Conservation Social Science: Understanding and Integrating Human Dimensions to Improve Conservation
Document Type
Article
Journal/Book Title
Biological Conservation
Publisher
Elsevier
Publication Date
11-29-2016
Volume
205
First Page
93
Last Page
108
Abstract
It has long been claimed that a better understanding of human or social dimensions of environmental issues will improve conservation. The social sciences are one important means through which researchers and practitioners can attain that better understanding. Yet, a lack of awareness of the scope and uncertainty about the purpose of the conservation social sciences impedes the conservation community's effective engagement with the human dimensions. This paper examines the scope and purpose of eighteen subfields of classic, interdisciplinary and applied conservation social sciences and articulates ten distinct contributions that the social sciences can make to understanding and improving conservation. In brief, the conservation social sciences can be valuable to conservation for descriptive, diagnostic, disruptive, reflexive, generative, innovative, or instrumental reasons. This review and supporting materials provides a succinct yet comprehensive reference for conservation scientists and practitioners. We contend that the social sciences can help facilitate conservation policies, actions and outcomes that are more legitimate, salient, robust and effective.
Recommended Citation
Bennett, N. J., Roth, R., Klain, S., et al. (2017). Conservation social science: Understanding and integrating human dimensions to improve conservation. Biological Conservation, 205, 93–108. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2016.10.006
