National Park Declassification in Mexico: Between Propaganda, Legitimisation and Bargaining

Abstract

This article analyses the discursive, participative, and negotiation practices in the territorialised public action that occurred during the category change of the Nevado de Toluca Protected Area in Mexico—i.e. the declassification from a high conservation status to a more flexible one. We use a sociological approach for the analysis of the three public policy instruments, namely discourse, participatory mechanisms, and negotiation agreements, implemented by the Mexican government to accompany this change. The analysis reveals how the government instrumentalised this declassification in order to construct an environmental problem to legitimise public intervention and neutralise existing conflicts around specific scientific and democratic controversies. As a result, despite the use of supposedly more democratic and participatory instruments, Mexican conservation policies remain rooted in top-down approaches.