On an environmental listserv someone today wrote:

Sustainability (and wilderness, for that matter) are dead ideas. Say goodbye to them. All ecosystems, in 100 years, are moving ~100 - 150 miles north or an equivalent up ...

To which I'd like to respond.

I agree that the ecology of designated Wilderness areas is subject to change (perhaps radical change), but strongly disagree with the claim that wilderness is "a dead idea." 
 
With regard to "sustainability", that politically motivated frame was invented in the 70s as an ecological analogue of the "New Deal." It was a compromise intended to sustain capitalism during a period of intense environmental attack and to avoid taking meaningful actions on such growth-unfriendly issues as population control and over consumption. The hope was that by working within the system (as contrasted to opposing it or trying to modify it), the conservation community could take the hard edge off unlimited growth and spare the planet the worst of its impacts.
 
Contrary to anyone's assessment that the concept of sustainability is dead, I suggest that few who possess power or influence will be kissing that idea farewell anytime soon. The decades old concepts of sustainable growth and sustainable development are about to blossom and the result will be unnecessarily extreme and disastrous overshoots on numerous fronts.  
 
(see:  Sustainable Development: A New World Deception by Bill Willers, 1994  and consider viewing the 8-part lecture on growth by Albert Bartlett  --- segments 7 and 8 being key).
 
The issues of Wilderness and sustainability should not be lumped together.  I acknowledge that Wilderness is threatened with becoming a dead idea, but suggest that will only happen if the original concept of Wilderness is rejected by those who once were its defenders. Wilderness could become a dead idea if a significant fraction of conservation movement advocates for transforming Wilderness into something it was never intended to be -- something such as an ecological museum or an ecological test bed.
 
For those who can relate to the concept of Wilderness as envisioned by Zahniser and as written into the Wilderness Act,  Wilderness is, and will remain, profoundly alive.  Here is a LINK to a page on Wilderness Watch's website where you can read an excellent synopsis of that original concept.
 
Scott
 

Comments (5) >>

Jef said:

Thanks the great food for thought. I think you hit the nail on the head with the ass backwards concept of "ecological museum." Too many people think of the world and natural entities as static. For example, we are now in a period of "climate change," which connotes a period of stasis that preceded it, but that's not true. We are in a period of extremely rapid climate change brought on by human-caused forcings that have probably never been experienced on Earth before. But the climate has changed a lot over time without anthropogenic influence, even since the rise of hominids (there are fascinating connections between the climate during the Midieval Warm Period and the subsequent Little Ice Age and developments in western culture, society, and political systems, and we are already finding out how strong our quality of life and ability to feed ourselves is still tied to the weather). But largely, ecological entities were able to respond over an intact landscape. Roughly 10,000 years ago all of Canada and much of the US was covered in a vast ice sheet, yet you would never guess that now with the diverse ecosystems that redistributed and arose since. So, what really sets wilderness apart, and I believe is THE key component of wilderness character, is that natural processes are allowed to reign without substantial direct interference from human hands. And this is precisely why wilderness should be so valued and very much alive in the coming 100 years: in these rare places habitat and ecological entities and processes will be allowed to migrate and evolve under the rules of nature, not the hands of a certain primate species. Given that the rest of the planet will be subject to human whims (and even wilderness will suffer from indirect, global and regional scale human impacts), the value of wilderness will be even greater than ever imagined (the preamble to the Wilderness Act certainly recognized this). Unfortunately, most debate so far centers on how we should become gardeners and zookeepers to shepherd our prized ecosystems through the rapid climate change gauntlet. But the Noah's ark approach will never work, given the scale of the problems and that we are going to struggle as a species as well (check out the expense and challenges just to try to breed a few declining amphibians in captivity: http://anuranblog.blogspot.com/2008/05/amphibian-ark-good-intentions-uncertain.html ). What's needed is not direct manipulation, but a system of reserves and corridors between, just as many far-sighted folks have advocated for a long time. Of course, there are many other pieces to the puzzle, but I hope that wilderness advocates can at least start to turn the tide against the antiquated notion that we can and should intervene to save species (e.g., by building guzzlers), rather than just get out of the way. And fight the notion that wilderness is dead because it ties our hands. In fact, that's precisely why it is so alive.

