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Relational values reflect the qualities of the relationships between humans and nature, such as care, social bonding, place attachment and spiritual meanings. In this perspective article, we argue that understanding relational values is vital for nature conservation, and we identify how incorporation of these values may function as leverage points for achieving more effective nature policy. We discuss the distinctive features of the concept of relational values and elaborate how relational values strongly influence people's perceptions of, engagement with and action for nature. Relational values can also provide important deep leverage points for policy interventions aiming to support citizen's contribution to nature conservation, to strengthen biodiversity policy and the relationship between people and nature. Based on three realms of leverage (re-think, re-structure and re-connect), we distinguish six routes through which relational values can be integrated in policies and practices of nature conservation: (1) incorporation of pluralized meanings of nature; (2) the uptake of relational language in policy discourse; (3) a prioritization of landscape-based policy; (4) empowering citizens in nature conservation; (5) re-orienting nature education to stimulate people's personal bond with nature; and (6) using digital technology to stimulate new relationships with nature.

Although forest devolution, as a type of decentralization, is a high priority in the policy agendas of developing countries, recentralization has also occurred. In this paper, we focus on emerging recentralization within the devolution process of Collective Forest Tenure Reform (CFTR) in China’s southern provinces and conceptualize this process as “recentralized forest devolution.” In this paper, we update a key framework for analyzing decentralization and recentralization in governance processes based on the “policy arrangement approach.” Case studies were conducted in four counties of the Fujian and Yunnan provinces by tracing governance dynamics from 2001 to 2019. Our study found that the central government has tightened upward accountability and recentralized power for environmental conservation since 2012 under the discourse of “Ecological Civilization.” At the local level, recentralized forest devolution was expressed in terms of the restricted timber harvest levels for the purposes of environmental conservation. Therefore, forest devolution could be more vulnerable than expected by researchers and potentially interwoven with recentralization processes. Discourses, actors, property rights, and power are, therefore, considered to be interwoven in the complex dynamics of decentralization and recentralization.

Natural resource-related conflicts can be extremely destructive and undermine environmental protection. Since the 1990 s co-management schemes, whereby the management of resources is shared by public and/or private sector stakeholders, have been a main strategy for reducing these conflicts worldwide. Despite initial high hopes, in recent years co-management has been perceived as falling short of expectations. However, systematic assessments of its role in conflict prevention or mitigation are non-existent. Interviews with 584 residents from ten protected areas in Colombia revealed that co-management can be successful in reducing conflict at grassroots level, as long as some critical enabling conditions, such as effective participation in the co-management process, are fulfilled not only on paper but also by praxis. We hope these findings will re-incentivize global efforts to make co-management work in protected areas and other common pool resource contexts, such as fisheries, agriculture, forestry and water management.

This article focuses on the interactions between multi-level decision-making centers – local, national, international – in migratory species conservation in Suriname. Such multilevel interactions are crucial for transboundary conservation practices, but they have been researched very little by the scientific community so far, and not on Suriname at all. Moreover, although multi-level decision-making may differ per situation, it always poses governance and management challenges. To understand these, two Suriname case studies are analyzed in-depth: migratory shorebirds in the Bigi Pan Multiple Use Management Area and marine turtles in the Galibi Nature Reserve. A polycentric governance framework is used as an analytical lens, while a qualitative case study methodology is applied. The results of the analysis show that polycentric structures for the conservation of migratory species are currently only moderately in place and heavily dependent on donor finance. Yet, such vertical interactions are crucial for building connections – particularly among international NGOs, national governments and local communities – to achieve effective and legitimate conservation outcomes, irrespective of the presence or absence of donors. This paper, therefore, draws the following three key lessons for polycentric conservation efforts in the global South: (1) structural funding and alternative sources of income to donor money are crucial for transboundary conservation, (2) effective cooperation will require robust institution-building for enduring collective action, particularly at the local level, and (3) decision-making centers at all levels should be truly committed to a social-ecological approach of conservation, since a sole focus on biodiversity will not lead to legitimate results.

Any present day approach of the world’s most pressing environmental problems involves both scale and governance issues. After all, current local events might have long-term global consequences (the scale issue) and solving complex environmental problems requires policy makers to think and govern beyond generally used time-space scales (the governance issue). To an increasing extent, the various scientists in these fields have used concepts like social-ecological systems, hierarchies, scales and levels to understand and explain the “complex cross-scale dynamics” of issues like climate change. A large part of this work manifests a realist paradigm: the scales and levels, either in ecological processes or in governance systems, are considered as “real”. However, various scholars question this position and claim that scales and levels are continuously (re)constructed in the interfaces of science, society, politics and nature. Some of these critics even prefer to adopt a non-scalar approach, doing away with notions such as hierarchy, scale and level. Here we take another route, however. We try to overcome the realist-constructionist dualism by advocating a dialogue between them on the basis of exchanging and reflecting on different knowledge claims in transdisciplinary arenas. We describe two important developments, one in the ecological scaling literature and the other in the governance literature, which we consider to provide a basis for such a dialogue. We will argue that scale issues, governance practices as well as their mutual interdependencies should be considered as human constructs, although dialectically related to nature’s materiality, and therefore as contested processes, requiring intensive and continuous dialogue and cooperation among natural scientists, social scientists, policy makers and citizens alike. They also require critical reflection on scientists’ roles and on academic practices in general. Acknowledging knowledge claims provides a common ground and point of departure for such cooperation, something we think is not yet sufficiently happening, but which is essential in addressing today’s environmental problems.

