The Importance of People, Institutions, and Resources in Large-Scale Conservation

Abstract

Large-scale conservation in the common interest requires that people beclear about the nature of the problems they face, the utility of thetheory or assumptions they employ, and the features of the situationthey try to manage. This chapter introduces ideas and language forrealistically conceptualizing problems in large-scale conservation, andit presents a framework for making sense of the human as well asbiophysical dimensions in natural resource management. Three types ofproblems are described-technical (ordinary), governance (political), andconstitutive (cultural); too often in large-scale conservationgovernance and constitutive problems are overlooked, misconstrued, orinadequately heeded. Large-scale conservation also requires integratinginformation into a rational, yet practical, framework for decisionmaking. The framework presented here to understand and carry out theintegration task can be most simply stated as ``humans seek valuesthrough institutions using and affecting resources.{''} These four vitalelements of management and policy making-humans, values, institutions,and resources-all of which are open for empirical, systematic study, aredescribed. Skillful application of this three-level problem typology andframework can enable practitioners to analyze the full suite of problemsand develop realistic solutions.