Are National Parks Inherently Unequal? The 2006 French Park Reform and its Initial Implementation in Mainland France

Abstract

ABSTRACT:In France, like in other parts of the world, environmental-protection policies appear to have taken note of local resistance driven by the eviction of populations and restrictions on their use of certain areas. The amendment to the law on French national parks (2006 reform) as such recognized that local populations can help to protect natural environments, as well as their right to participate in defining the charter (or spatial plan) of new parks. This article analyses the creation and local acceptance of the Calanques National Park, a peri-urban park and the first of a new generation of parks in mainland France. Our approach is based on the analytical framework of environmental effort. Using a qualitative corpus of semi-structured interviews and direct observation, we explore three analytical axes. We begin by analyzing the consultation process conducted during the creation of the park. This points up inequalities in access to the public sphere and underscores that only a few, wellendowed user-organizations truly helped define the "good use" of the Calanques that became a reference in the park's charter. Then we examine how such unequal user participation impacted the wording used in the charter and the distribution of environmental effort demanded of different users. Lastly, the first two observations lead us to question the acceptability of the effort required and its division among users, particularly since the consultation process has been strongly criticized. We question how fairly the effort required by the park's creation was distributed, particularly given the lack of information and limited legitimacy afforded to the consultation process. Finally, we look at the blaming that has taken place amongst different users of the park -a process compounded for many of those interviewed by their fear of being deprived (unjustifiably, they felt) of their freedom to access nature. RESUMO:Na França, como em outras partes do mundo, políticas de proteção ao meio ambiente parecem ter notado a resistência local impulsionada pela expulsão de populações e restrições sobre o uso de determinadas áreas. A alteração na lei sobre parques nacionais franceses (Reforma de 2006) reconheceu que as populações locais podem ajudar a proteger ambientes naturais, bem como o seu direito de participar na definição da escritura (ou plano espacial) de novos parques. Este artigo analisa a criação e a aceitação local do Parque Nacional de Calanques, um parque periurbano e o primeiro de uma nova geração de parques na França continental. A nossa abordagem baseia-se no quadro analítico do esforço ambiental. Usando um corpus qualitativo de entrevistas semiestruturadas e observação direta, exploramos três eixos analíticos. Começamos por analisar o processo de consulta realizado durante a criação do parque. Isto aponta as desigualdades de acesso à esfera pública e ressalta que apenas algumas organizações de usuários dotadas de recursos realmente ajudaram a definir o "bom uso" de Calanques, o que se tornou uma referência na Escritura do ...

Perceived Social Impacts of Protected Areas, Their Influence on Local Public Support and Their Distribution across Social Groups: Evidence from the Eifel National Park, Germany, during the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…Overall, our study revealed that many local people perceive an unequal distribution of costs and benefits between, on the one hand, visitors and residents, and, on the other hand, among different sub-sets of the local community. This represents a social equity issue that may also need managing in order to maintain local public support the park, and which has been reported across many PA sites in both the global north and global south [61][62][63][64]. Negative impacts of overcrowding and disturbance were reported in qualitative data to particularly affect certain 'hotspot' areas, such as particular villages, concentrations of restaurants and access routes, and that benefits and costs within the park were very location-dependent.…”