How do community-based conservation programs in developing countries change human behaviour? A realist synthesis

An environmental social marketing intervention in cultural heritage tourism: a realist evaluation

“…This mechanism was employed to overcome heritage organisation employees' and site managers' perceived lack of ownership, rights and ability to change things without contribute to the democratization of the workplace" (De Bussy et al, 2003, p.157). These findings also corroborate with some evidence that empowerment has found to be an effective tool for behaviour change in natural heritage locations i.e., programmes connected to ecotourism (Scheyvens, 1999) and conservation (Nilsson et al, 2016). Overall, in the case of the present case study, the use of the empowerment mechanism was concordant with the micro-culture of each site and has heightened the sense of autonomy in the decision-making process.…”

“…The use of this educational mechanisms is aligned with past research that considers knowledge building is important in sustainable tourism (Cole, 2006), thought its results can be mixed and highly dependent on contextual factors (Nilsson et al, 2016). Nieves and Haller (2014) highlighted the role of employee's knowledge in achieving dynamic capabilities in the hotel industry and, specifically, the importance of procedural organisational knowledge "which is linked to more routine processes [to] act as a reference to provide foundations for building learning processes to facilitate the introduction of changes" (Nieves & Haller, 2014, p.227), such as this current paper's environmental social marketing intervention.…”

“…(Pawson & Tilley, 2004, p. 5). While a case for critical realism has been made in the context of tourism research (Platenkamp & Botterill, 2013), the principles of realist evaluation have been only recently and scarcely applied to tourism-related areas such as heritage crime prevention (Grove & Pease, 2014), analysis of travel blogs (Banyai & Havitz, 2013) and community-based programmes (Nilsson, Baxter, Butler & McAlpine, 2016).…”

“…The context includes elements such as interpersonal/social relationships, technology, economic conditions, location, demographics material resources, rules and systems (Pawson & Tilley, 2004). Context is an important aspect in heritage, tourism and sustainability/conservation research (e.g., Chabra, 2009;Wickham & Lehman, 2015) and Adger, Brown, Fairbrass, Jordan, Paavola, Rosendo, & Seyfang (2003) has highlighted the need for context-specific solutions in sustainability and decision-making research, while Nilsson et al (2016) reflected on the numerous aspects of context (e.g., culture, logistics, knowledge/cognitions, time) that influence the outcomes of community-based conservation programmes e.g., natural parks, ecotourism, wildlife protection. Hence, a detailed assessment of the context is critical to the implementation, success and durability of an intervention in the tourism arena.…”

Local perpectives on drivers of deforestation and degradation and effectiveness of financial incentive mechanisms in Bach Ma National Park

“…Financial incentives often do not act on their own in changing human behaviors, but also act in combination with intrinsic motivations. The current paradigm of motivating communities in developing countries to adopt conservation behaviors primarily through monetary incentives and rewards should consider integrating autonomous motivational techniques that promote the intrinsic values of conservation (Nilsson et al 2016). Any conservation programs would be more effective and easy to enforce if local social norms and attitudes favor conservation.…”