Growth-dependent welfare states contribute to climate emergency. The ecological economics, degrowth, and sustainable welfare literatures demonstrate that to re-embed Western production and consumption patterns in environmental limits, an encompassing social-ecological transformation would need to be initiated very soon. This article focuses on the potential roles of the welfare state and social policy in this transformation, applying the concepts of ‘sustainable welfare’ and ‘safe-operating space’. Based on two Swedish studies, it also provides an empirical analysis of the popularity of selected eco-social policies designed to steer the economy and society towards this space: maximum and basic incomes, taxes on wealth and meat, as well as working time reductions. In analogy to the historical role of the state in reconstituting the welfare-work nexus in the post-WWII era and its present engagement in the context of the Covid-19 crisis, it is argued that a more interventionist state is required to grapple with climate emergency.

Successful anti-poaching policies and effective conservation of Asian elephants Elephas maximus require input and support from all stakeholders, including the public. But although Myanmar has one of the largest remaining populations of wild Asian elephants, there has been little research on public attitudes there towards elephants and poaching. We developed a questionnaire to assess attitudes of people in rural and urban areas towards elephants and conservation, and their perceptions of and experience with elephant poaching. We conducted 178 interviews across two regions in Myanmar. Although both rural and urban participants supported elephant conservation, people from urban areas expressed more favourable attitudes towards elephants than their rural counterparts. Similarly, conservation priorities differed between rural and urban communities, with rural communities less likely to believe that peaceful human–elephant coexistence was possible and preferring conservation initiatives that prioritize human activities over elephant conservation. Both groups were familiar with elephant poaching in Myanmar, but rural communities appeared to be better informed regarding the challenges faced by conservation agencies, and were more negatively affected by poaching. Our findings highlight potential areas for intervention by government and conservation agencies to reduce criminal activity and to protect both Myanmar's citizens and its elephants.

The Asian elephant Elephas maximus is of cultural significance for the Thai people. The development of legal protection for elephants in Thailand dates back to the 17th century, reflecting concerns about both human livelihoods and elephant conservation. The legal status of privately owned, captive elephants differs from that of wild individuals, with consequences for the lawful use of ivory from captive animals. Prior to 2015, the lack of comprehensive measures to control the Thai ivory market enabled the laundering of illegally sourced ivory in the country. The Thai government introduced legal reforms in 2015, imposing strict controls over the possession and domestic trade of ivory from captive Asian elephants, and aligning the protection of African elephants and their ivory with CITES regulations. Nonetheless, the sustainable use of Thai ivory remains disputed, and international pressure to close the commercial trade in domestic ivory persists. Here we review this complex situation, aiming to inform future reforms. Consolidation of laws related to elephants and ivory would facilitate law enforcement and compliance. Use of an electronic database would improve the monitoring of ivory movements and aid the implementation and enforcement of laws.

This paper explores the innovative socio-educational experience of Huerto Alegre (Spain), linking it to a critical perspective of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD). Going beyond the ‘pluralist practices’ associated with the ESD, our case study seeks to redefine ESD from a critical and ecocentric perspective within the context of the Earth Charter (EC). Huerto Alegre’s social-educational programme is aimed at children and young people with the objective of creating critical thinking and fostering connections between school and the natural environment by working collaboratively with teaching professionals. The methodology of the paper focuses on a content analysis of the centre’s key documents and on the narratives of students, in addition to an in-depth interview with its director. It also presents a critical reconstruction of the subject. This complements, and gives meaning to, the theoretical debates surrounding ESD — debates that call for structural changes to our current model of society.

Many in the conservation sphere have noted that robust and gender-equitable stakeholder engagement is crucial in achieving conservation outcomes, ensuring project sustainability and supporting human well-being. However, despite policies, international agreements and increasing requirements of donors, gender is still often viewed as an add-on rather than as a fundamental element of effective conservation. In an effort to overcome this, Conservation International has invested in nearly 20 project sites since 2014 to support targeted gender integration into existing conservation projects. We conducted a survey with practitioners across these sites to examine the barriers to and enablers of gender integration, and practitioners’ perceptions of the benefits and challenges involved in this. Our findings demonstrate the importance of both external drivers (funding requirements) and a supportive environment (capacity building, technical and financial support) in incentivising a focus on gender. Respondents also reported a suite of benefits (e.g. increased participation, higher quality of the project) and costs (mainly financial) related to gender integration. In documenting these efforts to build gender-related capacity, and the associated benefits and challenges, we highlight the importance of gender-responsive conservation initiatives, and evaluate a method of achieving this. As conservation practitioners may be more inclined to listen to each other (given their shared objectives) rather than to gender specialists, this research can help to shift practitioner dialogue and conservation practice to be more open and responsive to gender.

