Conservation at a Crossroads

Lecture slidesThursday January 4, 2013

"Wilderness is a dark and dismal place where all manner of wild beasts dash about uncooked."

Development of the Conservation Movement

• 1872: World’s First National Park- Yellowstone

• Late 1800’s: increased interest in wilderness recreation

• Debate between conservationists and preservationists

Conservationists– Proper use of nature

Preservationists– Protection of nature from use

Conservation vs. Preservation

1838 – 19141859-1919

Rachel Carson

Silent Spring published 1962

Cuyahoga River, near Cleveland, Ohio 1969

Golden Era of EV Legislation

• Wilderness Act - 1964• National Environmental Policy Act- NEPA 1969• Clean Air Act- 1970• Clean Water Act- 1972• Endangered Species Act - 1973

1990: Owls vs. Jobs

2000: The Anthropocene

MA: 2005

2005: Death of Environmentalism

“Modern environmentalism is no longer capable of dealing with the world’s most serious ecological crisis.”

What are the objectives of conservation?

Where do we target future investments?

“We should preserve every scrap of biodiversity as priceless while we learn to use it and come to understand what it means to humanity.”E.O. Wilson

“New conservation should seek to enhance those natural systems that benefit the widest number of people, especially the poor. Instead of trying to restore remote iconic landscapes to pre-European conditions, conservation will measure its achievement in large part by its relevance to people, including city dwellers. Nature could be a garden — not a carefully manicured and rigid one, but a tangle of species and wildness amidst lands used for food production, mineral extraction, and urban life.” Peter Kareiva

First order vs. Second order environmental problems

Questions of Conservation Today

• What is “nature”?• How should it be valued or protected?• How do we balance needs of humans and the

natural world?• What metrics do we use to guide decision-

making?• How do we allocate limited resources and

address tradeoffs?• What does success look like?

Defining Goals:

• Protect the rights of other species• Protect charismatic megafauna• Slow the rate of extinctions• Protect genetic diversity• Define and defend biodiversity• Maximize ecosystem services• Protect the spiritual and aesthetic experience of

nature

– From Rambunctious Garden, Emma Marris