fundraising which came to overshadow village-based fieldwork. These developments are important in and of themselves, but are doubly concerning when one considers their connections to the logic of neoliberal conservation as outlined in the introduction to this issue.

AWF’s Heartland vision revolves around the idea that it is possible to use ‘good science’ and the profit motive to maximise ‘both the economic and ecological function’ of African landscapes. This in turn revolves around the intensive management of people and wildlife, as well as the education of people to take advantage of new market opportunities by seeing themselves as ‘asset owners’ whose livelihoods depend on the protection of wildlife. This perspective fits well with the win-win scenarios that have become such an essential component of neoliberal conservation. In fact, from this perspective there are no losers. Wildlife, local people, NGOs, government agencies, western tourists, investors and for-profit companies all come out on top.

The successful growth strategy of AWF clearly demonstrates that such rosy scenarios are effective at mobilising people and money. Unfortunately, they also conceal conflicts, connections, and paradoxes that are ubiquitous features of late capitalism and neoliberal conservation (Igoe and Brockington 2007; Brockington, Duffy, and Igoe 2008 and Brockington 2009).9 Such scenarios can downplay the displacement of rural people by conservation and/or development. Or, where such displacements are acknowledged, the received wisdom is that they will be ‘mitigated’ by new kinds of market opportunities, as the economic potential of the environment is unlocked through conservation interventions.10 They also sidestep difficult questions about the efficacy of specific conservation strategies, a move that appears to contradict repeated calls by conservationists for a stronger evidence base to assess the effectiveness of their interventions. Sachedina’s work further suggests that conservation would also benefit from a more vigorous examination of actual patterns of conservation NGO expenditure.

It will remain difficult to engage with these complex and thorny problems as long as win-win market solutions are consistently presented as a kind of common sense in mainstream biodiversity conservation. As measures expand to include payments for ecosystem services, certified hunting ventures, carbon offset schemes under REDD (Reduced Emissions from Degradation and Deforestation), the concealments are likely to grow. Under such circumstances it would behoove us to begin exploring alternatives to neoliberal approaches to conservation and development, and finding more nuanced ways of presenting the socioecological problems that concern everyone in the global conservation community.

Taking these steps will involve difficult conversations, and reconsidering the assumptions that have been so effective at mobilising conservation resources in recent years. This does not mean a blanket rejection of market-driven conservation, but it will require more candid and inclusive evaluations of how well they are actually working. From this perspective, works like Chapin’s ‘Challenge to Conservationists’, though inconvenient, provide invaluable catalyst for the suspension of prevailing assumptions and beliefs. Though it may be profitable in the short-term to refuse to engage in reflexive thinking and dialogue, in the long-term such refusal stifles opportunities for learning, and therefore the possibility of finding more socially and ecologically effective conservation alternatives.

In the tropical, developing world conservation sector, big NGOs (BINGOs) dominate the prioritisation and implementation of conservation programmes (Rodriguez et al. 2007). Questions are asked about the impact and effectiveness of this dominance (Chapin 2004). Our research studied the impact and effectiveness of BINGO-dominance on the conservation sector in a small island developing nation in the Pacific – Fiji. In small island nations,
trends and impacts can have a clarity and visibility that may not always be transparent in large countries, hence providing us the opportunity to investigate assumptions that underpin BINGO programme design in developing nations throughout the world.The review took place during 2007.

We interviewed 67 informants, who were selected to be representative of stakeholders, collaborators, and other participants and funders of the
conservation sector. Over 70 reports, articles and other literature from published and unpublished sources were reviewed, as were numerous conventions, strategies, policies and documents. The draft findings of the review were put to a meeting of 29 stakeholders and informants, and the
ensuing discussion and conclusions were taken into account in the final analysis.

Fiji as an International Conservation Priority

The combination of Fiji’s perceived international biodiversity values and the degree of threat facing its species and ecosystems has made the country a priority for a number of international conservation organisations. For a total Fiji population of 900,000, we found 23 non-government agencies (including 18 BINGOs) and at least a half-dozen community-based groups working on conservation outcomes. A total of 148 individuals are employed full time in government and non-government conservation programmes and projects. Several Pacific regional secretariats with conservation mandates include Fiji in their oversight. By analysing the budgets of both government and non-government funding sources, we estimate that collectively over USD 8 million is spent on its biodiversity conservation annually.

A Biodiversity Crisis in Fiji

Most of the 18 BINGOs that have started conservation programmes in Fiji arrived a decade ago. While these arrivals resulted in a significant increase
in the number of conservation projects and programmes operating in Fiji, as well as increases in the total budget for conservation and the number of
staff employed in the sector, the past decade has not seen an increase either in conservation success in this country, or in capacity development of Fijian institutions that is commensurate with the international resources that the BINGOs have brought to Fiji. Instead our review identified serious
biodiversity conservation issues in Fiji including forest degradation and loss, invasive weeds and predators, endemic species threatened with extinction, and over-harvesting and pollution of marine habitats. While BINGOs may not be responsible for the current biodiversity crisis, given the resources they have brought to their work, they are accountable for having little impact on reducing the crisis.

Conservation History

Our analysis of the history of conservation programmes in Fiji revealed that over the past 30 years there have been nearly 50 significant conservation initiatives or programme start-ups. The changes and trends that have occurred during this time have been driven more by changes and trends in international understanding than by local needs and conservation priorities. This situation is exacerbated by interventions based on faulty assumptions about the underlying causes of Fiji’s biodiversity crisis. These assumptions include: lack of local awareness about conservation and the environment, inadequate policies and legislation, shortage of information and science, the need for new ideas, and inadequate resources. Our review does not confirm that any of these assumptions of program design were leading causes of biodiversity loss in Fiji. Instead we conclude that solutions will be found in a reassessment of conservation approaches and strategies based on sound strategic thinking. Two cornerstones to this reassessment are discussed below: national ownership of the crisis, and increased national capacity.

National Ownership of the Problem and the Solutions

Definition of conservation success provided to us by informants during the review includes the vision of Fiji nationals managing conservation
effectively – from community level to government – and being accountable to the people of Fiji for that work. Interviewees made clear that Fiji
nationals are central to resolving the biodiversity crisis. National and community leaders in Fiji need to own the conservation problems, set
the priorities for action and design the solutions. There is a critical role for international organisations to provide technical support, experience and
capacity development to support this agenda, but international organisations cannot be in the driver’s seat of conservation programming if effective, sustainable solutions are to be found. This is a deeper concept of ownership than participatory methodologies that link community members in village-based projects. Much of the aid and development sector has already embraced the concept of partners owning and defining programme direction (Chambers 1995; Fowler 2002; see also the 1995 Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness).

