Changing Perspectives in Biodiversity Management

Management of biodiversity takes into consideration the plurality of knowledge systems. Application of scientific research and local knowledge contributes both to the equity, opportunity, security and empowerment of local communities as well as sustainability of the natural resources. Top-down fortress conservation has been the preferred conservation strategy and practice for much of the twentieth century. From the 1970s onwards, the top-down preservationist management approach had to be supplanted by a more bottom-up, inclusive and participatory sustainable-use narrative. Bioregionalism, global environmental governance and the establishment of Trans-frontier conservation areas surpass the nation-state as the ultimate organizational unit and regard international boundaries as 'unnatural.' All these aim at Integrative conservation. 'Hijacked conservation,' an outcome of the recent international emphasis on security, paradoxically has led to a re-emphasis on borders, making the implementation of trans-frontier and bioregional conservation approaches strikingly more difficult. To realize future management objectives it is then truly necessary that new strategies and policies incorporate these dynamics and adopt the fusion of several different approaches.