Local Understandings of Conservation in Southeastern Mexico and Their Implications for Community‐Based Conservation as an Alternative Paradigm

Abstract

Since the 1990s national and international programs have aimed to legitimize local conservation initiatives that might provide an alternative to the formal systems of state-managed or otherwise externally driven protected areas. We used discourse analysis (130 semistructured interviews with key informants) and descriptive statistics (679 surveys) to compare local perceptions of and experiences with state-driven versus community-driven conservation initiatives. We conducted our research in 6 communities in southeastern Mexico. Formalization of local conservation initiatives did not seem to be based on local knowledge and practices. Although interviewees thought community-based initiatives generated less conflict than state-managed conservation initiatives, the community-based initiatives conformed to the biodiversity conservation paradigm that emphasizes restricted use of and access to resources. This restrictive approach to community-based conservation in Mexico, promoted through state and international conservation organizations, increased the area of protected land and had local support but was not built on locally relevant and multifunctional landscapes, a model that community-based conservation is assumed to advance.

From Paper to Forest: Local Motives for Participation in Different Conservation Initiatives. Case Studies in Southeastern Mexico

“…This result can be interpreted in various ways: it is possible that the road that has been forged on strategies to promote participation in conservation has brought about a profound change an awareness that will become effective in the future, and that this also make the people, even those that consider themselves excluded at present, visualize opportunities for their future participation in these new strategies. But it is also possible that this ''interest'' reflects an argument that has been seeded in certain groups within the communities in an attempt to become involved in conservation (Reyes-Garcia et al 2013), without necessarily leading to real participation.…”

Meanings, drivers, and motivations for community-based conservation in Latin America

“…The potentially negative impacts of such formalization on communities' decision-making power have also been observed in India, where the integration of sacred groves into national protected area systems seems to have weakened community members' traditional influence in resource management (Dudley et al 2009). Similarly, the imposition of external conservation rules was found to weaken traditional management, social norms, and taboos in Madagascar (Jones et al 2008) and to ignore local knowledge and practices in Mexico (Reyes-Garcia et al 2013). …”

“…For example, initiatives promoting ecotourism, safari hunting, participatory forest management, and the sale of nontimber forest products can lead to the commodification of nature by community members and can exacerbate existing socioeconomic inequalities (King andStewart 1996, Marshall et al 2006). More recently, the trend toward the monetization of ecosystem services has also generated problems leading local people to change their original idea of sustainable use of natural resources to another idea that uncritically supports the "fortress conservation" paradigm (Reyes-Garcia et al 2013). This is also generating new ecological and distributional conflicts at the local level (Corbera et al 2009).…”

Development of Slow Tourism Challenge and Operation Architecture: A Case Study on Green Island, Taiwan

“…Second, the slow tourism materials derived from local knowledge systems are regarded as the medium to promote slow tourism. The combination with local knowledge systems is a key success factor in the development of sustainable tourism (Reyes-Garcia et al 2013). The value of utilizing local knowledge lies in constructing local cultural identification and creating unique slow tourism elements locally.…”