Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dsjbd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-29T17:06:44.684Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Commodification of natural resources and forest ecosystem services: examining implications for forest protection

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 November 2016

HELEN KOPNINA
HELEN KOPNINA*
Affiliation:
Leiden University, Anthropology Department, Wassenaarseweg 52 2333 AK Leiden, The Netherlands The Hague University of Applied Science, International Business Management Studies, Johanna Westerdijkplein 75, 2521 EN Den Haag, The Netherlands
*
*Correspondence: Dr. Helen Kopnina e-mail [email protected]; [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Summary

Through the commodification of nature, the framing of the environment as a ‘natural resource’ or ‘ecosystem service’ has become increasingly prominent in international environmental governance. The economic capture approach is promoted by international organizations such as the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) through Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD), Payments for Ecosystem Services (PES) and The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB). This paper will inquire as to how forest protection is related to issues of social and ecological justice, exploring whether forest exploitation based on the top-down managerial model fosters an unequitable distribution of resources. Both top-down and community-based approaches to forest protection will be critically examined and a more inclusive ethical framework to forest protection will be offered. The findings of this examination indicate the need for a renewed focus on existing examples of good practice in addressing both social and ecological need, as well as the necessity to address the less comfortable problem of where compromise appears less possible. The conclusion argues for the need to consider ecological justice as an important aspect of more socially orientated environmental justice for forest protection.

Keywords

agroforestrycommodificationcommunity-based conservationecological justiceecosystem servicesPESREDDTEEB
Type
Papers
Information
Environmental Conservation , Volume 44 , Issue 1: Thematic section: Forest Ecosystem Services , March 2017 , pp. 24 - 33
Copyright
Copyright © Foundation for Environmental Conservation 2016 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anderson, E. N. (2012) Tales best told out of school: traditional life-skills education meets modern science education. In: Anthropology of Environmental Education, ed. Kopnina, H., pp. 12–24. New York, NY: Nova Science Publishers.Google Scholar
Balee, W. (1994) Footprints in the Forest: Ka'apor Ethnobotany – the Historical Ecology of Plant Utilization by an Amazonian People. New York, NY: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Ban, N. C., Mills, M., Tam, J., Hicks, C. C., Klain, S., Stoeckl, N. et al. (2013) A social–ecological approach to conservation planning: embedding social considerations. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 11 (4): 194–202.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baxter, B. (2005) A Theory of Ecological Justice. New York, NY: Routledge.Google Scholar
Beymer-Farris, B. A. & Bassett, T. J. (2012) The REDD menace: resurgent protectionism in Tanzania's mangrove forests. Global Environmental Change – Human and Policy Dimensions 22 (2): 332–341.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bose, P., Arts, B. & van Dijk, H. (2012) ‘Forest governmentality’: a genealogy of subject-making of forest-dependent ‘scheduled tribes’ in India. Land Use Policy 29 (3): 664–673.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brockington, D. (2002) Fortress Conservation. The Preservation of the Mkomazi Game Reserve. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Brosius, P. (1999) Green dots, pink hearts: displacing politics from the Malaysian rain forest. American Anthropologist 101 (1): 36–57.Google Scholar
Brown, D., Schreckenberg, K., Bird, N., Cerutti, P., Del Gatto, F., Diaw, C., et al. (2008) Legal Timber. Verification and Governance in the Forestry Sector. London, UK: Overseas Development Institute.Google Scholar
Brown, M. (2009) Science in Democracy: Expertise, Institutions, and Representation. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Büscher, B. (2015) “Rhino poaching is out of control!” Violence, heroes and the politics of hysteria in online conservation. Paper presentation at British International Studies Association. 16–19 June, London, UK.Google Scholar
