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- Convenors:
-
Peter Simonič
(Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana)
Peter Meurkens (Radboud University Nijmegen)
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- Discussant:
-
Javier Escalera Reyes
(Pablo de Olavide University)
- Format:
- Workshops
- Location:
- 0.5
- Sessions:
- Thursday 28 August, -, -
Time zone: Europe/Ljubljana
Short Abstract:
Natural protected areas today represent 12% of the world's surface and are increasing. The question is: who controls them and how are they being managed? Are protected areas a solution for ecological imbalance or are they another kind of (post)colonial enterprise and nationalisation of space?
Long Abstract:
More than 12% of the world's surface was designated as protected natural areas during the 20th century. In the Middle Ages, special preserves were the province of nobles. In the 19th century, protected areas derived from national mythologies and territorial divisions; outside Europe the same idea was connected with colonial enterprise and control of resources. Later, ecological and biological arguments came to the forefront, especially after the 1992 Rio de Janeiro declaration on protection of nature in situ. The European Union incorporated these values in the Nature 2000 programme.
We can conclude that the natural sciences and managers of protected areas today control this 12% of the planet's surface, protecting mainly its biological diversity. Inhabitants of "diversity islands" are presumably a matter of other interests (social, economic, cultural, etc.) and therefore attract little (natural, scientific) attention. Moreover, they can easily become victims of political and economic superstructures, which may in fact be connected with opinion makers from the natural sciences, the keepers of natural wealth and diversity.
Protected areas around the world lack anthropological attention, even though they offer excellent examples of ambivalent and contested interpretations and power relations in smaller and larger social contexts.
Inhabitants of this 12%, consisting mainly of rural areas, ¬cannot be seen only as another resource (economic point of view) or as a threat to the environment (biological point of view). Territorial redefinition should be accompanied by analyses of local (ecological) knowledge, social networks and ideologies, economic histories and migrations, in national and international frameworks.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Thursday 28 August, 2008, -Paper short abstract:
This paper examines the processes of patrimonialisation of nature in a Spanish protected area – the Gredos Mountains – and how the declaration by the regional government of Castile-León of the area of Gredos as a park in 1996 has affected social actors and their interests.
Paper long abstract:
The Gredos range (Sierra de Gredos in Spanish), which includes both alpine and Mediterranean ecosystems, is one of the most biologically interesting areas of Western Europe. There have been various unsuccessful initiatives to have the area of the Gredos Mountains declared a National Park. On 20 June 1996 the regional parliament of Castile-León, one of the seventeen autonomous regions which make up Spain, declared that part of the mountain range under their jurisdiction to be a Regional Park. When previously informed of the proposal to declare Gredos a park, the reaction of the majority of the inhabitants of the villages to be included in the area of the park had not been favourable. The mayors of the affected towns had signed a declaration in which they stated that the plan for the park 'ignores many aspects of the socio-economic reality of our villages . . . with a total lack of information and participation on the part of the distinct sectors directly affected by the project'. What the mayors were expressing was the fear of many local people that, if the mountains were to become a protected area, 'all the sierra would be only for the wolves', as a number of them put it, in detriment to cattle-raising and agriculture. This paper examines the processes of patrimonialisation of nature in a Spanish protected area and how these changes affect social actors and their interests.
Paper short abstract:
The ambivalence of "national" versus "local" in Triglav national park (Slovenia) will be presented in two contexts, related to the issue of preserving the traditional agricultural landscape and to the one of preserving hunting as a traditional spatial praxis.
Paper long abstract:
The paper will highlight some of the contested issues regarding cultural and natural heritage preservation in the case of Trenta valley in the Triglav national park (Slovenia) - the largest, the oldest, and the most important protected area in Slovenia. The institutionalization of the only Slovenian national park has been obviously grounded on the conception of its role of the instrument for preserving heritage of great importance for the national community and the newly born nation-state. Looking discursively, the institutionalization of the TNP was partly based on the Slovenian Alpine "mythology" and idealization of the Alpine "way of live". Under the veil of unquestionable concept of national heritage, this idealization is implicitly present also in many contemporary scientific and political debates about the new law of the TNP that is to be adopted in Slovenia. These "national" conceptions are rarely confronted to the heritage as seen from the point of view of people that are existentially tied to the landscape being "nationalized". In the case of Trenta local community, the notion of heritage is being constantly renegotiated, and in many cases opposed to the heritage as conceived by diverse national institutions. The ambivalence of "national" versus "local" point of view will be presented in two contexts, related to the issue of preserving the traditional agricultural landscape and to the one of preserving hunting as a traditional spatial praxis par excellence. The interpretation of these examples will be based on ethnographic fieldwork data collected over last five years in the region.
