Managing Biodiversity is about People:
Roles of Social & Behavioral Sciences in
Attaining the Aichi Targets
Stanley T. Asah, Ph.D.
Conservation Psychologist
Human Dimensions of Natural Resource Management
School of Environmental & Forest Sciences
College of the Environment
University of Washington, Seattle, USA.
Co-Presenters
Anantha K. Duraiappah
Eduardo Brondizio; Lori Hunter; Nicholas Kosoy;
Anne-Helene Prieur-Richard; Sunnetha Subramaniam
Biodiversity Conservation: A Human
Enterprise in Essence
 Key Observation:
 At this Conference, I see:
 No Kangaroos, Trees, Fish, etc.
 Insects I see invited themselves
 People with over 400 “identities”
 I am not thinking Geography; Rather, culture, politics, economics, values,
beliefs, norms, etc.
 I presume:
 Many know a lot about these animals/plants, policy, economics, etc.
 Few know enough about people:
 Attaining the Aichi Targets—More attention to Social & Behavioral
Sciences
Biodiversity Conservation: SocialEcological Reality
 How humans value, claim, and use ecological resources
 Manifested in:
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Individual statements, views, and value articulations,
Individual, collective, and organizational behaviors
Institutions created by humans
Within the confines of overarching political ecologies
 Power & power relations
Social-Ecological Reality: Desirable
Understandings
 How values and behaviors of individuals and collectives shape
and are shaped by the rules and norms (formal & informal
institutions);
 The political ecological context of power and power relations
within which this dynamic interplay of values, behaviors and
institutions play out in determining access and use of
resources.
Desirable Understandings: key
Messages
1. Values and beliefs are plural and dynamic
2. Economic and social in/security “can” alter long held beliefs
and values on biodiversity conservation and sustainable use
3. Individuals and collectives continuously make trade-offs
across biodiversity and ecosystem services with other
goods and services
4. Education, information and financial incentives alone are
not sufficient to promote biodiversity conservation and
sustainable use practices
Desirable Understandings: key
Messages
5. Biodiversity is now seen as a biophysical entity and not as an
integral part of well-being and identity
6. Many biodiversity related institutions (the rules & norms
governing conservation & sustainable use of biodiversity) are
exogenously designed; inadequately consider local specificity
7. Matching the mis-matches with institutional innovation is
key to improving the conservation and sustainable use of
biodiversity
Some Thought-Provoking Bases for
In/effective Conservation Efforts!
1. Biodiversity is strongly linked to “Livelihoods”—Very True
 So, we pay people to conserve biodiversity, e.g., ??
 Implications—subtle but salient and problematic
 Biodiversity has economic equivalence—Reductionism
 Livelihoods have equivalent functional economic value—Irrationalism
2. Power inequalities
 Some, other than the “locals” have power that somehow prohibits
on-the-ground conservation, e.g., western consumption?
 Implications—subtle but salient and problematic
 Agency and responsibility are with the “powerful”
 But, Are they really powerful?
Conservation Psychology: The
Behavioral Change Perspective
 Actual biodiversity conservation happens on the ground, often
far removed from the policy process, where:
 People as individual and small collectives take actions in the
interests, or otherwise, of biodiversity conservation
 Understanding and influencing behaviors at this level is crucial
because:
 It is about “capabilities”
 Local people are empowered
 Bottom-up biodiversity
management is more feasible &
therefore, more sustainable!
Conservation Psychology: Not that
Hard to Change Behavior
 Motivational Functionalism:
 Purposeful coping and adaptive mechanisms used to meet
personal goals;
 Initiates, directs, and sustains behavior/human actions:
 Much more than economics, e.g.,
 Desires to adhere to certain values, beliefs, cultural prescriptions
 Desires to be seen in favorable light by others—social
norms/desirability
 Desires to acquire and maintain individual/social identities
 Desires to be reelected, to do good, something meaningful, etc.
Conservation Psychology: The
Behavioral Change Purpose
 Understanding and promoting pro-environmental behavior
at the human-biodiversity interphase; where actual
biodiversity management happens
 What motivates and constrains human action?
 How motivations can be enhanced and constraints removed
 So:
 If Livelihood is a motivation—how can that be enhanced? Sell
existing livelihoods or sustainably co-exist with biodiversity?
 If Power inequalities is a constraint—How can it be removed?
Ask the powerful to relinquish power or make the less
powerful more powerful?
Attaining Aichi Target 1: Behavioral
Change Approach
 Determine/Research: Avoid solution mindedness
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Behavioral/action sequence leading to “endstate” behavior/action
Salient Motivations & Constraints
Impact, Probability, & Penetration of each behavior
Determine competing behaviors—Motivations & Constraints
 Common Strategies
 Persuasive communication to:
 Evoke most salient motivations & undermine salient psychological constraints—target 1:
awareness of the value of biodiversity?
 Evoke social norms
 Instill pro-biodiversity beliefs/identities
 Use of commitment—e.g., Pledges
 Behavioral showcasing/role modeling
 Pay attention to source of influence
 Discouraging competing behaviors—enhance constraints, minimize motivations
 Pilot, evaluate, lunch & monitor
Thank You!
 Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) secretariat; in
particular :
 Braulio Dias & David Cooper
 All views and contents of this presentation are mine and do not reflect the views of
any other institution or entity
Questions/Stick?
 Conversation?