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Human–wildlife conflict (HWC) presents a growing challenge to conservation and development worldwide. World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and experts on human–wildlife coexistence strategies have responded to this challenge by developing a holistic, globally applicable approach to HWC management that can be tailored to specific local, regional, or national contexts. Its framework addresses the complexity of essential HWC management and long‐term coexistence strategies and is implemented in a structured yet contextualized step‐by‐step sequence by a team of facilitators and multiple stakeholders. The C2C: Conflict to Coexistence Approach centers on four principles (tolerance is maintained, responsibility is shared, resilience is built, holism is fundamental), four outcomes (wildlife thrives alongside human presence, habitat sufficient to maintain viable wildlife populations, people able and willing to live alongside wildlife, livelihoods/assets secured against presence of wildlife), and six HWC management elements (policy and governance, understanding interactions, prevention, response, mitigation, monitoring) that are to be implemented in an integrated way. It is currently undergoing testing in diverse pilot sites across three continents and demonstrating positive initial results. Here, we share the framework and methodology of the approach and initial results and experiences from these pilot sites. We introduce the C2C:Conflict to Coexistence Approach, with its holistic and integrated framework and globally applicable methodology for the management of human–wildlife conflict (HWC) that can be tailored to specific local, regional, or national contexts. Its framework addresses the complexity of essential HWC management and long‐term coexistence strategies and is implemented in a structured yet contextualized step‐by‐step sequence by a team of process facilitators involving multiple stakeholders. The video summary is uploaded to our website on human‐wildlife conflict, which can be found here: Human Wildlife Conflict

While the importance of conserving ecosystems for sustainable development is widely recognized, it is increasingly evident that despite delivering global benefits, conservation often comes at local cost. Protected areas funded by multilateral lenders have explicit commitments to ensure that those negatively affected are adequately compensated. We make the first comparison of the magnitude and distribution of the local costs of a protected area with the magnitude and distribution of the compensation provided under the World Bank social safeguard policies (Performance Standard 5). In the Ankeniheny-Zahamena Corridor (a new protected area and REDD+ pilot project in eastern Madagascar), we used choice experiments to estimate local opportunity costs ( = 453) which we annualized using a range of conservative assumptions concerning discount rates. Detailed surveys covering farm inputs and outputs as well as off-farm income ( = 102) allowed us to explore these opportunity costs as a proportion of local incomes. Intensive review of publically available documents provided estimates of the number of households that received safeguard compensation and the amount spent per household. We carried out a contingent valuation exercise with beneficiaries of this compensation two years after the micro-development projects were implemented ( = 62) to estimate their value as perceived by beneficiaries. Conservation restrictions result in very significant costs to forest communities. The median net present value of the opportunity cost across households in all sites was US$2,375. When annualized, these costs represent 27-84% of total annual income for median-income households; significantly higher proportionally for poorer households. Although some households have received compensation, we conservatively estimate that more than 50% of eligible households (3,020 households) have not. Given the magnitude of compensation (based both on amount spent and valuation by recipients two years after the compensation was distributed) relative to costs, we argue that no one was fully compensated. Achieving full compensation will require an order of magnitude more than was spent but we suggest that this should be affordable given the global value of forest conservation. By analyzing in unprecedented depth both the local costs of conservation, and the compensation distributed under donor policies, we demonstrate that despite well-intentioned policies, some of the poorest people on the planet are still bearing the cost of forest conservation. Unless significant extra funding is provided by the global beneficiaries of conservation, donors' social safeguarding requirements will not be met, and forest conservation in developing countries will jeopardize, rather than contribute to, sustainable development goals.

This article analyses the World Bank’s environmental and social Safeguards against the backdrop of changing paradigms of global legal order. In January 2017, a new ‘Environmental and Social Framework’ (ESF) entered into force and replaced older ‘Safeguard Policies’ that had incrementally emerged since the 1980s in response to harmful impacts of investment projects financed by the Bank. The Safeguards reform epitomizes the changing structures and geopolitical shifts that shape international law in the twenty-first century and provides a fascinating looking glass on the evolution of global order since the end of the cold war. In this perspective, we see the first generation of Safeguards, introduced since the late 1980s, as an element of incremental legalization in the emerging global governance regime, a regime characterized by unipolar multilateralism and geopolitical dominance of ‘the West’. The 2016 reform not only reflects the increased politicization of global governance by civil society but also the emergence of a more competitive multilateralism, characterized by counter-institutionalization on the part of emerging powers like China. A comparison of the old and new Safeguards thus allows us to analyse different forms of contestation and resulting normative evolution in the key area of global governance of development and finance.