In contrast to this, Fijian nationals describe a situation where conservation is being done for them or to them by the 20 international agencies (including 18 BINGOs) that dominate the prioritisation, research, design, implementation, funding andevaluation of biodiversity conservation programmes and projects in Fiji. Sixty per cent of the total conservation budget in Fiji is managed by BINGOs. Yet BINGOs select their own programme priorities and are neither accountable within Fiji for this sizable portion of the national resource pool, nor are they required within Fiji to be for this sizable portion of the national resource pool, nor are they required within Fiji to be transparent about their operations. To attract donor funding, each BINGO seeks to attribute success and ideas to itself. As a result of which, projects, buildings, vehicles, and sometimes even communities are ‘branded’ with the name and symbol of the BINGO and/or donors. In both subtle and obvious ways this shifts the ownership of current conservation initiatives away from Fiji, from local people, and from local institutions that have the long-term responsibility for both the problem and solutions.

In their enthusiasm for ecosystem and species conservation, armed with science, supported by impressive budgets, and backed by a powerful global movement, BINGOs have swelled to fill the ‘conservation’ niche in Fiji to the point where the sector represents a problem with many foreign solution-finders but with few local leaders and owners. ‘Lost in translation’ has been a local concept of conservation that centres on resource management. International agencies bring an ‘international’ perspective of conservation, primarily one that concerns itself with species conservation (most particularly endemic and endangered species), habitat protection or the preservation of iconic, ‘pristine’, ‘wild’, or ‘remote’ landscapes. By contrast, the review confirmed Fijian-centred interest in biodiversity is primarily focused on its usefulness to people. As one informant told us ‘Communities don’t use the word ‘conservation’. We can’t even translate it into Fijian.’

Locally led conservation initiatives are almost always based on some practical reason, such as safeguarding food supply or because of ancestral, or cultural imperatives. Conservation is closely linked to development. We found very little ownership of the ‘international view’ of conservation among Fijians after more than a decade of diligent work by BINGOs in Fiji. An important start to building Fijian ownership and leadership of the biodiversity crisis would be to observe more carefully and thoughtfully the triggers for Fijian interest in conservation as it is linked to resource management, and make those the central components of international support to the sector. The question ‘whose priorities are being met by this programme?’ (a common question from Fijians we interviewed during the review) may be an effective early filter to programme design.

Fijian Capacity

The review found that there are two asymmetries in capacity within Fiji’s conservation sector: between government and NGOs, and between BINGOs and Fijian organisations and agencies. On the first point, despite the fact that solutions to the most profound problems facing conservation in Fiji require government response to be effectively resolved, capacity rests disproportionately with the NGOs.

Only one of the 22 NGOs told usthat lack of capacity was a problem for them. By contrast, every government department with a role in biodiversity
conservation that we interviewed said lack of capacity was their main, or one of their main, problems. There are about 45 government staff working
on conservation outcomes for a total budget of USD 644,000. There are more than twice as many people (103) working for NGOs in Fiji with a total
budget of just under USD 7.73 million– a budget more than 90 per cent higher than that of the Government. Within the NGO sector, resourcing and capacity for biodiversityconservation rests primarily with the BINGOs. This situation is exacerbated by the practice of BINGOs opening offices in Fiji and employing local staff.

Thirteen BINGOs have done just this. Today there are 24 people working for local NGOs on conservation (as defined by Fijians) compared with
nearly 80 working for BINGOs. Local NGOs and government cannot compete with the salaries and other benefits that BINGOs offer. From the viewpoint of an individual, there are obvious advantages in working for a BINGO including the higher salary, exposure to international experience, and increased resources to support conservation programmes. For national conservation outcomes, however, the negative impacts are serious. BINGO office-opening acts as a magnet, concentrating talented Fiji nationals into the service of international agencies and away from local NGOs and government. This in turn exacerbates the lack of capacity of the local agencies and government and further diminishes the likelihoodof the growth and development of a Fiji-led conservation sector. Similar issues are reported in the conservation sector in other developing countries (Rodriguez et al. 2007). The review found that after decades of sustained internationally-led conservation implementation in Fiji, there remains little capacity at both the NGO and governmental levels to design and lead effective conservation programmes. There are internationally-led capacity development projects in Fiji, but these tend to focus on developing technical skills (mapping, participatory methodologies, biological monitoring, information transfer), while the international agencies still control the skills required for programme prioritising, strategy, direction, and design. Yet it is the latter skills that are most critical for building long-term Fijian ownership and leadership and sustainability of conservation.

A fundamental reassessment of the role of international agencies and where capacity needs to be built, needs to be undertaken. Their most effective approach to conservation is likely to be supporting the growth of local organisations, national and subnational government capacity and local leaders. Talented local leaders and Fijian organisations are better able than international agencies to define biodiversity conservation in terms  are both credible and compelling to the people of Fiji. Importantly, only local NGOs will take on the role of mobilising civil society to hold government accountable. Even though this work is an essential contribution to biodiversity conservation in Fiji (government corruption or inaction are significant contributors to biodiversity loss), it is not work that the BINGOs will do (Edwards 2002; Chapin 2004).

References:

Chambers, R. 1995. Poverty and livelihoods: whose reality counts? Environment and Urbanization 7(1): 173-204.

Chapin, M. 2004. A Challenge to Conservationists. World Watch November/December:17-31.

Edwards, M. 2002. International Development NGOs: Agents of Foreign Aid or Vehicles for International Cooperation. In: The Earthscan Reader on NGO Management (eds. Edwards, M. and A. Fowler). Pp. 27- 37. Earthscan Publications.

Fowler, A. 2002. Beyond Partnership: Getting Real about NGO Relationships in the Aid System. In: The Earthscan Reader on NGO Management (eds.
Edwards, M. and A. Fowler). Pp. 27- 37. Earthscan Publications.

Rodríguez, J. et al. 2007. Globalization of Conservation: A View from the South. Science 317: 755-756.

This article recounts the 2002-03 separation of a Guatemalan NGO called ProPetén from Conservation International (CI). As one of the cases cited by both Bray and Anderson’s (2005) report and Chapin’s (2004) seminal article, ‘A Challenge to Conservationists,’ the previously unpublished details
of this organisational divorce illustrate the divergence of local environmental interests from the increasingly neoliberal agenda of large, transnational conservation organisations, as described by other journalists and academics such as MacDonald (2008), Dowie (2009), and Igoe and Sullivan (2008).