Büscher, B. & Fletcher, R. (2014) Conservation by accumulation. New Political Economy 19 (1): 1–26.Google Scholar
Cafaro, P. (2015) Three ways to think about the sixth mass extinction. Biological Conservation 192: 387–393.Google Scholar
Cafaro, P. & Primack, R. (2014) Species Extinction is a Great Moral Wrong: Sharing the Earth with other species is an important human responsibility. Biological Conservation 170: 1–2.Google Scholar
Caine, K. J. (2013) Bourdieu in the north: practical understanding in natural resource governance. Canadian Journal of Sociology/Cahiers Canadiens de Sociologie 38 (3): 333.Google Scholar
Crist, E. (2012) Abundant earth and population. In: Life on the Brink: Environmentalists confront Overpopulation, eds. Cafaro, P. & Crist, E., pp. 141–153. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press.Google Scholar
Crist, E. (2015) I walk in the world to love it. In: Protecting the Wild: Parks and Wilderness, The Foundation for Conservation, eds. Wuerthner, G., Crist, E. & Butler, T., pp. 82–95. Washington, DC, and London, UK: The Island Press.Google Scholar
Crist, E. & Kopnina, H. (2014) Unsettling anthropocentrism. Dialectical Anthropology 38: 387–396.Google Scholar
Daily, G. C., Polasky, S., Goldstein, J., Kareiva, P. M., Mooney, H. A., Pejchar, L, et al. (2009) Ecosystem services in decision making: time to deliver. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 7: 21–28.Google Scholar
Doak, D. F., Bakker, V. J., Goldstein, B. E. & Hale, B. (2015) What is the future of conservation? In: Protecting the Wild: Parks and Wilderness, The Foundation for Conservation eds., Wuerthner, G., Crist, E. & Butler, T., pp. 27–35. Washington, DC, and London, UK: The Island Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duffy, R. (2014) Waging a war to save biodiversity: the rise of militarised conservation. International Affairs 90 (4): 819–834.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duffy, R., Emslie, R. H. & Knight, M. H. (2013) Rhino poaching: how do we respond? Evidence on Demand, UK [www document]. URL http://www.evidenceondemand.info/rhino-poaching-how-do-we-respond Google Scholar
Duffy, R., St John, F. A. V., Büscher, B. & Brockington, D. (2015) The militarization of anti-poaching: undermining long term goals? Environmental Conservation 42 (4): 345–348.Google Scholar
Easterly, W. (2006) The White Man's Burden: Why the West's Efforts to Aid the Rest Have Done So Much Ill and So Little Good. New York, NY: The Penguin Group, Inc.Google Scholar
Elliott, J. (2013) An Introduction to Sustainable Development, London, UK: Routledge.Google Scholar
Engel, S., Pagiola, S. & Wunder, S. (2008) Designing payments for environmental services in theory and practice: an overview of the issues. Ecological Economics 65: 663–674.Google Scholar
Escobar, A. (1996) Constructing nature: elements for a post-structuralist political ecology. In: Liberation Ecologies, eds. Peet, R. & Watts, M., pp. 46–68. London, UK: Routledge.Google Scholar
Escobar, A. (2006) Difference and conflict in the struggle over natural resources: a political ecology framework. Development 49 (3): 6–13.Google Scholar
Fennell, D. A. (2008) Ecotourism and the myth of indigenous stewardship. Journal of Sustainable Tourism 16 (2): 129–149.Google Scholar
Fortmann, L. (2005) What we need is a community Bambi: the perils and possibilities of powerful symbols. In: Communities and Conservation: Histories and Politics of Community-Based Natural Resource Management, eds., Brosius, P. J., Tsing, A. L. & Zerner, C., pp. 195–205. Walnut Creek, CA: Alta Mira Press.Google Scholar
Fraser, J., Frausin, V. & Jarvis, A. (2015) An intergenerational transmission of sustainability? Ancestral habitus and food production in a traditional agro-ecosystem of the Upper Guinea Forest, West Africa. Global Environmental Change 31: 226–238.Google Scholar
FSC (2015) ForCES (Forest Certification for Ecosystem Services). Indonesia [www document]. URL http://forces.fsc.org/indonesia.26.htm Google Scholar
German, L., Karsenty, A. & Tiani, A.-M. (eds.) (2010) Governing Africa's Forests in a Globalized World. London, UK: Earthscan.Google Scholar
Gómez-Baggethun, E. & Ruiz-Pérez, M. (2011) Economic valuation and the commodification of ecosystem services. Progress in Physical Geography 35: 617–632.Google Scholar