Multilateral Development Banks (hereinafter MDBs) have evolved from avoiding non-economic considerations, as required in most of their charters, to officially supporting sustainable development. This transformation is due not only to international law, civil society pressure or internal adjustments, but in part to the emulation phenomenon between the international effort for sustainable development made by international conferences and commissions and the sustainable development effort by MDBs. The paper first examines this emulation phenomenon and its strong impact on MDB creation of substantive instruments – the environmental and social safeguards – and of procedural instruments – the accountability mechanisms – for the integration of sustainable development. Following this discussion, the second part points out that MDBs’ environmental and social safeguards still differ substantially, revealing a fragmentation in MDBs’ normative understanding of sustainable development. After presenting the arguments supporting this fragmentation, the last part of the paper argues in favor of the harmonization of MDBs’ environmental and social safeguards, resulting in the creation of a common law of sustainable development, the promotion of international law and the facilitation of investments.

Social and environmental safeguards are now commonplace in policies and procedures that apply to certain kinds of foreign investment in developing countries. Prominent amongst these is the principle of free, prior and informed consent (FPIC), which is commonly tied to policies and procedures relating to investments that have an impact on ‘indigenous peoples’. This paper treats international safeguards as a possible manifestation of what Karl Polanyi called the ‘double movement’ in the operation of a capitalist market economy. Our concern here is with the way that the FPIC principle has been applied in struggles over the alienation of land and associated natural resources claimed by indigenous peoples or customary landowners in three developing countries—Cambodia, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. Case studies of recent land struggles in these countries are used to illustrate the existence of a spectrum in which the application of the FPIC principle may contribute more or less to the defence of customary rights. On one hand, it may be little more than a kind of ‘performance’ that simply adds some extra value to a newly created commodity. On the other hand, it may sometimes enable local or indigenous communities and their allies in ‘civil society’ to mount an effective defence of their rights in opposition to the processes of alienation or commodification. The paper finds that all three countries have political regimes and national policy frameworks that are themselves resistant to the imposition of social and environmental safeguards by foreign investors or international financial institutions. However, they differ widely in the extent to which they make institutional space for the FPIC principle to become the site of a genuine double movement of the kind that Polanyi envisaged.

Balancing agendas for climate mitigation and environmental justice continues to be one of the key challenges in climate change governance mechanisms, such as Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+). In this paper we apply the three-dimensional environmental justice framework as a lens to examine the REDD+ process in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic (Laos) and the REDD+ social safeguards. We focus particularly on challenges to justice faced by marginalized communities living in forest frontier areas under an authoritarian regime. Drawing on policy analysis and open-ended interviews across different policy levels, we explore procedural, distributional, and recognitional justice across the REDD+ policy levels in Laos. We find that REDD+ social safeguards have been applied by both donors and state actors in ways that facilitate external control. We underscore how authoritarian regime control over civil society and ethnic minority groups thwarts justice. We also highlight how this political culture and lack of inclusiveness are used by donors and project managers to implement their projects with little political debate. Further obstacles to justice relate to limitations inherent in the REDD+ instrument, including tight schedules for dealing with highly sensitive socio-political issues under social safeguards. These findings echo other research but go further in questioning the adequacy of safeguards to promote justice under a nationally driven REDD+. We highlight the importance of recognition and political context, including aspects such as power relations, self-determination and self-governance of traditional or customary structures, in shaping justice outcomes.

