ABSTRACT
Worldwide, ideas about what parks and protected areas1 are and how best to manage them have been completely transformed within the span of most contemporary park managers’ careers. The protection of natural and cultural resources, human heritage, and even entire ecosystems through protected areas is increasingly based on the application of ecological principles. The concept of ecosystem-based management has become broadly accepted and widely implemented over the last 20 years, though with sometimes differing interpretations (Agee and Johnson, 1988; Slocombe, 1993, 1998; Grumbine, 1994, 1997; Wright, 1996). This time period has also seen unprecedented, rapid social and ecological change at a range of scales, from local to global. Results of these changes include human domination of Earth’s terrestrial and coastal ecosystems (Vitousek et al., 1997; Jackson et al., 2001; Millennium Assessment, 2005), anthropogenic climate warming (IPCC, 2001), and, arguably, a single globalized capitalist economy (Friedman, 2005). Considered together, these changes have created a novel state of global vulnerability for the planet’s social and ecological systems (Homer-Dixon, 2001, 2006; Diamond, 2005; Millennium Assessment, 2005).
