The editors of this volume are concerned that a stifling conservation orthodoxy is limiting the ability of practitioners to learn from evidence. The purpose of their book is to ‘expose the confirmation bias and weak evidence for some of conservation's most treasured tenets’. As such, this volume falls in line with the growing emphasis on generating and using evidence in many disciplines. It also can be considered part of the line of argument laid out in Bjorn Lomborg's more ambitious 2001 book The Skeptical Environmentalist: Measuring the Real State of the World.
Effective Conservation Science has three main sections: Challenges to foundational premises in conservation (eight chapters), Iconic conservation tales: sorting truth from fiction (eight chapters), and Questioning accepted strategies and interventions (nine chapters). Chapters cover a wide gamut of topics, from ecosystem services and introduced species to global agricultural expansion, fishing and the role of corporations. All authors lay out what they consider to be a misunderstood aspect of conservation, with some more successful than others in outlining how this misunderstanding came about and what the reader is supposed to think after completing the chapter.
There is no uniformity in the way chapters are written, with some presenting original research (fishing webs), others rehashing previously published work (GM crops), some reviewing debates in the literature (fisheries data), some provocative think pieces (sustainable fishing) and yet others deconstructing media coverage of issues (Yellowstone wolves). The chapters are short, so it is possible to learn about a large number of topics without the usual turgid quality of book chapters.
The challenge promised by the editors of critically examining our ‘most treasured tenets’ is only partially met because there is no clear mechanism laid out for identifying those tenets and then systematically addressing them. There is a lack of coherence to the topics chosen, with overlap in a number (e.g. fisheries data) and others absent (e.g. social value of protected areas, disease–biodiversity relationships, the role of evidence in policy development). The promise of the approach advocated by the editors is apparent through one excellent chapter, by Lenore Fahrig, on habitat fragmentation vs loss. If a systematic process had identified the right set of issues and each one had been addressed, as Fahrig did, this would have been a more impactful book.
Instead, the book is an idiosyncratic set of topics written largely by people within the apparent circles of the editors: 96% from North America and Australia and 83% from just North America. Twenty-four of the 47 authors are from the University of California, Duke, University of Washington or The Nature Conservancy, the last of which is represented by 10 authors. Europe, Africa, and Asia are not represented either by authors, or, with a couple of exceptions, by major tenets that should have been identified and challenged in chapters.
With these criticisms in mind this book does perform a valuable service in reminding us to always be on guard to the fact that we in conservation science live inside echo chambers just as much as our fellow citizens. We must question data, conclusions and, above all, accepted wisdom. For many of us who have been in the field for decades this will mean making active room for younger professionals with new ideas, penetrating suggestions, and uncomfortable critiques, to ensure a future for biodiversity.