Removal of 99 TcO 4 − from legacy defense nuclear tank waste at Savannah River Site is highly desirable for the purpose of nuclear safety and environmental protection, but currently not achievable given the extreme conditions including high alkalinity, high ionic strength, and strong radiation field. Herein, we present a potential solution to this long-term issue by developing a two-dimensional cationic metal organic framework SCU-103, showing ultrahigh stability in alkaline aqueous media and great resistance to both β and γ radiation. More importantly, it is very effective for 99 TcO 4 − separation from aqueous media as demonstrated by fast exchange kinetics, high sorption capacity, and superior selectivity, leading to the successful removal of 99 TcO 4 − from actual Savannah River Site high level tank waste for the first time, to the best of our knowledge. In addition, the uptake mechanism is comprehensively elucidated by molecular dynamics simulation and density functional theory calculation, showing a unique chemical recognition of anions with low charge density. Separation of 99 TcO 4 − from nuclear waste at the Savannah River Site is hampered by the extreme conditions. Here, the authors propose a solution by developing an alkaline-resistant metal organic framework material featuring unique recognition sites for selective incorporation of 99 TcO 4 − anions.

In a follow-up to our 2021 scoping review of the quantitative literature on the impacts of economic recessions on mental health, this scoping review summarizes qualitative research to develop a descriptive understanding of the key factors that transmute the socioeconomic stressors of a recession into poorer mental health. The previous study identified 22 qualitative studies from 2008 to 2020, which were updated with search results from six databases for articles published between 2020 and 2021. After inclusion and exclusion criteria were applied to the total 335 identified studies, 13 articles were included. These were peer-reviewed, qualitative studies in developed economies, published from 2008 to 2021, and available online in English. Participants perceived that financial hardship and unemployment during recessions increased stress and led to feelings of shame, loss of structure and identity, and a perceived lack of control, which increased interpersonal conflict, social isolation, maladaptive coping, depression, self-harm, and suicidal behavior. Participants struggled with accessing health and social services and suggested reforms to improve the navigation and efficiency of services and to reduce the perceived harms of austerity measures. Providers should screen for mental distress and familiarize themselves with health and social resources in their community to help patients navigate these complex systems. Policy makers should be aware of the potential protective nature of unemployment safeguards and consider other low-cost measures to bolster mental health supports and informal social networks. Research in this area was limited. Further research would be beneficial given the impacts of the ongoing COVID-19 recession.

Reducing carbon emissions through avoided deforestation and forest degradation and enhancement of carbon stocks (REDD+) is key to mitigating global climate change. The aim of REDD+ social safeguards is to ensure that REDD+ does not harm, and actually benefits, local people. To be eligible for results-based compensation through REDD+, countries should develop national-level safeguard information systems to monitor and report on the impacts of REDD+. Although safeguards represent a key step for promoting social responsibility in REDD+, they are challenging to operationalize and monitor. We analyzed the impacts of different types of REDD+ interventions (incentives vs. disincentives) on key safeguard-relevant indicators, i.e., tenure security, participation, and subjective well-being, as well as on reported forest clearing. We used household-level data collected in Brazil, Peru, Cameroon, Tanzania, Indonesia, and Vietnam from approximately 4000 households in 130 villages at two points in time (2010-2012 and 2013-2014). Our findings highlight a decrease in perceived tenure security and overall perceived well-being over time for households exposed to disincentives alone, with the addition of incentives helping to alleviate negative effects on well-being. In Brazil, although disincentives were associated with reduced reported forest clearing by smallholders, they were the intervention that most negatively affected perceived well-being, highlighting a clear trade-off between carbon and noncarbon benefits. Globally, although households exposed to REDD+ interventions were generally aware of local REDD+ initiatives, meaningful participation in initiative design and implementation lagged behind. Our analysis contributes to a relatively small literature that seeks to operationalize REDD+ social safeguards empirically and to evaluate the impacts of REDD+ interventions on local people and forests.

There is a sense of urgency in emerging market and developing countries in general, and Latin America in particular, for international development banks to generate a pipeline of infrastructure projects in order to reboot lagging economies and to meet broader sustainable development goals. In meeting those goals, it is important to also ensure that such efforts are socially inclusive and environmentally sustainable. To draw lessons for this new wave of development finance, this article conducts a comparative analysis of social and environmental safeguards across international development banks. We find a significant divergence in safeguard policy across development banks operating in the region, with Western-backed development banks requiring that borrowers harmonize to developed country standards to others such as China's and Brazil's banks deferring to host country standards. On the basis of this research, we develop a framework that allows analysts to better empirically examine the impact of different safeguard regimes on environment, social, and development outcomes.