Paper short abstract:
One of the greatest changes in cross-border Balkans Peace Park is the status of the actual regions: three years ago only Albania was an independent country, Montenegro and Kosovo were still a part of Yugoslavia. A report on the tremendous progress made on the project.
Paper long abstract:
As a contributor, five years ago, to the book, Ethnography of Protected Areas, this report follows the tremendous progress made in the interim on the cross-border Balkans Peace Park Project (BPPP) on the single mountain range, known as The Forbidden (or Accursed) Mountains which straddle the borders of Albania, Kosovo and Montenegro.
Probably one of the greatest changes in these years is the status of the actual regions, such that we are now working with three sovereign countries, whereas only three years ago only Albania was an independent country, Montenegro and Kosovo were still a part of Yugoslavia.
BPPP works with people and authorities at all levels, individuals in the region, NGOs, INGOs, municipalities, national governments and foreign government donors. The most recent development was the successful hosting by the Shkodra Qark (regional body for northern Albania) of representatives from all the above mentioned stakeholders.
Paper short abstract:
Using ethnographic and ethnobotanical data from research in two Portuguese natural protected areas this paper discusses the political aims of biodiversity and cultural preservation in rural contexts that face social and economical changes.
Paper long abstract:
The study of social and economic change and the consequent landscape transformation in Parque Natural de Montesinho and Parque Natural de Douro Internacional (in the Northeast of Portugal) allows us to discuss the ambivalent relation between the political aims of biodiversity preservation and social reality in protected rural areas.
Ethnographic research of plants uses and nature discourses together with an analysis of social differentiation (in terms of age, gender and schooling) of ethnobotanical knowledge show us the dynamic way local people combine traditional and orally transmitted knowledge with popular or then scientific exogenous ecological knowledge, especially that learned from the media and books.
This data allows us to reflect also about the way local culture in the context of protected areas is transformed into heritage.
Paper short abstract:
Il s’agit de contribuer à la réflexion sur la nature territoriale des espaces protégés, à partir de l’exemple des parcs naturels français. Mon hypothèse est que la question de la durée et de la temporalité est centrale dans les dynamiques conflictuelles que connaissent les parcs nationaux.
Paper long abstract:
Au contraire des domaines tropicaux, l’analyse des espaces protégés comme imposition d’une forme de domination sur des territoires existants est quasi absente de l’horizon des recherches sur le domaine européen.
L’invention des parcs nationaux français constitue un cas intéressant, dans la mesure où ses acteurs revendiquent souvent une conception « culturelle » de la nature. Pourtant, en France comme ailleurs, les institutions parcs n’ont pas réussi à résoudre leurs difficultés « d’acceptation » locale.
L’on peut faire l’hypothèse que les conflits à l’œuvre dans les espaces protégés soulèvent une problématique de la temporalité. Par des médiations multiples, les Parcs instaurent autoritairement un mode de rapport au temps qui se confronte aux temporalités particulières des habitants et usagers. Les sciences sociales peuvent se donner comme tâche d’explorer l’expérience différenciée de ce qui est « durée » et « durable » dans les territoires « de nature ».
A titre d’exemple, j’observerai quelques éléments de la pratique territoriale du Parc national des Cévennes, qui permettent d’interroger la temporalité mise en place par l’institution, ainsi que les résistances qui lui sont opposées.
Enfin, un retour sur la création des espaces protégés français permet de constater combien cette pluralité des temporalités est présente dans la confrontation des différents projets qui ont donné naissance à ces territoires. Cette matrice historique des parcs français, en particulier la période 1950-1970, donne un éclairage supplémentaire au problème de l’articulation entre territorialité et temporalité, en jeu dans les espaces protégés.