Goodall, J. (2015) Caring for people and valuing forests in Africa. In: Protecting the Wild: Parks and Wilderness, The Foundation for Conservation, eds. Wuerthner, G., Crist, E. & Butler, T., pp. 21–26. Washington, DC, and London, UK: The Island Press.Google Scholar
Guha, R. & Alier, J. M. (2013) Varieties of Environmentalism: Essays North and South. London, UK: Routledge.Google Scholar
Harvey, C. A., Chacón, M., Donatti, C. I., Garen, E., Hannah, L., Andrade, A. et al. (2013) Climate-smart landscapes: opportunities and challenges for integrating adaptation and mitigation in tropical agriculture. Conservation Letters 7 (2): 77–90.Google Scholar
Henley, D. (2011) Swidden farming as an agent of environmental change: ecological myth and historical reality in Indonesia. Environment and History 17: 525–554.Google Scholar
Hiedanpaa, J. & Bromley, D. W. (2014) Payments for ecosystem services: durable habits, dubious nudges, and doubtful efficacy. Journal of Institutional Economics 10 (2): 175–195.Google Scholar
Hoffman, U. (ed.) (2013) Trade and environment review 2013: wake up before its too late – make agriculture truly sustainable now for food security in a changing climate [www document]. URL http://unctad.org/en/PublicationsLibrary/ditcted2012d3_en.pdf Google Scholar
Igoe, J. & Brockington, D. (2007) Neoliberal conservation: a brief introduction. Conservation and Society 5 (4): 432–449.Google Scholar
Jax, K., Barton, D. N., Chan, K. M., de Groot, R., Doyle, U., Eser, U. et al. (2013) Ecosystem services and ethics. Ecological Economics 93: 260–268.Google Scholar
Kareiva, P. & Marvier, M. (2007) Conservation for the people. Scientific American 297: 50–57.Google Scholar
Kidner, D. (2014) Why ‘anthropocentrism’ is not anthropocentric. Dialectical Anthropology 38: 465–480.Google Scholar
Klooster, D. (2010) Standardizing sustainable development?: the Forest Stewardship Council's plantation policy review process as neoliberal environmental governance. Geoforum 41: 117–129.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kopnina, H. (2012a) Towards conservational anthropology: addressing anthropocentric bias in anthropology. Dialectical Anthropology 36 (1): 127–146.Google Scholar
Kopnina, H. (2012b) Education for sustainable development (ESD): the turn away from ‘environment’ in environmental education? Environmental Education Research 18: 699–717.Google Scholar
Kopnina, H. (2016a) Half the earth for people (or more)? Addressing ethical questions in conservation. Biological Conservation 203: 176–185.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kopnina, H. (2016b) Wild animals and justice: the case of the dead elephant in the room. Journal of International Wildlife Law & Policy 19 (3): 219–235.Google Scholar
Lansing, S. (1991) Priests and Programmers: Technologies of Power in the Engineered Landscape of Bali. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Li, T. M. (2007) Practices of assemblage and community forest management. Economy and Society 36 (2): 263–293.Google Scholar
Marvier, M. (2014) A call for ecumenical conservation. Animal Conservation 17 (6): 518–519.Google Scholar
Mehta, L., Leach, M. & Scoones, I. (2001) Editorial: environmental governance in an uncertain world. IDS Bulletin 32 (4): 1–9.Google Scholar
Miller, B., Soulé, M. E. & Terborgh, J. (2014) ‘New conservation’ or surrender to development? Animal Conservation 17 (6): 509–515.Google Scholar
Milne, S. & Adams, W. (2012) Market masquerades: uncovering the politics of community-level Payments for Environmental Services in Cambodia. Development and Change 43 (1): 133–158.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neef, A. (2015) Sustainable rural development and livelihoods. In: Sustainability: Key Issues, eds. Kopnina, H. & Shoreman-Ouimet, E., pp. 315–322. London, UK: Routledge.Google Scholar
Peterson, D. (2013) Talking about bushmeat. In: Ignoring Nature No More: The Case for Compassionate Conservation, ed. Bekoff, M., pp. 64–76. Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press.Google Scholar
Poiani, K. A., Goldman, R. L., Hobson, J., Hoekstra, J. M. & Nelson, K. S. (2011) Redesigning biodiversity conservation projects for climate change: examples from the field. Biodiversity and Conservation 20 (1): 185–201.Google Scholar
Quan, J., Naess, L. O., Newsham, A., Sitoe, A., & Fernandez, M. C. (2014) Carbon forestry and climate compatible development in Mozambique: a political economy analysis [www document]. URL http://www.ids.ac.uk/publication/carbon-forestry-and-climate-compatible-development-in-mozambique-a-political-economy-analysis Google Scholar
