Paying for nature: What every conservationist should know about political economy

Abstract

Global conservation policy and global capitalism have become increasingly intertwined over the last decade. The move towards ‘green capitalism’ has manifested itself in diverse ways, most notably in the expansion of payments for environmental services and attempts to commodify nature. However, there are concerns that prioritizing the financial value of nature could undermine efforts to conserve biodiversity. One particularly strong set of critiques has emerged from political economy. While providing rich theoretical and empirical insights into the potential downsides of green capitalism, the literature is often dense and difficult for non-specialists to navigate. Here I review and translate its main concepts and critiques for a conservation audience. I begin by exploring the basic process of commodity exchange. I then consider nature as a reluctant and uncooperative commodity that often requires new institutions and technologies to be commodified. This means conservation organizations play a key role in green capitalism's political economy. These developments are likely to have considerable social and environmental impacts, with a highly uneven distribution of costs and benefits.

Full text

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Paying for nature: what every conservationist should
know about political economy
IVAN R. SCALES
Abstract Global conservation policy and global capitalism
have become increasingly intertwined over the last decade.
The move towards ‘green capitalism’has manifested itself in
diverse ways, most notably in the expansion of payments for
environmental services and attempts to commodify nature.
However, there are concerns that prioritizing the financial
value of nature could undermine efforts to conserve
biodiversity. One particularly strong set of critiques has
emerged from political economy. While providing rich
theoretical and empirical insights into the potential down-
sides of green capitalism, the literature is often dense and
difficult for non-specialists to navigate. Here I review and
translate its main concepts and critiques for a conservation
audience. I begin by exploring the basic process of
commodity exchange. I then consider nature as a reluctant
and uncooperative commodity that often requires new
institutions and technologies to be commodified. This
means conservation organizations play a key role in green
capitalism’s political economy. These developments are
likely to have considerable social and environmental
impacts, with a highly uneven distribution of costs and
benefits.
Keywords Environmental values, green capitalism, market
environmentalism, neoliberal conservation, payments for
environmental services
Introduction
Inaneffort to address conflicts between economic growth
and the maintenance of biological diversity, global
conservation policy and global capitalism have become
increasingly intertwined over the last decade. The idea that
capitalism can and should help conservation is now
mainstream (Brockington & Duffy, 2010). This trend has
manifested itself in diverse ways, including partnerships
between conservation non-governmental organizations
(NGOs) and large corporations to help reduce and offset
the environmental impacts of their activities (Burgin, 2008;
Seagle, 2012), conservation NGOs playing a key role in the
expansion of payments for environmental services such as
carbon sequestration (McGregor, 2010; Fisher, 2012), and
NGOs promoting and managing ecotourism as a way of
generating funds for conservation (West & Carrier, 2004;
Duffy, 2006).
These developments can be seen as part of a broader
trend of trying to ‘green’capitalism (Prudham, 2009; Igoe
et al., 2010). Green capitalism is based on the belief that
environmental degradation is largely the result of the failure
of markets to reflect the environmental costs of production
and consumption and the value of natural capital. Following
on from this, private property and the assignment of
economic values to the environment are seen as the best
way to manage natural resources (Anderson & Leal, 2001;
Farber et al., 2002). Green capitalist policies are presented
as win–win solutions, with the potential to create oppor-
tunities for economic growth, incentives for the mainten-
ance of biological diversity, and financial support for
conservation activities (Ferraro, 2011). Placing an emphasis
on the economic value of nature is often put forward as
the only realistic and pragmatic way of explaining
the importance of conservation to policy-makers and
business leaders and achieving conservation goals (Igoe
et al., 2010).
The implicit assumption behind capitalism generally,
and green capitalism more specifically, is that it is the system
best suited to the real world of scarce natural resources and
unlimited human wants (Gowdy et al., 2010). This argument
is based on the presumption that only through pricing
will people understand the value of nature and therefore
act responsibly (Roberts, 2008). These ideas have resulted in
growing efforts to commodify nature (Igoe et al., 2010;
Fairhead et al., 2012).
The increasingly close relationship between conservation
and capitalism has led to growing concerns among some
conservationists that conservation is selling out on nature
(McCauley, 2006). There are worries that important
intrinsic and cultural dimensions of nature are being lost
in the rush for utilitarian economic solutions (Collar, 2003;
Pyle, 2003; Clements et al., 2010). Although important, these
arguments have been well rehearsed. My aim here is to
show there are more radical critiques that conservation
researchers and practitioners should be aware of, and to
make them accessible to a conservation audience. I do so
in response to calls for conservation research and practice
to be more interdisciplinary, as well as to comments that
differences in language and concepts often make this
IVAN R. SCALES St Catharine’s College, University of Cambridge, Trumpington
Street, Cambridge, CB2 1RL, UK. E-mail irs28@cam.ac.uk
Received 29 August 2013. Revision requested 8October 2013.