July 10, 2008

Tom said:

Global warming will alter wilderness, as Scott says, radically. Those changes are anthropogenic. Our signature will be right on all that radical change. It may not be fun (much less a spiritual experience) to go there: as noted in Franklin et al. (1991) the changes resulting from transition-related disturbances (disease, pests, widespread fire) will be more dramatic than changes from mere elevated temperature or changed hydrology. I support set-asides. They are no longer really wildernesses and, see Jack Turner, The Abstract Wild, they never were.

July 10, 2008

Scott said:

Tom, It appears that you may have confused Turner's views on Wilderness with those of William Cronin. In The Abstract Wild Turner LAMENTS the fact that the wild has been sucked out of Wilderness whereas Cronin claims that it never existed and that Wilderness is an abstract fabrication. Here is a passage from the publisher description of the Abstract Wild which, incidentally, is one of the best books on wildness ever written. http://www.uapress.arizona.edu/books/bid985.htm How wild is wilderness and how wild are our experiences in it, asks Jack Turner in the pages of The Abstract Wild. His answer: not very wild. National parks and even so-called wilderness areas fall far short of offering the primal, mystic connection possible in wild places. And this is so, Turner avows, because any managed land, never mind what it's called, ceases to be wild. Moreover, what little wildness we have left is fast being destroyed by the very systems designed to preserve it. Natural resource managers, conservation biologists, environmental economists, park rangers, zoo directors, and environmental activists: Turner's new book takes aim at these and all others who labor in the name of preservation. He argues for a new conservation ethic that focuses less on preserving things and more on preserving process and "leaving things be." He takes off after zoos and wilderness tourism with a vengeance, and he cautions us to resist language that calls a tree "a resource" and wilderness "a management unit."

July 10, 2008

Steve Sergeant said:

I think that whether or not you consider the concept of wilderness dead, as you imply, depends very much on your definition. I suggest that there is less cognitive dissonance that you might think in the idea of maintaining different definitions for different purposes. The managers of those lands already designated as Wilderness (big "W") need a realistic, technically and politically achievable definition that guides them in how to protect and manage their lands. They need something that's detailed, precise, and relatively unambiguous. Our increasingly urban population, I argue, needs a simpler, more inclusive, less nuanced definition that makes them feel like these places belong to them (or visa-versa) or we won't have the political constituency necessary to maintain the hard-fought protection. Activists such as you and me probably need yet another definition. Our definition would clearly be the most ambitious, and risky from a political perspective. Because what we want to see is something that can easily be framed as being at odds with human civilization. Our challenge, then, is to present that vision in a way that actually seems harmonious to human civilization (but not necessarily in its present form). BTW, the WildernessWatch.org link seems broken. Is that group still active?

July 10, 2008

Kurt S. said:

I may be alone in this but I am increasingly frustrated by the merging of wilderness preservation with environmentalism. I quickly lose patience with political staffers, who answer my inquiries about a candidate's Wilderness positions, by directing me to that candidate's position on environmental issues. It's not that I don't care about the environment (I do), or species survival (ditto), but I do believe that Wilderness preservation is a completly separate issue. I want Wilderness managed in a way that provides me with self-sufficient, self-reliant adventure. I don't want land managers to concern themselves with my safety in, make it easy for me to navigate through, or ease my access to, the wilderness they are responsible for. Nor do I appreciate in any way the Search and Rescue Clubs that exist to save me from my own bad planning, or bad luck, in my wilderness experience. I feel contempt for NPS, USFS, and BLM spokespersons who advocate cell phones and their accompanying infrastructure in wilderness. I am alarmed when those same spokespersons advocate "enhancing local economies" with their managment policy. Wild flora and fauna are an important part of wilderness to be sure but, we can preserve both of them (or not) with or without truly wild wilderness areas.

July 16, 2008

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