Preventing perverse outcomes from global protected area policy. Shifting the focus from quantity to quality to avoid perverse outcomes.
1
School of Natural Resources and Environmental Management, University of Hawaii at Manoa, MANOA, HI, United States
2
WWF-US, Washington DC, Washington DC, United States
3
Luc Hoffmann Institute, WWF-International, Gland, Switzerland
4
ARC Coral Reef Centre of Excellence, James Cook University of North Queensland, Townsville, Queensland, Australia
- Published
- Accepted
- Subject Areas
- Science Policy, Environmental Impacts
- Keywords
- Convention on Biological Diversity, conservation psychology, conservation policy, impact evaluation, Sustainable Development Goals, parks
- Copyright
- © 2018 Barnes et al.
- Licence
- This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ Preprints) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
- Cite this article
- 2018. Preventing perverse outcomes from global protected area policy. Shifting the focus from quantity to quality to avoid perverse outcomes. PeerJ Preprints 6:e26486v1 https://doi.org/10.7287/peerj.preprints.26486v1
Abstract
Aichi Target 11 focuses on protected areas. While it has galvanized expansion of the global protected area (PA) network, we highlight a lack of evidence that enlarging systems of PAs alone is associated with real biodiversity gains. We examine how prioritizing more area risks unintended perverse consequences. We consider the incentives underpinning this misguided focus on PA extent and suggest a new paradigm for PA target development: shifting the focus from quantity to quality to achieve improved biodiversity outcomes.
Author Comment
This is a preprint submission to PeerJ preprints. It is currently under review for publication.