To begin, I must disclose that before becoming a cultural anthropologist, I worked for CI’s Guatemala program (a.k.a. ProPetén) for five years between
1993-1999 (7 months in DC and 4 years in the Petén, Guatemala, field office) as a volunteer, intern, affiliated Fulbright researcher, and eventually paid staff. Because of my long-term commitment to the project, my former Guatemalan colleagues invited me and one other North American anthropologist to join its founding board of directors when planning began in 2002 to legalise ProPetén as an independent NGO. Having moved back to Petén for dissertation research between September 2002 and May 2004, I was present and involved with all the events described herein as secretary (2002-03), then president (2003-05), and finally emeritus advisor (2005- present) of this new board of directors. All events described in this article are documented in my fieldnotes, email records, and/or organisational archives. The contextual explanations of the growing schism between ProPetén and CI over several ‘springs’ are based on my anthropological interpretation of events and should not be interpreted as an official ProPetén statement.

Spring 1990. Described romantically in the travel-writing genre as the ‘land of eternal spring,’ Guatemala’s natural beauty also constitutes a central part
of the planet’s third most important biodiversity ‘hotspot’ (according to CI’s own internal ranking system). Following Guatemala’s 1990 declaration of the 1.6 million hectare Maya Biosphere Reserve in northern Guatemala (a complex of national parks surrounded by multiple-use and buffer zones), CI won the largest grant offered by USAID-Guatemala for community-based conservation efforts in this region. Charged with providing economic alternatives to deforestation for communities located inside the Reserve, CI established a field office called ‘ProPetén’ and hired a talented, local Guatemalan team.

Over the next several years, ProPetén launched a series of successful flagship projects in ecotourism, sustainable timber management, non-timber forest products, primary and reproductive health, and environmental education that helped CI to gain credibility among more bi- and multi-lateral donors and build its global brand as an organisation with a mission ‘to demonstrate that human societies are able to live harmoniously with nature.’

Spring planning meetings, late 1990s. Building on the success of CI’s initially decentralised structure that empowered national directors to make
good decisions based on the local context, money began to flow into CI’s global coffers. To meet the needs of its new multilateral and corporate
donors, headquarters leadership also began to demand more reports, more budget requisitions, more vertical communication, and more complicated
planning frameworks from its field staff. Little by little, national directors lost the autonomy they held in the early 1990s. At almost every annual
planning meeting (always held in the spring) around the millennium turn, CI’s CEO and President announced the creation of a new DC-based and
-staffed initiative (e.g., the Center for Applied Biodiversity Science in 1999, the Center for Leadership in Business in 2001, among others). The absence of a ‘center’ led by social scientists to support partnerships with grassroots, indigenous, or communitybased organisations was notable. While many kinds of organisations (corporate, nonprofit, governmental) develop structural tensions between satellite offices and headquarters, CI’s disproportionate growth in DC staff over field staff exacerbated these normal internal divisions. Adding to the tensions was a cultural clash between an increasingly corporate management style at headquarters and the more diverse and pragmatic management styles of community-based
field programs.

Spring 2000. After having been heralded as CI’s poster project for a decade, ProPetén’s leadership began hearing murmurs from DC staff that they were doing too much ‘development’ and wasting ‘scarce’ conservation dollars on ‘poverty alleviation’ instead of focusing on strict biodiversity conservation. Precisely as CI’s central management had begun to question its community-based field programs, USAID-Guatemala also happened to be closing down the tenyear Maya Biosphere Reserve initiative. For over a decade, CI headquarters had negotiated the maximum NICRA (Negotiated Indirect Cost Recovery Agreement) rate from USAID, which meant that it collected an average of 38 per cent in overhead fees from ProPetén’s million dollar-plus annual grant. Once a major source of revenue for CI, the ProPetén field office was soon to become a liability. Without consulting its Guatemalan field staff, CI’s President Russell Mittermeier wrote a memo to USAID-Guatemala pledging to establish ProPetén ‘as a fully independent non-governmental organisation under Guatemalan law’ within seven months, following which ‘CI will continue to act as an associate, providing technical support and advice as needed….’ (21 December 2000).

Spring 2002. Two years later, the swift and amicable separation promised by Mittermeier to USAID began to sour into prolonged and bitter divorce. To be fair, ProPetén was not the only local organisation that experienced problems in becoming legally independent of its international counterpart asUSAID Guatemala closed down the original Maya Biosphere Reserve project; Defensores de la Naturaleza / TNC, CARE-Petén / CARE International, and Centro Maya / Rodale all had their own disagreements. However, of all these organisations, ProPetén and CI suffered the longest and most acrimonious separation process with disagreements along three lines: (a) ownership of a local biological station, (b) budgetary issues, and (c)philosophical approaches to ‘business’ and the environment. The most contentious point of separation was over future ownership of ProPetén’s biological research station located in a conflictive region of Laguna del Tigre National Park. Bypassing the ProPetén field office, a pair of CI biologists traveled directly to the station in early 2002 to draw up an inventory and a ‘co’-management plan in which CI would take control of the station and leave ProPetén with the more difficult, conflictive, and sometimes physically dangerous community relations with surrounding villages. According to their budget,

CI would contribute nothing to the community projects, but ProPetén would be expected to raise 50 per cent of the station’s research and operating
budget. After ProPetén rejected this lopsided plan, CI then proposed partnering with other NGOs unfamiliar with the local context to ‘co’-manage the station. Both these proposals were unacceptable to the Guatemalan staff who had risked their lives defending the property after loggers tricked local communities into burning it down days before its planned inauguration in 1997. CI refused to contribute funds for the station’s reconstruction, so ProPetén’s director decided to raise the money himself from the Japanese embassy in Guatemala city for a more humbly designed facility built with local materials that would be less of a target for arson. As a space for Guatemalan biologists and university students to carry out applied research involving local villages, the station’s scientific program was perhaps not as glamorous as CI’s famous ‘rapid assessment programs’ for inventorying biodiversity, but it contributed significantly to the formation of a committed class of conservation professionals in Guatemala. Moreover, the health and agricultural training programs that ProPetén then organised at the station also developed a network of neighboring village leaders willing to cooperate with conservation activities.

