A New Approach to Conservation The Importance of the Individual through Wildlife Rehabilitation

About this book

Conservationists assume a set of underlying values which guide their decision-making and action. The safeguarding or promotion of biodiversity, it is believed, is the means by which nature is best protected. A New Approach to Conservation examines – and challenges – these general conservation assumptions. While reinforcing the need to halt extinction and value biodiversity, it shows that biodiversity needs to be more clearly understood, perhaps being replaced by the notion of 'wildness'. It examines how biodiversity is a holistic term, and how individual species need to be assessed and their own contribution to 'wildness' has to be recognized. A New Approach to Conservation proposes a new way of conservation – one which makes more room for neglected, rather than endangered or rare species. It also asserts that 'wildness' is not incompatible with certain kinds of human intervention.

Contents

Part I: Exploring Conservation's Basic Assumptions:
- Extinction
- Rarity
- Nativity

Part II: The Conservationist's Role Redefined
- Humans and nature: is conservation meaningful?
- How is nature to be safeguarded?
- Conservationist, custodian of wildness

Part III: A New Emphasis in Conservation
- The problem with species: reviewing units of importance
- Wildlife rehabilitation as conservation strategy?
- Conservation and individual worth
- compatibility: problems and answers

Part IV: The Upshot
- Implications for Action: Managing wildness?
- The new conservation

Bibliography
Index

Customer Reviews