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ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEWS AND CASE STUDIES: Searching the Conditioning Factors Explaining the (In)Effectiveness of Protected Areas Management: A Case Study Using a SWOT Approach

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 January 2014

Corrado Battisti ,
Daniel Franco  and
Luca Luiselli
Corrado Battisti*
Affiliation:
MD, Environmental Service, Province of Rome, Rome, Italy
Daniel Franco
Affiliation:
PhD, Planland Organization, Rome, Italy
Luca Luiselli
Affiliation:
PhD, Center of Environmental Studies, Demetra, Rome, Italy
*
Corrado Battisti, Environmental Service, Province of Rome, via Tiburtina 691, I-00159 Rome, Italy; (phone) +39-06-67663321; (fax) +39-06-67663168; (e-mail) [email protected]
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Abstract

Based on long-term fieldwork, we report a descriptive SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis performed by a public agency that manages a protected area (PA) system in a densely populated area (Rome, central Italy) to highlight the core limits in this PA's management effectiveness. The key result of the analysis is that the limits of the management effectiveness and the obstacle in setting improvement strategies can be basically derived from the hierarchical command-and-control government approach and from the adopted management model. The main hindrance to the implementation of a multilevel collaborative management appears to be the “institutional stickiness” of the managing public agency in shifting from its hierarchical government approach to a governance one. Having observed the presence of operational gaps among the best solutions in the scholarly mainstream, the governing capability of the managing authority, and what happens in the field, we suggest that an answer to aligning these factors could be the creation of more fluid conditions for bottom–up initiatives—for instance, by monitoring the multibenefits of PAs for local communities or by making available to the public the economic evaluation of public goods.

Environmental Practice 15:401–408 (2013)

Type
Features
Information
Environmental Practice , Volume 15 , Issue 4 , December 2013 , pp. 401 - 408
Copyright
Copyright © National Association of Environmental Professionals 2013 

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