Accepted 7January 2014. First published online 29 April 2014.
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difficult (Campbell, 2005; Balmford & Cowling, 2006;
Fox et al., 2006). With this in mind, I review and translate
recent research by scholars in the social sciences on the
political economy of conservation. Broadly speaking,
political economy pays close attention to the role of political
institutions and power in economic systems (Johnston et al.,
2001). The fundamental questions of political economy are:
(1) who does what in an economic system, (2) who owns
what, (3) who gets what, and (4) what do they do with it
(Bernstein, 2010)?
Given the volume and theoretical complexity of the
literature, I concentrate on a small number of core concepts,
mainly from Marxian political economy, as well as specific
case study examples, primarily from low-income nations.
I begin by exploring the basic process of commodity
exchange under capitalism. I then consider nature as a
reluctant and uncooperative commodity that often requires
new institutions and technologies to be commodified. This
means conservation organizations play a crucial role in the
commodification of nature and have moved from the critical
margins of global capitalism to playing a key role in green
capitalism’s political economy. These developments are
likely to have significant social and environmental conse-
quences, with a highly uneven distribution of costs and
benefits.
Capitalism and commodities
At its most basic, capitalism can be described as a system for
organizing production (a ‘mode of production’in Marxian
terminology) based on private ownership, the exchange and
distribution of goods and services through markets, and
driven by the profit motive (Bowles, 2007). It is a distinct
and increasingly pervasive way of ‘making, moving and
selling all manner of goods and services’(Castree, 2003,
p. 274). As a mode of production it places considerable
emphasis on commodities.
A commodity can be defined as something that is
produced for the purpose of exchange (Kosoy & Corbera,
2010). So when conservation policy attempts to place an
economic value on the environmental services provided by
nature and promotes or facilitates the exchange of these
services for money, it can be said to be commodifying
nature. In other words, commodification is the ‘process
whereby goods formerly outside marketised spheres of
existence enter the world of money’(Bakker, 2005,p.545).
The concept of a commodity has a central role in political
economy, since it plays a crucial part in shaping social
relations and the relationship between humans and the
material world around them.
The simplest form of commodity exchange involves
bartering. We can represent this form of exchange as
Commodity to Commodity, or C–C. The point is that
commodities are exchanged because of their use values.
As well as bartering, money can be used as a form of mobile
value. This commodity exchange can be represented as
Commodity–Money–Commodity, or C–M–C. This allows a
commodity to be exchanged for money in one place, the
value stored or moved and then exchanged for another
commodity. The important point is that this doesn’t
necessarily change the purpose of the exchange, which
emphasizes the use value of that commodity.
There is considerable variation between societies (his-
torically and geographically) in what is considered to be
private property and what is exchanged as commodities
(Bowles, 2007). Under certain modes of production
commodities become a vehicle for profit and capital
accumulation; i.e. money is invested for the sole purpose
of making profit. This form of exchange is represented as
M–C–M. The emphasis here is not on what the commodity
can be used for but what it can be exchanged for: its
exchange value is prioritized over its use value. While
capitalism is by no means the only mode of production that
involves transactions based on exchange value, it makes
it a core principle. Capitalism is driven by competition,
wealth accumulation and an increase in the productive and
consumptive capacity of society. The logic of capitalism thus
dictates that capital continually searches for investment
opportunities and sources of continued economic growth;
i.e. new profitability frontiers. Because capitalism needs new
profitability frontiers, it must always be in search of new
objects and processes to commodify (Harvey, 2005). The
relentless quest for growth and profits has thus seen an ever
greater number and range of objects, assets and processes
come under private ownership and market exchange
(Watts, 1994; Harvey, 2003).
The most recent phase of global capitalism, emerging in
the late 1970s, is described as ‘neoliberal’. Broadly speaking,
neoliberalism can be described as a set of policy measures
informed by a distinct world-view that places emphasis on
individual liberty and freedom, minimal involvement of
the state, and free markets as the best way to coordinate
the diverse needs of people (Castree, 2003,2010; Harvey,
2005; Igoe et al., 2010; Peck, 2010). In terms of policy,
neoliberalism tends to promote the privatization of state
assets and common pool resources, clear property rights,
and the deregulation of markets to allow maximum
entrepreneurial freedom (Harvey, 2005; Castree, 2008;
Peck, 2010). Under green capitalism, previously uncommo-
dified aspects of the natural world are becoming part of
capitalism’sprofitability frontier. This is interpreted by
some scholars as the neoliberalization of conservation
(Igoe et al., 2010; Fletcher, 2012). The important question is
how the greater commodification of nature under green
capitalism might alter social and environmental relations.