As such, the station became a symbol of national sovereignty for he ProPetén team, university students, and local people — and was simply not
negotiable. The conditions of CI’s long-term financial commitment to continued conservation work in Petén became a second point of contention.
Uncertain whether CI would pay them the pensions due to them under Guatemalan law, ProPetén’s employees threatened to sue in the early spring
of 2002. Under some pressure from USAID-Guatemala, CI did pay the pensions and also promised in May 2002 to relinquish the station, provide
USD 100,000 in general start-up funding, delegate all outstanding project funds (USD 86,287 from twelve donors), and transfer all other fixed assets accrued over the life of the USAID program to ProPetén by the end of that fiscal year. June passed with no further word from CI. ProPetén was
born as a Guatemalan NGO with 57 employees and not a cent in the bank. Not until August did CI give half the promised start-up money (USD
50,000) but held onto the other funds and assets. ProPetén began to lay off workers, eventually losing more than half its original staff.

As the months rolled by, ProPetén’s board realised the DC accountants were trying to reassign the aforementioned pension payments to ProPetén’s start-up budget and other project balances. CI’s lawyers also continued to quibble over ProPetén’s shares in an ecotourism alliance (‘Eco- Maya’) and attempted to renege upon debts CI acquired from a failed microcredit fund (‘Fondo Maya’) planned and established by DC-based staff in the 1990s. While ProPetén’s board complied with CI’s request for a ‘gentlemen’s agreement’ not to speak of these troubles to any donors, we later learned that CI had secretly communicated with ProPetén’s twelve donors asking them to reassign outstanding balances to other divisions of CI’s multimillion
budget. Trusted friends in DC confided that CI had tried to block a medium-sized grant that ProPetén was poised to receive from the Global Environmental Facility (GEF) to implement a three-year project in partnership with an indigenous-led NGO called the BioItzá Association. While the GEF grant proceeded normally, CI did manage to block a pass-through grant (an anticipated USD 300,000) that ProPetén was to receive from USAID/Washington’s Population and Environment program in recognition of its successful ‘Remedios’ program. After failing to contract another Guatemalan NGO (with no previous experience in Petén) for this project, CI diverted this funding to another country program.Spring 2003. Following the unexpected loss of ProPetén’s executive director to liver cancer in May 2003, USAID Guatemala officers renewed pressure on CI to honor its legal commitments to ProPetén. After more months of delays, CI finally transferred the biological station and fixed assets to a deeply weakened ProPetén in July 2003, although CI’s 990 form for 2001 available online reveals that the organisation had already claimed to the IRS USD 243,344 for a ‘transfer to local NGO in Guatemala.’

Subsequent tax reports show that after squabbling over relatively small budget amounts with ProPetén (in CI’s terms, not ProPetén’s), CI immediately donated USD 471,000 to the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) for projects in Petén in 2004, illustrating a pattern of ‘strange bedfellows’ described by Christine McDonald in Green Inc. in which ‘big industry groups and big conservation groups that seem like logical rivals end up in alliances, partnerships, and pacts’ (2008: 204). While CI’s leadership internally dismissed the ugliness of the ProPetén divorce to other CI staff as caused by ‘personality conflicts,’ the irreconcilable differences between the two organisations actually went deeper. Working in a densely populated region with thousands of farmers also living inside the Maya Biosphere Reserve, ProPetén remained committed to community-based partnerships as the best methodology for biodiversity conservation. CI, however, had begun to move up the economic scale to establish multiple partnerships with corporations such as Monsanto, Alcoa, Anheuser- Busch, BP, Fiji Water, Chevron Corporation, ConocoPhillips, Ford Motor Company, Rio Tinto, Royal Caribbean Cruises, S.C. Johnson &Son, Shell Oil, Starbucks, even Wal- Mart. Representatives of many of these corporations also garnered influential seats on CI’s board of directors.

To be clear, ProPetén’s Guatemalan leadership was not opposed to engaging with the market, per se, but they wanted to help communities develop
economic interests in conservation at a scale and pace that local people could manage themselves. This meant,for example, supporting projects to
help women’s groups sell artisanal herbal products locally rather than making bioprospecting agreements with pharmaceutical corporations (as CI’s lawyers once proposed in 1999). It also meant supporting local ecotourism businesses rather than signing partnerships with large hotel owners and other corporate players involved in the Inter-American Development Bank’s controversial Puebla to Panama Plan (as CI did in 2002). Another serious disagreement concerned whether ProPetén should continue a decade of village extension work to establish certified community run forest concessions or switch to complicated, top-down carbon-trading being leases (as proposed by CI in 2002).

The very same DC-based economists that had argued in the early 1990s that ProPetén must help communities ‘use it or lose it’ began to
argue the opposite by the late 1990s: that ‘direct conservation’ (i.e., paying villagers leases not to harvest their trees) was the more cost-effective approach. The problem with the economists’ proposed carbon trading scheme for Petén was that it only offered short term funding to just two village groups – threatening the unity and marketing of the other 21 other community forest concessions operating in the Maya Biosphere Reserve. When the Guatemalan park service eventually rejected CI’s plan for these and other reasons, the DC economists accused ProPetén’s executive director of not demonstrating sufficient enthusiasm for their plan in meetings with the Guatemalan government. As these and other examples reveal, ProPetén’s staff had broadened their environmental philosophy to integrated concerns about ecological and human welfare, much in the same way that the 1962 publication of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring had expanded U.S. environmentalism from its origins among a small band of elites interested on wilderness preservation into an expanded social movement involving new constituencies such as housewives, students, inner-city residents, and factory workers. CI unfortunately remained devoted to a technical and increasingly corporate model of biodiversity conservation myopically focused on park preservation.

Six years after its financial and ideological separation from CI, ProPetén has rebuilt itself under the leadership of two dynamic Guatemalan women, Rosa Maria Chan and Rosita Contreras. As an independent Guatemala organisation, ProPetén not only continues to support community-based
conservation, but has also joined popular and agrarian struggles against corporate trade and neoliberalism and embraced other environmental justice issues to establish a greener life not only for the forest, but also for the people of the land of eternal spring.

References:

Bray, D.B. and A.B. Anderson. 2005. Global Conservation, Non- Governmental Organization, & Local Communities: Perspectives on
Programs and Project Implementation in Latin America. Working Paper No.1. Conservation and Development Series. Latin American and Caribbean
Center, Florida International University, Miami.

Chapin, M. 2004. A Challenge to Conservationists. World Watch November/December:17-31.

