Valuing Marine Wilderness: Representative Marine Protected Areas and the Perceived Value of Biodiversity Restoration

Abstract

Although the political will to protect areas of the ocean in marine protected areas lagged far behind governments' willingness to protect ecologically or culturally important terrestrial areas, marine protected areas and systems of marine protected areas have emerged into the political agendas of governments throughout the world, including Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United States, and, as of June 2003, the European Union; however, the creation of marine protected areas and systems of marine protected areas requires countries to sacrifice potentially beneficial uses of those areas, such as fishing and mineral extraction. Creation of marine protected areas and systems of marine protected areas thus involve political choices and policy promotion, and a country's choice of legal vehicle and political priorities can suggest implications regarding the eventual scientific and ecological success of its national system of marine protected areas. This paper examines the legal and political rhetoric that three countries—the United States, Canada, and Australia—have used to justify their national systems of marine protected areas and explores the potential ramifications of that rhetoric and the policy choices behind it for the scientific and ecological success of each of their systems. Because each system is relatively new, measurements of success may have to wait for several years; nevertheless, some distinctions are already striking. The United States, for example, is pursuing its national system of marine protected areas based on a non-binding legal policy to promote economic goals, suggesting that the scientific and ecological value of its system will readily fall victim to changing political priorities and economic pressures. Canada, in contrast, has put in place substantial national culture and national pride policies that will serve to reinforce its biodiversity goals for its system of national marine conservation areas. Finally, Australia has committed fully to the protection of marine biodiversity for biodiversity's sake, suggesting that its national system of marine protected areas, as has already been evidenced in the history of the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park, will enjoy considerable scientific validity.