Abstract
Rural communities are taking active roles in conservation. However, the basic modes and content of community participatory approach are seldom summarised or reflected on in China, leaving the use of terms confused and their links to practice disconnected. By reviewing the literature, we traced back to the protected area-community relations from the perspective of features of rural communities, namely knowledge accumulation, social bond, collective actions, and risk-aversion, and reflected on changing roles of community conservation through recognition of these features. Combining case studies and our own research experience, we focused on the de facto practices behind the somewhat casual use of several terms and re-classified community participation in conservation to three modes of community participatory management, community co-management, and community dominant management, along a continuum in which, from low to high level, conservation is more a means rather than an end for the community to be empowered for their own resource management. We argued that the success of community participation must ensure stable and flexible land tenure so that the right to benefit can be guaranteed, and the collective action in managing resources can be achieved by empowerment. In practice, further institutional changes of improvement in the legislation and optimisation in benefit sharing and compensation are needed to promote community participation in a broader social participation context.
Highlights
The role of the community in conservation is gaining growing concern in the global conservation cause [1]
Within the 50 articles, about 20% focused on the theories and general progress of the community-involved conservation, and 80% were case studies to practices of the eight different names focusing on multiple aspects of community participation, including planning, incentive mechanism, limiting factors, etc., as well as some comparative studies
Community participation in conservation is well discussed in the global conservation context, but a summary of its modes adaptive to the Chinese context is yet to come, or at least not systematically presented
Summary
The role of the community in conservation is gaining growing concern in the global conservation cause [1]. The second is regulating resource use through a self-disciplined way by social norms and regulations. It is not compulsory, and dynamic in a changing social context so the effect may be unstable and limited. The third one is an integrated conservation approach that considers natural resource use as part of conservation, and the community an essential power in conservation activities. The former two approaches can be integrated to the third to maximize conservation effects with the least damage to communities’ benefit. This viewpoint expands the view of conservation as an end to conservation as a means for a sustainable and fair natural resource use and benefit sharing from empowering the community
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