Dowie, M. 2009. Conservation Refugees: The Hundred-Year Conflict between Global Conservation and Native People. Boston: MIT Press.

Igoe, J. and S. Sullivan. 2008.Problematizing Neoliberal Biodiversity Conservation: Displaced and Disobedient Knowledge. Wenner Gren Workshop, American University, Washington, DC. 25 pp.

MacDonald, C. 2008. Green, Inc.: An Environmental Insider Reveals How a Good Cause Has Gone Bad. Guilford, CT: The Lyons Press.

It has now been nearly five years since Mac Chapin’s article, ‘A Challenge to conservationists’ (2004) caused a stir that reverberated through the 2004 World Conservation Congress (WCC) in Bangkok. Although many readers will be familiar with Chapin’s article, which provoked the largest outpouring of reader letters ever received by World  Watch,  his main points are worth reiterating here. First, Chapin noted that a growing portion of the money available globally for biodiversity conservation increasingly is being controlled by the three largest conservation NGOs: the Nature Conservancy, Conservation International, and the World Wide Fund for Nature. Dowie (2009) has added the Wildlife Conservation Society and the African Wildlife Foundation. Next, he pointed out that the growth of these organizations coincided with a general failure of conservation practice. Finally, he expressed concern over the growing influence of the World Bank, bilateral agencies and corporations on conservation NGOs. He argued that this situation made it increasingly difficult for conservation big NGOs (BINGOs) to be critical of the environmentally and socially disruptive spread of corporate enterprise, extractive industries. Many of Chapin’s observations and arguments have been echoed in the work of journalist Mark Dowie, which culminated this year in the publication of Conservation Refugees (2009).

This special issue of Current Conservation is the product of a network of scholars,  activists,  and conservation practitioners who have also observed and documented the kinds of dynamics noted by Chapin and Dowie. Members of this network also share observations that there has been a clear move beyond simple partnership between corporate interests and global conservation, to an apparent paradigm shift in which economic growth and big business increasingly are presented as essential to successful biodiversity conservation and a sustainable future for our planet.

In other words, there appears to be a strengthening consensus that there is a synergistic relationship between growing markets and the protection of nature. This consensus, which can be seen in both the realms of concept and practice, is variously referred to as market environmentalism (Anderson and Leal 1991), green neoliberalism (Goldman  2005), green capitalism (Heartfield 2008) and neoliberal conservation (Igoe and Brockington 2006; Sullivan 2006).

We are aware that these terms are widely, and to a certain extent justifiably, regarded as opaque jargon by many who work in the realm of international conservation. In this collection, therefore, we strive to be as clear as we what we are talking about. An excellent possibly can about the particulars of place to begin is Bram Buscher’s (2008) concise and thorough treatment of what the ‘neoliberalisation’ of conservation looks like in a specific intellectual/policy context. His case study of the 2007 meetings of the Society for Conservation Biology (SCB) describes the alignment of conservation with market forces, seen through the pervasiveness of certain ideas and rhetoric. He was especially concerned with assertions that markets can bring about win-win solutions through conservation interventions, in which value is added to nature through ecotourism and ‘ecosystem services.’ Most recently the concept of ‘cultural services’ has been added to this discussion.

This increasingly pervasive and powerful narrative about markets and nature asserts that value added to nature through various kinds of for-profit investment and finance can provide incentives for local people to protect nature, and thus also enjoy a profit from the ‘cultural services’ that they provide in protecting global biodiversity. It will also provide the financial means necessary to protect the gains made in the global expansion of protected areas during the 1990s in a context where parks are being rapidly downsized and degazetted. This thinking was pervasive at the most recent WCC in Barcelona.

The entrance to the Congress was aesthetically dominated by corporate displays, while the Congress featured films with titles such as ‘Conservation is Everybody’s Business’. The Congress was also marked by contentious struggles over an emerging partnership between the IUCN and the Rio Tinto Mining Group, as well as another between the IUCN and Shell Oil. Research by Ken MacDonald  (forthcoming)  and  Saul Cohen (forthcoming) on the Congress reveals how specific groups within the IUCN used various kinds of marketing and performance to make market-based conservation appear unproblematically compatible with social justice and ecological sustainability.

We find these transformations concerning on a number of levels. As work by Zoe Young (2002) and Michael Goldman(2005) have shown,  the greening of the  WorldBank and the creation of the Global Environment  Facility  (GEF)  in  the 1990s  facilitated the extension of market logic into natural and cultural realms previously beyond its reach. This process has revolved around the phenomenon that social scientists from Marx on refer to as commodification, the transformation of objects and processes into products and experiences accruing monetary value determined by trading in frequently distant markets (Castree  2007;  Brockington  et  al. 2008). Thus spectacular landscapes are transformed to become high-end tourist destinations, often at the expense of local people and their livelihoods (West and Carrier 2004).3 Thus a rainforest is reconceptualised as a specified number of carbon credits or the environmental damage of a gold mine is calculated in ways that make it appear amenable to offsetting by nature protection in another context. The underlying logic is that the higher the price for a tradable commodity species, a landscape, a cultural practice, or an ‘ecosystem service’  the more likely it becomes that the commodity will be conserved or sustainably utilised into the future.

An economistic application of the term ‘ecosystem services’ (as posited by Costanza et al.  1987  and  the Millenium Ecosystem Assessment (2005) thus reduces and  transforms complex natural and social phenomena into pricedand thereby tradable commodities whose priced value is set from afar (Sullivan 2009a and 2009b). An especially problematic aspect of these processes of commodification is that of environmental and social mitigation.

Basically, this proposes the substitutability of one landscape for another, an environmental good for an environmental bad, and market opportunities of the livelihood practices and lifeworlds of people living on the landscapes in question. These concepts increasingly are deployed in association with extractive enterprises such as hydroelectric dams (Goldman 2005) and oil pipelines (Brockington et al. 2008), which harm the environment and contribute to the physical, social, and economic displacement of local people. The mitigation concept proposes that these types of harm can be corrected through nature conservation in other landscapes, combined with the absorption of displaced people into market-based economic opportunities. You can see how mitigation is presented in terms of business opportunity at the website of the Business and Biodiversity Offsets Program.