The Makira Natural Park (Makira) is the largest terrestrial protected area in Madagascar, supporting nearly 200,000 people living around the park, who derive a significant proportion of their animal-source foods from hunting. Makira is currently managed with three different policies: (1) traditional management with no external assistance; (2) community-based forest management (Gestion Contractualisée des Forêts; GCF) with non-governmental support and externally developed policies; and (3) strict external management policies (Zone d’Occupation Controlée; ZOC), meaning a zone of controlled residence for communities inside the core protected area. Here, we longitudinally assess the impacts of these policies on wildlife hunting and consumption by using a difference-in-differences method to evaluate policy efficacy. We found that externally developed conservation policies led to drastically reduced wildlife hunting and consumption in Makira. We also found that public education in the form of environmental awareness-raising, conducted 1 year before adoption, led to a greater concealment of hunting behaviours. Overall, wildlife hunting and consumption have decreased in the Makira region since the adoption of GCF and ZOC policies and could be effective at reducing the unsustainable wildlife hunting across the Makira, particularly when supported by economic development and the creation of alternative sources of livelihood and food.

Conservation challenges occur in complex social-ecological systems that require scientists and practitioners to recognize and embrace that humans are active agents within these systems. This interdependence of the social and ecological components of systems necessitates effective leadership to address and solve conservation problems successfully. Although conservation practitioners increasingly recognize leadership as critical to achieve conservation goals, clarity about the term leadership remains elusive in terms of specific strategies and behaviours. Our objective in this review of conservation leadership scholarship was to build on prior literature to conceptualize and define the behavioural leadership strategies that lead to successful conservation outcomes. Following an initial review of more than 1,200 peer-reviewed publications, we conducted a systematic review of 59 articles utilizing an inductive analysis approach and identified a set of five leadership domains that contribute to positive conservation outcomes: (1) stakeholder engagement, (2) trust, (3) vision, (4) individual champion, and (5) excellence in internal attributes. Each domain is defined by 2–4 behaviours that we consider leadership practices. To sustain meaningful progress toward global conservation of biodiversity, conservation scientists and practitioners must embrace and invest in leadership as an integral component of solving our collective conservation challenges.

Many conservation projects have weak capacity to monitor their target species and the threats they face, compromising adaptive management. We assessed 74 vertebrate and plant conservation projects worldwide that were supported by the SOS–Save Our Species Programme (now IUCN Save Our Species) during 2012–2015. Our aim was to determine how and where monitoring efforts were focused, identify trends in data availability and make recommendations for improvement. Project managers reported more of a decrease in threats (73%) and improved habitat conditions (68%) than positive population changes (19%), primarily because of the focus of their objectives and limited time to collect population data. More population data were collected on reptiles and amphibians than mammals and birds, contrary to global trends. This probably reflects a greater focus of mammal and bird projects on improving habitats or reducing threats. There were geographical differences in data availability. Lessons learnt that could be applied to future project portfolios include: a common strategic framework should be developed, along with a set of common indicators against which projects can align and demonstrate their contributions; more guidance and capacity building support should be provided to grantees; and a greater allocation of project budgets should be dedicated to monitoring.

Neoliberal land reforms to increase economic development have important implications for biodiversity conservation. This paper investigates land reform in New Zealand’s South Island that divides leased state-owned stations (ranches) with private grazing leases into state-owned conservation land, private land owned by the former leaseholder and private land under protective covenant (similar to conservation easement). Conserved lands had less threatened vegetation, lower productivity, less proximity to towns and steeper slopes than privatized lands. Covenants on private land were more common in intermediate zones with moderate land-use productivity and slope. Lands identified with ecological or recreational ‘significant inherent values’ were more likely to shift into conserved or covenant status. Yet among lands with identified ecological values, higher-threat areas were more likely to be privatized than lower-threat areas. This paper makes two novel contributions: (1) quantitatively examining the role of scientific recommendations about significant inherent values in land reform outcomes; and (2) examining the use of conservation covenants on privatized land. To achieve biodiversity goals, it is critical to avoid or prevent the removal of land-use restrictions beyond protected areas.

Systems thinking provides a comprehensive range of theories and methods that are useful for understanding and managing sustainability challenges. Biodiversity conservation is riddled with complex interactions between science, society and myriad interacting systems through temporal and spatial scales. This article presents a synthetic analysis of the history of systems thinking from a genealogical perspective, drawing from hard and soft systems thinking, and resilience and social-ecological systems. Using the anchor point of system leverage points and system characteristics (parameters, feedbacks, design and intent), we employ a diversity of examples to illustrate their relevance to multiple biodiversity related problems. We conclude by illustrating the opportunities for systems thinking to bridge epistemic divides with multiple biodiversity actors working towards conservation outcomes. Systems thinking can support more integrative biodiversity interventions, as they provide a pluralistic set of tools for bridging knowledges and disciplines, which can be useful to create new shared understandings of how to conserve biodiversity.

The UN Sustainable Development Goals to 2030 call for action by the globe to tackle some of the most pressing problems facing humanity. There is a key role for business in helping to meet the goals, and in particular, small- to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which account for over 90% of global businesses. Many organisations that were already engaged in addressing sustainability prior to the release of the SDGs will need to shift their approach to accommodate the new framework, including SMEs like Sydney Theatre Company (STC). This paper explores the use of the SDG Compass as a tool for making that shift by revisiting a previous case study on STC's sustainability journey since 2008 to assess the efficacy of the SDG Compass as a guide to addressing the SDGs. It finds that the SDG Compass is prohibitively complex for SMEs which could impede engagement with the SDGs by SMEs.