Increasing human pressure threatens plant and animal species with extinction worldwide. National political institutions constitute an important arena for biodiversity conservation. Yet, the relationship between how democratic these national institutions are and a country's efforts towards and track-record for biodiversity conservation remains poorly understood. In this review, we outline the theoretical links between democracy and biodiversity conservation and review the empirical literature testing them. While more studies reported a positive than a negative relation between democracy and biodiversity conservation (15 vs. 11), the most common result was a mixed relationship (28), often conditioned on economic factors. The use of different proxies to measure biodiversity, including deforestation, protected areas, threatened species, and fishery statistics emerged as a primary obstacle for synthesis. We suggest overcoming this caveat together with a consistent definition of democratic institutions and a standardized statistical framework as research priorities to improve policies against the global biodiversity loss.
Aim Geo‐referenced species occurrence records are a prime example of biodiversity data and a cornerstone of biodiversity research. Yet, their availability depends on non‐biological factors, including the political framework in the region of collection. Here we present Bio‐Dem (http://www.bio-dem.surge.sh), an open‐source software to explore the relationship between the availability of species occurrence records and the political framework in countries worldwide and through time. Location Global. Taxon Any. Methods Bio‐Dem accesses the number of occurrence records available from countries worldwide from the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (http://www.gbif.org) and socio‐political information from these countries from the Varieties of Democracy database (http://www.v-dem.net) as well as information on colonial history from the Issue Correlates of War Project. Results Bio‐Dem is available as a free graphical user interface web application at http://www.bio-dem.surge.sh. Through three interactive graphs, Bio‐Dem enables users to explore the relationship between species occurrence records and countries’ regime type, freedom of movement, freedom of association, gross domestic product, education length, political corruption, armed conflict and colonial history. We describe possible links of these specific political indicators with the collection and mobilization of biodiversity data. Illustrative examples and video tutorials explaining the use of Bio‐Dem are available at http://www.bio-dem.surge.sh. Main conclusions Bio‐Dem provides a user‐friendly way to explore the link between socio‐political variables and the availability of species occurrence records in user‐selected taxa and geographic regions, and to generate hypotheses on their connection. We envision Bio‐Dem as a useful tool for teachers communicating the caveats of available biodiversity data, for biodiversity scientists exploring potential spatial and temporal bias in their data, and for social scientists exploring the impact of political systems on scientific data collection and biodiversity conservation.
Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem)is a new approach to conceptualization and measurement of democracy. The headquarters -the V-Dem Institute -is based at the University of Gothenburg with 19 staff. The project includes a worldwide team with six Principal Investigators, 14 Project Managers, 30 Regional Managers, 170 Country Coordinators, Research Assistants, and 3,000 Country Experts. The V-Dem project is one of the largest ever social science research-oriented data collection programs.Please address comments and/or queries for information to: V-Dem Institute AbstractNational governments are the main actors responsible for mapping and protecting their biodiversity, but countries differ in their capacity, willingness, and effectiveness to do so. We quantify the global biodiversity managed by different regime types and developed a tool to explore the links between level of democracy and other key socio-economic variables with the number of natural history specimens registered within country boundaries. Using this tool, distinct and previously unknown patterns emerge around the world, that urge for increased collaboration between the natural and social sciences to further explore these patterns and their underlying processes.
18National governments are the main actors responsible for mapping and protecting their 19 biodiversity, but countries differ in their capacity, willingness, and effectiveness to do so. We 20 quantify the global biodiversity managed by different regime types and developed a tool to 21 explore the links between level of democracy and other key socio-economic variables with the 22 number of natural history specimens registered within country boundaries. Using this tool, 23 distinct and previously unknown patterns emerge around the world, that urge for increased 24 collaboration between the natural and social sciences to further explore these patterns and 25 their underlying processes. 26 28 85 the exploration of how regime change, as well as armed conflict, affect the availability of 86 primary biodiversity data. Taking Cambodia as an example, we find a decrease of new 87 biodiversity data records by two orders of magnitude in the 1970s, coinciding with the 88 beginning of a period of conflicts and autocratization (Fig. 2c). The end of this period 89 and the corresponding increase in the level of democracy led to a sudden increase in data 90 availability. Similarly, in India political turmoil and a related decrease in the level of 91 democracy in 1975 and 1976 led to an abrupt decrease in the availability of biodiversity data 92 from national institutions (Fig. 2d). Despite historical turmoil and a minor recent decline 93 in the level of democracy, Cambodia and India mirror most other countries in exhibiting a 94 general increase in biodiversity data, probably attributable to the widespread use of citizen 95 science applications for mobile phones such as iNaturalist. 96 The relationships between political differences, socio-economic variables and biodiversity 97 knowledge are multi-faceted. 1 These links are also likely to be multi-directional. Increasing 98 societal concerns for environmental protection are likely to affect political processes and the 99 gathering of biodiversity data. In general, a causal interpretation of the observed patterns 100 is difficult, due to indirect or unclear mechanisms, and the large number of potentially 101 confounding factors. 1 The Bio-Dem app and its underlying data sources provide a useful 102 platform for research at a global and regional scale and over time. We hope it will foster 103 increased collaborations between biologists, conservationists and political and other social 104 scientists. 15 105 Material and Methods 106 Commented scripts for all analyses are available in the electronic supplement of this article 107 and the source code of the Bio-Dem app is available at https://github.com/Antonelli 108 Lab/Bio-Dem under a MIT license.109We used two datasets of species geographic distributions to estimate the fraction of 110 species covered by regime type. For amphibians, non-marine birds and mammals, we used 111 112 of Nature (www.iucn.org) together with country borders as provided by Naturalearth 113 (www.naturalearth.org) to estimate the range-weighted species endemi...
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