ABSTRACT
The ecocultural landscape of the Iraqi marshlands has the potential to be a major tourist destination (as suggested in Chapters 12, 13, 15, and 16). In many parts of the world, the most biologically diverse lands and treasure grounds from the perspective of conservationists are homelands of indigenous peoples (such as the Marsh Arabs of southern Iraq), who have lived on the lands for generations and form their own culture, language, and identity (Abrahams 1994). The traditional worldwide conservation concept is to set aside these lands as nature reserve areas based on the advice of people outside the area and on strong control from a mainstream sovereign. In a good scenario, the indigenous people living in the reserved areas are told about the plan. In a worst-case scenario, these indigenous people would lose the right to practice their original lifestyle and would even have to move out of the reserve areas (Dasmann 1991). Thus, the conict between conservation and indigenous community emerges, and similar situations can be found all around the world with different contexts and geographic environments.