Conservation and capitalism are thus transforming the world in partnership (Brockington et al.2008). Conservation grows with extractive enterprise and large scale development. It grows through promoting a global tourist industry that is heavily dependent on ecologically and economically unsustainable fossil fuel consumption (Chapin 2004; Carrier and MacLeod 2005; Sullivan 2006; Neves forthcoming). It grows through the promotion of consumer goods such as green credit cards, Starbuck’s conservation coffee, and McDonalds Endangered Animal Happy Meals (Igoe, Neves and Brockington forthcoming). Finally, it grows alongside extractive enterprise through the provision of mitigating services and carbon offsets. In other words, conservation grows as capitalism matures and spreads, and vice versa. According to these arguments, biodiversity conservation and ecological sustainability appear to be best achieved through increased consumption.

Countering this logic is difficult. As a general rule, the analyses presented in this special issue have not been well received in conservation circles. As Buscher (2007: 230) has argued, the types of win-win scenarios proposed by neoliberal conservation are highly effective in bringing together ‘a broad variety of interests and goals into apparently immutable objectives that can be embraced by all’. It thus is especially valuable in mobilising resources and support for conservation NGOs and interventions, which increasingly are also opportunities for business investment. In his systematic observations of the 2007 SCB meetings, Buscher noted that presentations of these kinds of ideas and scenarios more often were cast in terms of consensus-building than in terms of ‘intellectually sound and clear argumentation’. He thus concludes that the promotion of these types of concepts and scenarios tautologically affirms the very market logic they are promoting, a phenomenon he calls ‘market science.’ In market science ‘the best knowledge is apparently that which the most knowledge consumers (i.e., the audience) buy into’. From a scientific stand point, Buscher concludes, this is a problematic state of affairs. He acknowledges the urgency of biodiversity conservation, and the corresponding need to build constituencies and procure financial support/investment. At the same time, he warns that doing this without an empirically grounded understanding of the often problematic complexities of relationships between global markets, ‘the environment’, and local peoples and livelihoods can contribute to the perpetuation of social injustice, as well as to paradoxically undermining the goals of biodiversity conservation. Despite the difficulties of bringing alternative views into the arena of conservation business, we think these developments require critical analysis and challenge. The links between capitalism and conservation are more problematic than mainstream ideas regarding synergistic relationships between markets and the environment
would have us believe. In some cases global conservation may be facilitating processes and relationships that undermine its own goals of protecting the environment and creating sustainability. In others, market-based approaches to conservation often are inimical to both good conservation and democratic processes.

Nevertheless, we also caution against treating conservation, and particularly conservation NGOs, as a group that acts in concert and always in agreement. It is true that many of the practices described above and their associated rhetoric are present in conservation NGOs: with so many of these organisations receiving various forms of support from the World Bank and bilateral development organisations, this is hardly surprising (cf. Young 2002). But it also is interesting to note the diversity of responses to these global pressures and funding flows that are visible in the conservation NGO sector. Despite an emphasis on consensus building, and the common stance that large global conservation meetings appear to encourage, it is intriguing to observe the variety of practice engaged in by different NGOs in their respective contexts of action. The empirically grounded studies of conservation performance and policy which this network has collated, some of which are reported below, thus describe considerable variety in policies, practices and consequences. Different NGOs working in the same region can behave in very different ways. Indeed the same NGO’s performance in different regions also can vary considerably. These are structures and institutions which themselves produce diversity (see especially Dowie 2009).

This diversity in the conservation movement is reflected by the fact that some of the authors of the articles in this special issue themselves were working for conservation NGOs when they formed their views, and all have worked closely with them. This collection itself was reviewed and critiqued by other members and former members and employees of conservation NGOs. In other words, this is not a sector which can be easily typecast.

Unfortunately, it also has been a frequent common experience that the formal institutional responses to our work have not been sympathetic. In some cases our work and writing has been actively shut down and shut out through censorship, threats and proposed legal action. It has seemed at times that the knowledge we have produced through research and reflection somehow is ‘disobedient’ and subject to disciplining as such, which is why we use the term ‘disobedient knowledge’ here. Clearly, the knowledge we have produced in collaboration with local people and situated in local contexts does not mesh well with the ideas and rhetoric of neoliberal conservation. Nevertheless we remain convinced that it is relevant, in terms of both conservation and social justice agendas. Because of our concerns we have been working together to create an alternative locus of knowledge production concerning biodiversity conservation, sustainability, and our collective future. Based on our experiences we are working to design this locus of knowledge with the following principles in mind:

1) Collaboration: Current approaches to conservation, especially market-oriented ones, are driven by competition. NGOs compete with one another for sources of conservation funding. At the same time, scholars researching and producing knowledge regarding conservation, frequently in close collaboration with local people, also compete with each other for even scarcer sources of research funding, often provided by NGOs or the foundations that fund them;

2) Affinity and Common Concern: Research on conservation issues often is built around the availability of certain sources of funding, which may be tied to particular perspectives and agendas. We are attempting to build a research network that is minimally influenced by funding priorities, emphasising instead collaboration, friendship and shared concerns for both biological and cultural diversity;

3) Inductive and Empirical Research, Open to Scrutiny and Contestation: Our goal is to weave theories and discussions regarding conservation and sustainability that emerge from a diversity of empirical observations from different parts of the world. We are building these perspectives from patterns that we have noticed arising from our observations in many different locales and contexts. Our goal is to present these perspectives in both web-based forums that are interactive in nature creating opportunity for dialogue and debate, as well as to publish in journals and other outlets, of which we intend this issue of Current Conservation as an initial collaborative contribution; and finally

4) Openness: Collaborative knowledge building depends on modes of communication that are, as far as possible, open, sincere, and constructive. In a competitive environment geared towards funding and profit, there are strong incentives to communicate in ways that cast doubt on perspectives and information that may be seen as undermining the procurement of funding and institutional growth. Such modes of communication often require the overlooking of perspectives and information that might be essential for effective institutional learning. We do not envision this alternative locus of knowledge production to be standing in opposition to, or even wholly separate from, mainstream conservation. Our intention is rather that it will contribute to new types of productive tensions that broaden our understanding of conservation and its problematic relationships to capitalism, consumerism, and institutional competition.

Our hope is that the conversations emerging from these productive tensions will reveal that alternatives to market-oriented conservation deserve more substantial consideration in policy circles, academic research, and public understandings of environmental issues. A full discussion of such alternatives is beyond the scope of this special issue. We anticipate that these will be the topic of upcoming conversations. We look forward to being part of these, as well as working with similarly committed people to imagine and implement alternative futures.

References:

Brockington, D., R. Duffy, and J. Igoe.2008. Nature Unbound: Conservation, Capitalism, and the Future of Protected Areas. London: Earthscan.

