Toward a more effective conservation biology: including social equity in the formulation of scientific questions and management options

We offer an evaluation of the field of conservation biology with the intent of elucidating why many conservation efforts meet with limited success, and we propose alternative approaches that may be useful in making the discipline more effective. Our discussion centers on our sense that conservation biology generally fails to formally acknowledge that social inequalities among people are often (although not always) basal causes of environmental degradation. This failure often results in ineffective research and conservation programs. We describe how an in-depth understanding and explicit discussion of the social background of conservation problems can help improve the effectiveness of scientific inquiry, without compromising the rigor of scientific methods, and we outline three concrete techniques that may help accomplish this goal: participatory research, coalition-building, and advocac