Rolston, H. (2016) Environmental ethics and environmental anthropology. In: Handbook of Environmental Anthropology, pp. 276–287. New York, NY: Routledge.Google Scholar
Schroth, G. & Harvey, C. A. (2007) Biodiversity conservation in cocoa production landscapes: an overview. Biodiversity and Conservation 16 (8): 2237–2244.Google Scholar
Shoreman-Ouimet, E. & Kopnina, H. (2015) Reconciling ecological and social justice to promote biodiversity conservation. Biological Conservation 184: 320–326.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shoreman-Ouimet, E. & Kopnina, H. (2016) Conservation and Culture: Beyond Anthropocentrism. New York, NY: Routledge Earthscan.Google Scholar
Sinclair, A. R. E. (2014) Serengeti Story: Life and Science in the World's Greatest Wildlife Region. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Sinclair, A. R. E. (2015) Protected areas are necessary for conservation. In: Protecting the Wild: Parks and Wilderness, The Foundation for Conservation, eds. Wuerthner, G., Crist, E. & Butler, T., pp. 72–81. Washington, DC: The Island Press.Google Scholar
Sivaramakrishnan, K. (1999) Modern Forests. Statemaking and Environmental Change in Colonial Eastern India. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Smith, D. J. (2007) A Culture of Corruption: Everyday Deception and Popular Discontent in Nigeria. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Sponsel, L. (2014) Human impact on biodiversity: overview. In: Encyclopedia of Biodiversity, ed. Levin, S. A., pp. 137–152. Waltham, MA: Academic Press.Google Scholar
Strang, V. (2016) Justice for all: inconvenient truths – and reconciliation – in human–non-human relations. In: Handbook of Environmental Anthropology, eds. Kopnina, H. & Shoreman-Ouimet, E., pp. 259–279. New York, NY: Routledge.Google Scholar
Sullivan, S. (2009) Green capitalism and the cultural poverty of constructing nature as service provider. Radical Anthropology 3: 18–27.Google Scholar
Sutton, S. G. & Tobin, R. C. (2009) Recreational fishers’ attitudes towards the 2004 rezoning of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park. Environmental Conservation 36, 245–252.Google Scholar
TEEB (2010) The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity: Ecological and Economic Foundations, ed. Kumar, P.. London, UK: Earthscan.Google Scholar
Temudo, M. P. (2012) “The white men bought the forests”: conservation and contestation in Guinea-Bissau, Western Africa. Conservation Society 10: 354–366.Google Scholar
Terborgh, J. (2015) Foreword. In: Protecting the Wild: Parks and Wilderness, The Foundation for Conservation, eds. Wuerthner, G., Crist, E. & Butler, T., pp. xi–viii. Washington, DC, and London, UK: The Island Press.Google Scholar
The World Bank (2013) Regional Forest Law Enforcement and Governance (FLEG) initiatives [www document]. URL http://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/forests/brief/fleg-regional-forest-law-enforcement-governance Google Scholar
UNEP (2008) Payments for Ecosystem Services: Getting started [www document]. URL http://www.unep.org/pdf/PaymentsForEcosystemServices_en.pdf Google Scholar
UN-REDD (2015) UN-REDD programme [www document]. URL http://www.un-redd.org/Home/tabid/565/Default.aspx Google Scholar
Vayda, A. P. & Walters, B. (1999) Against political ecology. Human Ecology 27 (1): 167–179.Google Scholar
Vira, B. (2015) Taking natural limits seriously: implications for development studies and the environment. Development and Change 46: 762–776.Google Scholar
von Hellermann, P. (2007) Things fall apart? Management, environment and Taungya Farming in Edo State, Southern Nigeria. Africa 77 (3): 371–392.Google Scholar
von Hellermann, P. (2016) ‘Good governance’, corruption, and forest protection: critical insights from environmental anthropology. In: The Routledge Handbook of Environmental Anthropology, eds. Kopnina, H. & Shoreman-Ouimet, E., pp. 302–315. London, UK: Routledge.Google Scholar
Vucetich, J., Bruskotter, J. & Nelson, M. (2015) Evaluating whether nature's intrinsic value is an axiom of or anathema to conservation. Conservation Biology 29: 321–332.Google Scholar
WCED (1987) Brundtland Report. Our Common Future. World Commission on Environment and Development. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
West, P. (2006) Translation, value, and space: theorizing an ethnographic and engaged environmental anthropology. American Anthropologist 107 (4): 632–642.Google Scholar
West, P. & Brockington, D. (2012) Introduction: capitalism and the environment. Environment and Society: Advances in Research, 3 (1): 1–3.CrossRefGoogle Scholar