Büscher, B. 2008. Conservation, Neoliberalism and Social Science: A Critical Reflection on the SCB 2007 Annual Meeting, South Africa. Conservation Biology 22(2): 229-231.

Chapin, M. 2004. A Challenge to Conservationists. World Watch November/December: 17-31. Cohen, S. Forthcoming. How to NASDAQ the Environment: the Science and Performance of Neoliberal Conservation at the World Conservation Congress.

Dowie, M. 2009. Conservation Refugees: the 100 Year Conflict Between Global Conservation and Native People. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Goldman, M. 2005. Imperial Nature: The World Bank and Struggles for Social Justice in the Age of Globalization. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Carrier, J. and D. Macleod. 2005. Bursting the Bubble: the Socio-Cultural Context of Ecotourism. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 11: 315-334.

Castree, N. 2007. Neoliberalizing Nature: The Logics of De- and Re- Regulation. Environment and Planning A4: 131-152.

Costanza, R., R. d’Arge, S. de Groot, M. Farber, B. Grasso, K. Hannon, S. Limburg, R. Naeem, J. O’Neill, R. Paruelo, R. Raskin, P. Sutton and M. van den Belt. 1987. The value of the world’s ecosystem services and natural capital. Nature 387: 253-260.

MacDonald, K. Forthcoming. Business, Biodiversity and New ‘Fields’ of Conservation. Conservation and Society.

MEA. 2005. Millennium Ecosystem Assessment: Ecosystems and Human Well-being. Washington DC: Island Press.

Neves, K. Forthcoming. Cashing in on Ecotourism: A Critical Ecological Engagement with Dominant E-NGO Discourses on Whaling, Cetacean
Conservation, and Whale Watching. Antipodes.

Sullivan, S. 2006. The elephant in the room? Problematizing ‘new’ (neoliberal) biodiversity conservation. Forum for Development Studies 33(1): 105-135.

Sullivan, S. 2009a. An Ecosystem at Your Service: Environmental Strategists are Redefining Nature as a Capitalist Commodity. The Land Winter 2008/2009.

Sullivan, S. 2009b. Green Capitalism and the Cultural Poverty of Constructing Nature as Service Provider. Radical Anthropology 3: 18-27.
Terry L.A. and D.R. Leal. 1991. Free- Market Environmentalism. London: Palgrave Macmillan.

West, P. and J. Carrier. 2004. Getting Away from it all? Ecotourism and Authenticity. Current Anthropology 45(4): 483-498.

Young, Z. 2002. A New Green Order?The World Bank and the Politics of the Global Environment Facility. London: Pluto Press.
 
 

Conservation problems are typically complex, uncertain, multi-scale and affect multiple actors and agencies. This demands transparent decision-making that is flexible to changing circumstances and embraces a diversity of knowledge and values. To achieve this, stakeholder participation is increasingly being sought and embedded into environmental decision-making processes, from local to international scales. However, involving people in decisions is inevitably time- consuming and costly – and it may not work. History is littered with examples of failed attempts to work with stakeholders. Old conflicts have been re-ignited, and dominant groups and individuals have been given the power to de-rail or bias outcomes. So why are so many conservationists still interested in participatory approaches?

First of all, whether it works or not, there is a strong argument that we should give those who are affected by, or who can affect, proposals to develop the uplands a chance to have their say. Increasingly this is a right that is being enshrined in law. The Aarhus Convention stipulates that all environmental decisions must involve stakeholders. Local communities are now being involved in environmental decision-making across Europe as River Basin Management Plans are developed in collaboration with stakeholders to reach water quality targets under the Water Framework Directive.

But proponents of participatory approaches argue that there are also many pragmatic benefits to be gained from working with stakeholders. They argue that the reason why stakeholder engagement has sometimes failed in the past is that people haven’t done it right. Poor engagement may be more damaging than none at all. But to what extent are these claims supported by evidence? There is now empirical evidence showing that environmental decisions that were taken in collaboration with stakeholder were higher quality and more durable. Decision quality can be higher because decision-makers can access a wider range of often higher quality information upon which to base decisions, rather than relying solely on text-book answers from researchers. By getting a more complete picture in this way, unintended consequences may be anticipated and avoided. The long-term durability of decisions can be enhanced through participation because the design of interventions, projects and technologies can be more effectively adapted to local circumstances, needs and priorities.

Although empirical evidence has yet to be collected, many other benefits have been claimed. For example, by establishing common ground and trust between participants and learning to appreciate the legitimacy of each others’ viewpoints, participatory processes may have the capacity to transform adversarial relationships and find new ways for participants to work together. This may lead to a sense of ownership over the process and outcomes. If this is shared by a broad coalition of stakeholders, long-term support and active implementation of decisions may be enhanced. Depending on the nature of the initiative, this may significantly reduce implementation costs. Surely even if a few of these additional benefits can be realised, it is worth trying to engage stakeholders in conservation?

There are numerous ways of conceptualizing stakeholder participation in conservation. Early work used the metaphor of a ‘ladder of participation’ to describe different levels of participation from no engagement (one- way communication), through more consultative levels to community empowerment at the top of the ladder. More recently, this has been re-cast as a ‘wheel of participation’, emphasising that different levels of participation are relevant in different contexts. In some contexts (e.g. informing stakeholders about a change in the law), communication may be the most appropriate course of action (indeed anything more would raise unrealistic expectations and waste everyone’s time).

But participation is more than either of these metaphors can describe. It is an approach that values and attempts to reconcile multiple (often differing) perspectives, to facilitate learning and progress.

There is a philosophy (some have called it a world view) underpinning stakeholder participation that emphasises empowerment, equity, trust and learning. There is a need to replace a ‘tool-kit’ approach to participation, which emphasizes selecting the relevant tools for the job, with an approach that views participation as a process. This view emphasises the people who use the tool-kit in the context of a long-term relationship where the parties develop mutual trust and respect as they learn from each other to negotiate potential solutions.

In this context, it is possible to consider best practice principles that can guide the design of effective participatory processes. Box 1 suggests 6 principles based on a Grounded Theory Analysis2 of available literature on stakeholder participation from around the world.