During the last few decades, both policy practices and policy idioms have drastically changed. Concepts such as interactive planning, network management, stakeholder dialogue, deliberative democracy, policy discourses, governance, etc. have replaced older ones such as public administration, policy programmes, interest groups, institutions, power, and the like. Although we recognise the relevance and importance of this shift in vocabulary, we also regret related 'losses'. We particularly regret that the concept of power has - in our view - become an 'endangered species' in the field of public policy analysis. We therefore will develop a framework to analyse power - being a multi-layered concept - in policy practices in this article. We will do so on the basis of the so-called policy arrangement approach, which combines elements of the old and new policy vocabularies. In addition, we draw upon different power theories in developing our argument and model. As a result, we hope to combine the best of two worlds, of the 'old' and the 'new' idioms in policy studies, and to achieve our two aims: to bring back in the concept of power in current policy analysis and to expand the policy arrangement approach from a power perspective.

There is broad consensus that policymakers must work with indigenous peoples and local communities (IPLCs) to protect biodiversity and carbon stocks in the remaining tropical forests. However, the success of community forest magement initiatives around the world has been mixed. Collaboration between policymakers and IPLCs requires a nuanced understanding of the socio-economic and cultural realities, motivations, and long-term conservation needs of IPLCs. In this study, we examine the factors that influence the interl rulemaking in forest communities for the sustaible magement of their forests. We collected social and ecological data from 57 local communities located in the tropical peatland forests of the Pastaza Marañon Foreland Basin in northern Peru—an area of global importance for its carbon storage and biodiversity. These communities are engaged in harvesting M. flexuosa palm fruit (locally called aguaje). This practice often involves the cutting of palms, which contributes to the increasing degradation of peatland forests. Using chi-squared alysis, we found that the commercialization of forest resources by community members predicts the presence of rules in communities. Resource scarcity is not associated with the existence of restrictive rules. In addition, we found that the adoption of rules by a community strongly associated with its participation in a community of practice (COP). In the context of sustaible forest magement, COPs are networks that link IPLCs with exterl forest professiols for mutual learning and practical assistance. They must be horizontal partnerships that ensure equitable participation and mutual respect. While IPLCs have an invaluable traditiol ecological knowledge (TEK) about their forest, their remote locations often prevent them from accessing innovative magement solutions or scientific knowledge about the broader landscape-level status of the forest and its species, such as regeneration capacity and population size. Trusted partners can play a critical role in facilitating dialogue about sustaible forest magement, reassuring communities about the implementation of restrictive rules, providing tangible visions of viable and sustaible altertives, and offering practical support.

Community forest management (CFM) has become an influential approach in the sustainable use, management, and conservation of forests worldwide. It ranges from community-based self-governance of local village forests to co-management approaches with state forest agencies in public forests. However, analyses show complex relationships between states and communities in CFM. At least three ideal types can be identified. The first refers to local communities that collectively decide to manage surrounding forests themselves due to a lack of state involvement. As a manager of the public good, such absence of the state may easily lead to deforestation and forest degradation that such communities wish to avoid. A second type refers to the co-management approaches of local communities and state forest agencies. Here, forest officials and community members cooperate in managing local forests. A final type refers to indigenous communities with strong customary forest institutions whose territorial claims are recognized by the state. While communities always need specific institutions, knowledge, and tenure rights in place to make CFM perform, each ideal type presupposes various degrees of state capacity and state autonomy. The article concludes that weak states (to some degree) and strong communities (of a certain kind) may indeed form a “convincing liaison” in CFM, although it is not the only arrangement that may produce (some) positive social and environmental impacts on the ground, as the cases explored illustrate.

Reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation in developing countries (REDD+) has opened up a new global discussion on forest monitoring and carbon accounting in developing countries. We analyze and compare the extent to which the concept of measurement, reporting, and verification (MRV) for REDD+ has become institutionalized in terms of new policy discourses, actors, resources, and rules in Indonesia, Peru, and Tanzania. To do so, we draw on discursive institutionalism and the policy arrangement approach. A qualitative scale that distinguishes between “shallow” institutionalization on the one end, and “deep” institutionalization on the other, is developed to structure the analysis and comparison. Results show that in all countries MRV has become institutionalized in new or revised aims, scope, and strategies for forest monitoring, and development of new agencies and mobilization of new actors and resources. New legislations to anchor forest monitoring in law and procedures to institutionalize the roles of the various agencies are being developed. Nevertheless, the extent to which MRV has been institutionalized varies across countries, with Indonesia experiencing “deep” institutionalization, Peru “shallow-intermediate” institutionalization, and Tanzania “intermediate-deep” institutionalization. We explore possible reasons for and consequences of differences in extent of institutionalization of MRV across countries.

Deforestation is a widely recognized problem in the Brazilian Amazon. Small farmers play a key role in this process in that they earn their livelihood by ranching and farming. Many studies have addressed the link between deforestation and livelihood strategies adopted by small farmers. Most have focused on advanced monitoring systems, simulation models, and GIS approaches to analyze the interaction of both dimensions, i.e., livelihoods and forest cover change. Although the current toolbox of methods has proved successful in increasing our understanding of these interactions, the models and approaches employed do not consider small farmers’ perspectives. On the assumption that local small farmers are agents of land-cover change, understanding how they perceive their own situation is essential to elucidate their actions. Our objective is to explore future changes in livelihood security and environmental sustainability as envisaged by local small farmers in the Brazilian Amazon. Previous livelihood cluster analysis of small farmers located in southeast Pará was integrated with fuzzy cognitive mapping to determine present perceptions and to explore future changes, using global scenarios downscaled to the local situation. Overall, system description differs only on details; all results indicate a strong trade-off between livelihood security and environmental sustainability in all livelihood systems, as identified by the small farmers. However, fundamentally different outcomes are obtained from the future analysis, depending on the livelihood strategy cluster. Achieving win-win outcomes does not necessarily imply a positive scenario, especially if small farmers are dependent on income transfers from the government to provide their livelihood.