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López de la Lama, Rocío María

University of British Columbia

The global biodiversity crisis needs innovative and flexible strategies for nature conservation. Privately protected areas (PPAs) offer a potential avenue for citizen participation in conservation efforts but fulfilling their potential depends on a deeper understanding of the underlying reasons for establishing PPAs and the challenges faced by landowners. This dissertation follows a structural and individual perspective to understand the governance context surrounding PPAs and the diverse and meaningful relationships that landowners have with nature, humans, and more-than-human beings that they seek to protect through the PPA. The focus is primarily on Peru, where PPAs have proliferated across the country despite limited governmental support and multiple structural challenges. This research involves an extensive review of legal frameworks governing PPAs in South American countries, followed by 32 semi-structured interviews with landowners who own and manage a PPA in Peru. Chapter 2 provides an overview of the legal frameworks recognizing PPAs in South America. Here I found that a disparity exists between low government support for PPAs and high commitment expected of landowners. Chapter 3 challenges the common perception that PPAs are established by wealthy and foreign landowners, revealing that local people are the main implementers. These landowners hold diverse intrinsic, instrumental, and relational values that underlie their commitment to voluntary conservation initiatives. Chapter 4 showcases that landowners implement multiple stewardship practices within their PPAs as a relational act of care and love for the land. Through these practices, landowners deepen their relationships with the land they seek to protect and restore, perceiving multiple personal, social, and environmental outcomes throughout the process. However, Chapter 5 uncovers a high degree of tenure insecurity among landowners, which directly impacts the long-term sustainability of these initiatives. This last empirical chapter underscores the need for robust legal frameworks concerning property rights, strengthening institutional capacity, and recognition of both formal and informal tenure systems to ensure the effectiveness of PPAs.

Text

2023-10-12

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International

http://hdl.handle.net/2429/86144

Resources, Environment and Sustainability

University of British Columbia

UBCV

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/