Although few of the claims that are made for stakeholder participation have been tested, there is evidence that it can enhance the quality of environmental decisions, possibly due to more comprehensive information inputs. However, the quality of decisions made through stakeholder participation is strongly dependant on the nature of the process leading to them. Deficiencies in this process are most commonly blamed for the failures that have led to disillusionment in stakeholder participation. Often this has arisen from a focus on the tools of participation, rather than the process within which those tools are used. However, by focusing on participation as a process, Box 1 identifies a number of best practice principles from the literature. But for these sorts of approaches to become embedded in conservation practice, stakeholder participation must be institutionalised, creating organizational cultures that can facilitate processes where goals are negotiated and outcomes are necessarily uncertain. In this light, participatory processes may seem very risky, but there is growing evidence that if well designed, these perceived risks may be well worth taking.

Box 1: Best practice principles of stakeholder participation in environmental management

1. Start talking to people as soon as you can

Stakeholder participation should be considered right from the outset, from concept development and planning, through implementation, to monitoring and evaluation of outcomes. Engagement with stakeholders as early as possible in decision-making has been frequently cited as essential if participatory processes are to lead to high quality and durable decisions. Typically, stakeholders only get involved in decision-making at the implementation phase of the project cycle, and not in earlier project identification and preparation phases. Increasingly they may also be involved in monitoring and evaluating the outcomes of the decision-making process. However, unless flexibility can be built into the project design, this can mean that stakeholders are invited to get involved in a project that is at odds with their own needs and priorities. This may make it a challenge to motivate stakeholders to engage with the decision-making process, and those who are engaged may be placed in a reactive position, where they are asked to respond to proposals that they perceive to have already have been finalised. The Sustainable Uplands Project presents one of the few documented examples of stakeholder engagement right from the development of the initial concept. This was made possible by seed- corn funding from the Rural Economy and Land Use programme where stakeholders developed a project proposal with researchers in a Scoping Study. A review of the Programme’s seed-corn funding showed that it played a crucial role in catalysing interdisciplinary collaborations to tackle complex problems, and recommended wider use of such funding mechanisms. Other researchers have shown how stakeholders could be actively engaged in sampling design, data collection and analysis, in addition to more traditional roles.
 
2 Make sure you’re talking to the right people

Stakeholder analysis is increasingly being used to systematically represent those relevant to environmental decision-making processes. Stakeholder analysis is a process that: (i) defines aspects of a social and natural system affected by a decision or action, (ii) identifies individuals and groups who are affected by or can affect those parts of the system (this may include non-human and non- living entities and future generations), and; (iii) prioritises these individuals and groups for involvement in the decision-making process. A wide variety of tools and approaches have been used for stakeholder analysis to: (i) identify stakeholders; (ii) differentiate between and categorise stakeholders; and (iii) investigate relationships between stakeholders.
 
3 Make sure you know what people want to talk about

In order to design an appropriate process using relevant tools, it is essential to clearly articulate the goals towards which the group will be working. This is closely linked to stakeholder analysis and may take place as part of such an analysis, where system boundaries and issues are identified alongside those who hold a stake in what happens to the system under investigation (Reed et al., submitted for publication). This may require negotiation, and different stakeholders may have irreconcilable objectives. If the goals are developed through dialogue (making trade-offs where necessary) between participants, they are more likely to take ownership of the process, partnership building will be more likely, and the outcomes are more likely to be more relevant to stakeholder needs and priorities, motivating their ongoing active engagement. 

4. Be flexible: base level of participation and methods on your context and objectives

Participatory methods can only be chosen once the objectives of the process have been clearly articulated, a level of engagement has been identified that is appropriate to those objectives, and relevant stakeholders have been selected for inclusion in the process. For example, there are many methods that can be used to communicate (e.g. information dissemination via leaflets or the mass media, hotlines and public meetings), consult (e.g. consultation documents, opinion polls and referendums, focus groups and surveys) or participate (e.g. citizen’s juries, consensus conferences, task- forces and public meetings with voting) with stakeholders. Methods must also be adapted to the decision-making context, including socio-cultural and environmental factors. For example, methods that require participants to read or write should be avoided in groups that might include illiterate participants. The amount of time that participants are likely to give up varies between cultures, and limited time may constrain the choice of methods. Equally, the resources available may also limit this choice. Depending on the power dynamics of the group, methods may need to be employed that equalise power between participants to avoid marginalising the voices of the less powerful. There is evidence that less powerful actors who are marginalised during decision-making can delay or prevent implementation through litigation. 

5. Get a facilitator

Don’t underestimate the power of a good facilitator to bring people together and deliver high quality outcomes. The outcome of any participatory process is far more sensitive to the manner in which it is conducted than the tools that are used. Highly skilled facilitation is particularly important in the uplands, given the high likelihood of dealing with conflict, for example between conservationists and resource users. Different facilitators can use the same tools with radically different outcomes, depending on their skill level. Such skills include technical expertise in the use of different tools. However, it is sometimes the most seemingly simple of methods, such as informal group discussion, which require the greatest expertise. A successful facilitator needs to be perceived as impartial, open to multiple perspectives and approachable. They need to be capable of maintaining positive group dynamics, handling dominating or offensive individuals, encourage participants to question assumptions and re- evaluate entrenched positions, and get the most out of reticent individuals. Such skills are difficult to learn and tend to be developed through years of experience, intuition and empathy. 

6. Put local and scientific knowledge on an equal footing

The need for scientific information and analysis to inform stakeholder deliberation has been identified by many authors as an essential ingredient in any participatory process. It is argued that local stakeholders may be able to learn from scientific sources of knowledge and so make more informed decisions in highly technical decision-making contexts, for example using Citizens’ Juries. Equally, by taking local knowledge into account, researchers may have their assumptions and validity of results questioned, leading to further investigation and a more rigorous understanding of the issues they are investigating. Following from this, cross- fertilisation of ideas between these different sources of knowledge may provide more comprehensive information upon which to base decisions, which may increase their robustness and durability. Having said this, opponents argue that local knowledge may be exaggerated or distorted, and irrelevant to ‘scientific’ nature of much modern environmental management. On this basis, concerns have been expressed that integrating scientific and local knowledge bases will inevitably involve a trade-off between meaningful participation and scientific rigour. However, the same critique can be made of scientific knowledge, which should also not be uncritically accepted without evaluating the uncertainty and associated value judgments in the claims being made. If we consider local and scientific knowledge to be equally valid, it is necessary to subject each to an appropriate level of scrutiny, before considering what exactly may be integrated.

Originally published as:

Reed M.S. 2008. Stakeholder participation for environmental management: A literature review. Biological Conservation 141: 2417–2431.