Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
infl uence through the 'National Forum on BioDiversity', convened in 1986, that
was funded and organised through the National Resource Council and National
Academy of Sciences of the United States, with additional support from the Smith-
sonian Institution, the World Wildlife Fund, and other prominent public and Non-
Governmental Organizations. This event coincided with a report entitled
'Technologies to Maintain Biodiversity' that was issued in 1987 through the US
Offi ce of Technology Assessment (OTA, 1987). Subsequent infl uence on biodiver-
sity initiative is widely demonstrated through both many individual countries, which
have adopted pioneering approaches, and the global-scale and international organi-
sations, many headquartered in Europe and the United States (such as the IUCN
and UNEP, see pages 53-54 and 56-61). These infl uences - which are relatively
tractable and well-documented - reveal how the prevailing idea of biodiversity came
about though the activities and ideas of specifi c institutions and individuals (i.e., its
'constructedness'), who have held infl uential positions in science, policy, and
management (see pages 56-61; see also Takacs, 1996; Farnham, 2007).
Biodiversity concepts and concerns: overview
The concepts and concerns of biodiversity are rooted in a complex scientifi c and
social web that is historically and geographically extensive. Biodiversity, as a term,
has become imbued with multiple and sometimes contested meanings and interpre-
tations that stem from these highly varied strands. This realisation is not meant to
detract from the validity or worthiness of the concepts and concerns of biodiversity.
Rather, quite the opposite, my analysis urges engagement with the fuller range of
meanings of biodiversity. Future advances depend on fuller engagement across the
gamut of scientifi c analysis to activist interpretation in ways that are both construc-
tive and critically aware.
Multiple geographic scales distinguish the formative phase of contemporary bio-
diversity interests that began in the mid- and late-1980s. Concurrent with US
national-level undertakings - principally the report and workshops organised by the
US Offi ce of Technology Assessment and the National Forum on BioDiversity in
1987 and 1988 that are described above - there co-existed global-scale framings of
the idea. The global scale was prioritised, for example, in the Interagency Task Force
on Biological Diversity, formed by the US Congress in 1985, which was the outcome
of an amendment (Section 119) to the Foreign Assistance Act that authorised the
US AID (Agency for International Development) to assist developing countries in
conservation programs, with an emphasis at that time on protecting wildlife habitat
and endangered species. By the late 1980s US AID was supporting the Biodiversity
Support Program, with substantial involvement and assistance from global environ-
mental organisations, such as the World Wildlife Fund, The Nature Conservancy,
and World Resources Institute (Oldfi eld and Alcorn, 1991). Well-publicised scien-
tifi c analysis of the biodiversity crisis, along with coordinated institutional and
political efforts aimed at conservation, has thus relied on the global and interna-
tional scales as key frames of reference.
The global framing of biodiversity became still more explicit and predominant
in the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) that was adopted by more than
100 countries following the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and
Development held in Río de Janeiro, Brazil (UNCED that has become well known
also as the 'Earth Summit'). Article 1 of the CBD asserts that the main objective of
the global suite of signatory countries includes 'the conservation of biological diver-
