The Challenges and Opportunities Throughout the Life Cycle of Landscape-Scale Collaborative Conservation Organizations: Case Studies in the Southern Appalachians and the Northern Rockies Ecosystems

Currently our natural environment is threatened by climate change, habitat fragmentation, and other transboundary issues. To address these problems, it is thought that conservation organizations and land management agencies should attempt to manage at larger geographic scales and across political boundaries. The Crown Managers Partnership (CMP) and the Southern Appalachian Man and the Biosphere Cooperative (SAMAB) are two such organizations that work at an ecoregional scale to support collaboration among agencies, aboriginal groups, conservationists, scientists, and other stakeholders for the conservation and restoration of the Northern Rocky Mountain and the Southern Appalachian regions in North America. Over the past decades, SAMAB and CMP have contributed to their long-term goal of connectivity throughout the landscape and have created inspiring visions for ecoregional conservation planning and management by sharing and communicating sound scientific information and strategizing and implementing conservation action among diverse partners from the local to international scale. Although landscapes are considered the suitable scale for conservation endeavors, developing a successful collaborative landscape-scale organization that can accomplish meaningful and sustained activities appears difficult. An in-depth analysis of SAMAB and CMP can help other landscape-scale organizations begin to understand the influence of both internal and external processes and factors that can impede or produce challenges to these types of organizations during different stages over the life of an organization. The presentation will present the case study findings from nearly sixty interviews, secondary documents, and observations and specifically provide guidance regarding how SAMAB and CMP are evolving over time and provide strategies for maintaining the vitality of the organization and the roles they can play in future transboundary management of their respective regions. In addition, the in-depth analysis can provide broader lessons for other emerging landscape organizations or mature organizations that are attempting to maintain relevance and thrive