Justice and conservation: The need to incorporate recognition

Abstract

In light of the Aichi target to manage protected areas equitably by 2020, we ask how the conservation sector should define justice. We focus in particular on ‘recognition’, because it is the least well understood aspect of environmental justice, and yet highly relevant to conservation because of its concern with respect for local knowledge and cultures. In order to explore the meaning of recognition in the conservation context, we take four main steps. First, we identify four components of recognition to serve as our analytical framework: subjects of justice, the harms that constitute injustice, the mechanisms that produce injustices, and the responses to alleviate these. Secondly, we apply this framework to explore four traditions of thinking about recognition: Hegelian inter-subjectivity, critical theory, southern decolonial theory, and the capabilities approach. Thirdly, we provide three case studies of conservation conflicts highlighting how different theoretical perspectives are illustrated in the claims and practices of real world conservation struggles. Fourthly, we finish the paper by drawing out some key differences between traditions of thinking, but also important areas of convergence. The convergences provide a basis for concluding that conservation should look beyond a distributive model of justice to incorporate concerns for social recognition, including careful attention to ways to pursue equality of status for local conservation stakeholders. This will require reflection on working practices and looking at forms of intercultural engagement that, for example, respect alternative ways of relating to nature and biodiversity

The science and politics of human well-being: a case study in cocreating indicators for Puget Sound restoration

“…Early theories in the United States focused on distributing risks equitably across social groups that often received disproportionate impacts based on their social class or race (Schlosberg 2013, Martin et al 2016). More recently, environmental justice frameworks have become increasingly pluralistic, as represented in Amartya Sen's (1999) foundational work on capabilities.…”

“…The project placed substantial effort in inviting individuals representing a wide range of values, including Native Americans, conservationists, agricultural interests, economic developers, and members of the political Tea Party movement, among others. Taking each of these local perspectives into consideration was not simply to ensure the fair distribution of benefits and consequences, but also to recognize and include the individuals in the moral and political community (Schlosberg 2007, Martin et al 2016. A second way that social justice can be affected is through the final selection of indicators.…”

Transforming Justice in REDD+ through a Politics of Difference Approach

“…While there is an emerging body of scholarship calling for more explicit consideration of the recognitional dimensions of justice in environmental governance [27,40], much of the current literature on justice and REDD+ focuses primarily on distributive and procedural justice [41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51]. Additionally, there is limited (although growing) engagement among scholars and practitioners on how to practically engage recognitional justice in institutional designs [52,53].…”

“…Schlosberg [25] later added a fourth dimension, capabilities, reflecting influences from Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum, to identify the importance of possessing the freedoms to realize one's aspirations [27]. Thus, even in cases where distributive, procedural, and recognitional justice concerns are attended to, if the subjects of justice-the rights-holders-do not have the capabilities to benefit from or participate in environmental governance initiatives, then injustices may persist.…”

Forest, water and people: The roles and limits of mediation in transforming watershed conflict in Northern Thailand

“…interpersonal) but also include the institutional and structural level. Additionally, as Martin et al (2016) suggest, part of improving recognition in conservation is to also ensure equitable engagement and influence over decision-making, for example by integrating local actors and their ways of knowing, valuing and managing resources in conservation management. Bush and Folger (1994;1995) highlight the importance of 'empowerment', defined as improving the capability of the conflict parties to handle and make better decisions on their conflict problems, as an important condition for conflict transformation.…”