NCF Courses in Conservation Leadership 2022

Conservation today is a broad church. A dizzying, sometimes contradictory diversity of regulatory, extractive, economic and organizational practices fall within the rubric of conservation. In the widest sense, conservation can be viewed as a diverse set of ideas and practices that mediate relationships between human and non-human nature. These ideas and practices are historically situated and deeply social. This recognition throws up critical questions concerning the structure and dynamics of global conservation. Where and when do conservation ideas and practices stem from? What are the social and political contexts and conjunctures that have influenced and transformed them? How have certain sets of ideas and ideologies come to dominate and assume hegemonic proportions? Is it possible to disentangle the combination of “visible” and “invisible” influences at work in specific practices across the globe? What are the socio-historical processes whose pushes and pulls diverse conservation practices respond to and influence in turn?

Through a series of historically informed lecture and reading sessions, this course will undertake an interactive enquiry into these and allied questions. Focusing on key events, people, institutions and movements drawn from the modern history of human – nature relationships, the sessions will seek to illuminate the role larger global structures and processes have played in the construction of contemporary conservation. Structures and processes that range from European imperialism, global capitalism and the evolution of institutionalized knowledge systems, to the formation of sovereign nation-states, the emergence of global environmental governance & civic awareness and the emergence of pluriversal alternatives. The course sessions will follow the broad structure outlined below:

• Overview: conceptual foundations and motivations

• Themes in conservation – protecting, valuing and ‘balancing’ nature

• Wildlife and the nation state: preservationism and state-led conservation

• Institutionalized knowledge: conservation science and the global conservation project

• Reconciling conservation and development: from Stockholm to Rio and beyond

• Natural capital: conservation in the marketplace

• Brave new world: from pluriversal alternatives and community-led movements to “neo-protectionism” and de-extinction

• Synthesis

CLICK HERE to apply

The deadline for submission of the applications is 31 August 2022.

For any questions you can reach us on apply@ncf-india.org, with “CL courses 2022” in the subject line.

NOTE: Selected participants will be notified within a week after the application deadline.

This course will be held at Mysore during 26th Sep to 1st Oct 2022. If you need travel and/or accommodation support, please write to us separately – apply@ncf-india.org. Please indicate your Name-Support Requested (CL course 2022) in the subject line of the email. Limited travel/accommodation support is available.