Call for Papers: Policy Matters no 15 on Conservation and Human Rights

This is a call for contribution issued by IUCN's Commission on Environmental, Economic and Social Policy for the 15th issue of its magnificant magazine "Policy Matters". I hope that the coming issue will contain some analytical examples from the Arab World.

Policy Matters (PM) is a periodic publication of the World Conservation Union’s (IUCN) Commission on Environmental, Economic, and Social Policy (CEESP). PM has an international distribution of 1,000-2,000, including worldwide CEESP members, IUCN staff, and participants in IUCN-sponsored workshops, conferences and events. The journal is addressed to the growing network of community activists, policy-makers, academics and others engaged in improving policy and practice at the intersections of the environmental, economic, and social arenas.

PM issues are typically comprised of diverse articles centered around a unifying theme, in addition to updates on CEESP themes’ and working groups’ activities.

The PM 15 co-editors include Jessica Campese, Marcus Colchester (proposed/ to be confirmed), Michelle de Cordova, Armelle Guignier, Robert Monro and Grazia Borrini-Feyerabend. The co-editors invite interested parties to submit articles addressing a broad range of links between conservation and human rights.

Drawing on decades of experience with conflicts between environmental and human values, governmental and non-governmental conservation organizations, scientists, and practitioners have come to recognise that conservation should be conducted in ways that do not harm, and whenever possible support, the rights and livelihoods of human communities. This is reflected in recent international policy efforts, from the Aarhus Convention (The Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-Making and Access to Justice in Environmental Mattersto the 5th World Parks Congress and Program of Work on Protected Areas of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD.

There are, however, unresolved critical questions regarding how to establish tangible and positive links between conservation and human rights in policy and practice. Concrete examples of how conservation can support human rights, and how conflicts between the two can be effectively resolved when they occur, remain relatively undocumented and unexplored.

The conservation-human rights connections can be structured in many ways. One such way distinguishes among connections dealing with “positive” rights (e.g., between watershed protection initiatives and the right to health through provision of clean water); connections dealing with “negative” rights (e.g., between the development of new protected areas and the loss of rights to assess natural resources); and connections dealing with procedural rights (e.g., between environmental decision making and the right to be informed and participate). This issue of PM will offer reflections and case examples of conservation-human rights links across these and other possible categories. Below is a (by no means exhaustive) list of questions that articles submitted for this PM issue may wish to address:

♦ In what ways and under what circumstances can conservation initiatives support the rights to life, health and development?

♦ In what ways and under what circumstances can conservation initiatives diminish the rights to life, health and development?

♦ In what ways and under what circumstances can conservation initiatives support procedural rights such as participation, information, and access to justice?

♦ What are the key implementation challenges of moving the connections between conservation initiatives and human rights into concrete action? How can communities, organizations, and others address these challenges?

♦ How can complexities such as inter-generational vs. present rights, and/or collective vs. individual rights be addressed in conservation initiatives?

♦ Are there illustrative case examples of acute conflicts between conservation initiatives and human rights? Were such conflicts eventually solved? How?

♦ In what conceptual and practical ways is a human-rights approach related to and/or distinct from other approaches, including socially responsible conservation? What additional benefits and challenges characterise a human rights approach to conservation?

The co-editors will highlight themes and general lessons across articles. Hopefully, PM 15 will illuminate some of the conceptual and practical promises and challenges of linking conservation and human rights, and thereby encourage improvements in conservation policy and practice.

Most PM contributors are active CEESP members, but non-member submissions are also welcomed. All submissions should be addressed to the co-editors who solicited them with a copy to:

♦ Jessica Campese (jessica@cenesta.org) ; and

♦ Grazia Borrini-Feyerabend (gbf@cenesta.org )

Articles may be sent in Microsoft Word or Rich Text Format. For more details on the submission guidelines you can coordinate with Grazia Borrini-Feyerabend

The Deadline for submissions is Sunday 28 January 2007.