Paper long abstract:

In the Cabo de Gata-Níjar Natural Park (Andalucía, Spain) different social groups- notably local farmers and nature-tourism entrepeneurs- seek to legitimise very different sets of practices and visions regarding the land and its use. The conflict between these two groups creates a polarised backdrop against which public discussions on the Natural Park, including its features and future, unfold. Drawing on an ethnographic analysis of the discourses deployed by different actors in this conflict, I show how the dynamic construction of a particular idea of 'the environment' is formed through the dialectical interaction between political agency and environmental perception, itself shaped through human-environment relations.