Iconic Lands: Wilderness As a Reservation Criterion for World Heritage
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ICONIC LANDS Wilderness as a reservation criterion for World Heritage Mario Gabriele Roberto Rimini A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Institute of Environmental Studies University of New South Wales April 2010 1 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My gratitude goes to the Director of the Institute of Environmental Studies, John Merson, for the knowledge and passion he shared with me and for his trust, and to the precious advice and constant support of my co-supervisor, Stephen Fortescue. My family, their help and faith, have made this achievement possible. 2 TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER I Introduction ………………………………………………………………………….…...…… 8 Scope and Rationale.………………………………………………………………………….…...…………. 8 Background…………………………………………………………………………………………………… 12 Methodology…………………………………………………………………………………………………. 22 Structure…………………………………………………………………………………………………….... 23 CHAPTER II The Wilderness Idea ……………………………………………………………………........ 27 Early conceptions …………………………………………………………………………………………..... 27 American Wilderness: a world model …………………………………………………….....………………. 33 The Wilderness Act: from ideal to conservation paradigm …………………………………........…………. 43 The values of wilderness ……………………………………………………………………….…………… 48 Summary ………………………………………………………………………………………….…………. 58 CHAPTER III Wilderness as a conservation and land management category worldwide …………......... 61 The US model: wilderness legislation in Canada, New Zealand and Australia …………………………… 61 Canada: a wilderness giant ………………………………………………………………………..…............ 64 Wilderness purism in New Zealand ………………………………………………………………….……… 66 Australian wilderness: a World Heritage saga …………………………………………………….………… 68 The Wilderness Continuum: advocating wilderness protection as a management-focused policy ..………. 77 Wilderness as a global conservation paradigm……………………………………………..…….................... 82 Summary …………………………………………………………………………………………….……….. 86 CHAPTER IV A genetic affinity: the wilderness idea and the “iconic” dimension of World Heritage…… 88 The cultural birthmark ………………………………………………………………………………………... 88 Nature as World Heritage …………………………………………………………………………………….. 91 The original wilderness legacy in the World Heritage Convention .……………………………....…………. 95 The criterion of integrity: the wilderness embedded ……………………………………………….……….... 101 The departure from the wilderness idea………………………………….………………………....……….... 107 The question of effectiveness ……..………………………………………………………………………….. 124 The burden of State sovereignty …………………………………………………………………....……….... 128 The World Heritage List: iconic power……….…………………………………………………....…………. 139 Summary ………………………………………………………………………………………….…………... 141 CHAPTER V The political effectiveness of the synergy between wilderness and World Heritage….……. 144 Birth of an icon: from Lake Pedder to the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area …………………… 144 3 The Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area: an overview …………………………………...………… 153 The TWWHA model: influence on the national wilderness preservation politics.. …………………………. 164 Global wilderness preservation and World Heritage: opportunities and potential .………………………..... 176 The Southern Forests: the need for a World Heritage Wilderness criterion…………………………….......... 182 The forest failure……………………………………………………………………………………………… 186 Summary……………………………………………………………………………………………………… 190 CHAPTER VI World Heritage wilderness as an economic development opportunity ……………………. 193 Ecotourism, wilderness and Tasmania’s brand ……………………………………………………………… 193 Tourism on Tasmania’s West Coast: a gateway to World Heritage wilderness …………………………….. 199 The Queenstown Geopark Project: World Heritage, wilderness and cultural change………………………. 208 The Tarkine: Tasmania’s up and coming wilderness mecca………………………………………………… 211 Summary …………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 215 CONCLUSIONS …………………………………………………………………………………………… 216 REFERENCES ……………………………………………………………………………………..……... 224 4 LIST OF FIGURES Fig. 1 Wilderness Quality in Tasmania, Source: Parks and Wildlife Service 2004………………….…..….... 81 Fig. 2 TWWHA zoning, Source: Parks And Wildlife Service 2002 ………………………..……………..…. 160 Fig. 3 TWWHA Land Tenure, Source: Parks and Wildlife Service 2004 …………………..…………….…. 161 Fig. 4 The Tarkine region in North West Tasmania………………………………………………………….. 165 Fig 5 The reserve system in the Tarkine……………………………………………………………………… 171 Fig 6 Nelson Falls, marking the entrance to the TWWHA from Queenstown on the West Coast………….. 195 Fig. 7 The peak of Cradle Mountain seen from Lake Dove, TWWHA …………………….……………..… 196 Fig. 8 The Gordon River………………………………………………………………………………........... 199 Fig. 9 Rainforest reflected in the tannin-stained waters of the Gordon River………………………………. 