"The White Men Bought the Forests"

Conservation and Contestation in Guinea-Bissau, Western Africa

Bibliographic Data

ID14954331
AuthorsM P Temudo (0000-0002-8254-4233, corresponding author), MarinaPadrão Temudo
Year2012
Volume10
Issue4
Pages354
Publication date2012-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueConservation and Society (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0972-4923 • E-ISSN: 0975-3133
PublisherMedknow (PUBLISHER • IN)
DOI10.4103/0972-4923.105563
OpenAlexW2013966650
LanguageEN
Citations received20
References cited28

Both fortress and community-based approaches to conservation have shown poor (sometimes negative) results in terms of environmental protection and poverty reduction. Either approach can also trigger grassroots resistance. This article is centered on an allegedly 'community-based' conservation and development project (and its successive follow-ups) intended to create a national park in Guinea-Bissau. It discusses how external agents have constructed the need for intervention, and explores the negative consequences of the practical solutions adopted for a non-existing problem, as well as the on-going shifting and multiple responses of local people. The article aims to demonstrate that supposedly community-based approaches can be as authoritarian and ineffective as fortress conservation, and that resistance generated by them can be fruitless in terms of collective empowerment and welfare, while also being harmful for the environment. The only genuine winner is the aid industry

Authoritarianism · Democracy · Development economics · Economic growth · Economics · Empowerment · Environmental planning · Fortress (chess · Geography · Grassroots · Intervention (counseling · Political economy · Political science · Politics · Poverty · Resistance (ecology · Sociology · Agriculture, Land Use, Rural Development · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management · History · Law · Ecology

Tools

Open DOIOpen Access