Fictitious conservation in Canadian parks and protected areas

Abstract

ABSTRACTSince 1987, sustainable development has become popular in Canada. During this same time, capitalism has shifted from post-Fordist to financialization regimes for capital accumulation. Using data from environmental non-government organization websites, think tank reports, government websites, media stories and consultant papers from 2009 to 2016, we examine how neoliberal conservation practices have evolved to include fictitious commodities (e.g. biodiversity credits and protected in situ resources used by ecotourism) and financialization tactics (e.g. speculative financing, and derivatives and futures trading). These tactics suggest conservation practice in Canada is changing to reflect a monetization of nature that divorces conservation from specific places, allowing capital to produce more capital without the need for actual conservation. The more Canadian parks and protected areas adopt financialization, the less sustainable they will be.