200 Fig. 10 The Queenstown Moonscape………………………………………………………………………... 202 Fig. 11 The waterfront at Strahan……………………………………………………………………………. 205 Fig. 12 Lake St Clair, with Cradle Mountain in the background……………………………………………. 207 Fig. 13 Gateway towns and transport routes in the Tarkine region…………………………………………. 213 Table 1 Tasmanian Visitors Survey………………………………………………………………………….. 203 5 ACRONYMS / ABBREVIATIONS CBD – Convention on Biological Diversity CITES – Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species CNPPA – Commission on National Parks and Protected Areas DAFF –Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry DEH – Department of Environment and Heritage DTSR – Department of Tourism, Sports and Recreation HEAT – Hydro Employees Action Team HEC – Hydro-Electric Commission IUCN – International Union for the Conservation of Nature TWWHA – Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area UNEP – United Nations Environmental Program UNESCO – United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization WCMC – World Conservation Monitoring Centre WCPA – World Commission on Protected Areas WHC – World Heritage Centre 6 ABSTRACT Wilderness is crucial for global conservation. Contemporary research established that between 33% and 52% of the Earth qualifies as wilderness. It is a fragile, threatened resource which needs a global conservation framework. This role could be successfully fulfilled by the World Heritage Convention. The founding notion of the World Heritage idea – Outstanding Universal Value – bears a striking resemblance to the attributes and characteristics of wilderness. The two notions possess an undisputable cultural and historic affinity, embodied by their “iconic” dimension. This makes the synergy between wilderness and World Heritage extraordinarily effective, as the history of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area demonstrates. The Franklin Dam dispute, solved after the World Heritage nomination of the Tasmanian wilderness, is emblematic in this respect. It gave birth to the world’s only protected area which includes close to 100% of the local wilderness resource, and which coincides entirely with World Heritage status. The classic wilderness character of the region matched and enhanced the iconic power of the World Heritage, and the outcome represented a watershed for Australia’s wilderness politics. Locally, it also paved the way for the establishment of a thriving ecotourism industry, providing the core of Tasmania’s “green” brand. Its lesson is still invoked in unresolved wilderness conflicts throughout the country, and could be applied to other similar international contexts, as a model of proactive wilderness reservation through World Heritage nomination and of economic development based on wilderness tourism. On the other hand, despite the cultural affinity wilderness was never chosen as a criterion for World Heritage identification, and therefore the Convention cannot coherently fulfill this role of wilderness protection framework before solving this paradox. The unresolved dispute over Tasmania’s wilderness forests indicates that the lack of an official endorsement of wilderness as a World Heritage criterion deprives the Convention of the conceptual tools needed to successfully address those environmental conflicts affecting existing World Heritage areas, in which the resource at stake is namely wilderness. Including wilderness as a World Heritage criterion would fill this gap and provide the global community with an effective framework for the preservation of remaining wilderness regions. 7 CHAPTER I Scope and rationale In today’s global conservation agenda, wilderness counts. According to the leading studies of the remaining wilderness resource, between 33% and 52% of the Earth is still in almost pristine condition - what can be called a wilderness (Mittermeier et al. 2003). This chunk of intact globe is crucial for the global goals of conservation. It is made of regions that possess the attributes which made wilderness relevant for centuries: a mix of anthropocentric and bio-centric values which gives it a priceless significance for humanity. In addition, some of these wilderness areas are also crucial biodiversity hotspots, and have the best chances, given their size and wholeness, to preserve biological diversity. The vast majority of the remaining wilderness, though, is unprotected and under siege. So, how to address the impellent question of preserving it? Is there a regime of preservation that would be particularly appropriate for global wilderness regions? The argument of this thesis is that such a regime already exists, and it is one of the most successful nature conservation systems at the international level. It is the World Heritage Convention. This assumption is underpinned by solid evidence on one hand, and undermined by a major challenge