From the perspective of political economy the answer to this
question depends on how nature behaves as a commodity.
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Nature as a reluctant and uncooperative
commodity
The problem with treating nature as a commodity is that it
is not produced specifically for the purpose of exchange.
Like land and labour, nature is a fictitious commodity
(Polanyi, 1944) and must be commodified through the
creation of new institutions and technologies (Harvey,
2005). However, nature can be a reluctant commodity and
hard to commodify. The neoclassical economic definition of
a commodity is based on the idea of a standardized good or
service, with interchangeable units and a price determined
through market exchange (Bakker, 2005). A good com-
modity (i.e. something that is straightforward to exchange)
has clear values, boundaries and property rights (Kosoy &
Corbera, 2010). This is the opposite of most ecosystems and
landscapes: their values are multiple, complicated and differ
between people and cultures, with often unclear and
contested ownership rights (Bakker, 2005; Carrier, 2010;
Castree, 2010).
Bakker’s(2005) research on the privatization of water
supply and management in England and Wales shows just
how uncooperative nature can be as a commodity. Water is
difficult to own, manage privately and commodify. Firstly,
its provision and use involves a set of complex and diffuse
biophysical processes: from precipitation to surface flow,
river flow and storage. Secondly, its provision is dependent
on major infrastructure that requires considerable invest-
ment and therefore favours monopoly control rather than
competing providers in a free market. Thirdly, flows of
water cut across political and economic boundaries at vari-
ous spatial levels, leading to complex politics of ownership
and control. Finally, water involves a diverse set of users
with different and sometimes conflicting priorities. Its priva-
tization and commodification has thus been both partial (i.e.
only part of the process can be privatized and commodified)
and highly contested (Castree, 2003; Bakker, 2005; Roberts,
2008). As I discuss in the next section, these factors have
often led to an uneven distribution of costs and benefits.
Because ecosystems and the services they provide are
complex, most conservation policy efforts to commodify
nature tend to focus on one or two specific services and also
simplify those services as much as possible. Looking at
carbon offsets for example, for the sake of simplicity and
efficacy, schemes tend to treat carbon as fungible; i.e.
different forms of carbon, locked up in different forms of
biomass and released through diverse processes, become
mutually substitutable. Carbon is thus converted into a
uniform commodity and separated from both its social and
ecological context so that it can be traded on global carbon
markets (van der Horst & Evans, 2010; Bumpus & Liverman,
2011). This is likely to lead to a narrowing of vision when
it comes to environmental policy, so that other values and
issues are crowded out.
In the context of climate change, the world’s forests are
increasingly seen through the lens of carbon sequestration.
The current priority is to reduce carbon in the atmosphere,
through whatever means: renewable energy, energy
efficiency or carbon offsets. Offsetting carbon by paying
low-income nations to maintain tropical forest cover
through avoided deforestation is seen as a cheap way of
doing this (Kindermann et al., 2008; Bumpus & Liverman,
2011). However, in privileging carbon, other social and
environmental concerns risk being forgotten. The focus on
carbon has already led to the planting of certain tree species
over others because of their high carbon content and rapid
growth rates, and could encourage investment in planta-
tions instead of work on restoring complex ecosystems or
maintaining biodiversity (Kosoy & Corbera, 2010).
The power relations behind the commodification
of nature
Given the fact that nature is often an uncooperative
commodity, the process by which it is commodified, and
its power relations, deserve special attention. Dealing first
with the question of ‘who does what’(Bernstein, 2010)ina
green capitalist mode of production, the commodification of
environmental services is based on its own distinctive
division of labour and elites. Given their largely fictitious
character, the commodities traded under green capitalism
rely on particular individuals and institutions to create and
maintain them. They also require new ways to quantify and
measure the services provided. Looking at regulating
services such as carbon sequestration for example, these
require complex scientific measurements and financial
mechanisms (Kosoy & Corbera, 2010). The elites in this
mode of production are the scientists who facilitate the
measurements of carbon, the consultants and organizations
who advise on carbon-offset projects, and the financial
experts and institutions who sell credits on carbon markets
(Bumpus & Liverman, 2008,2011). Looking at biodiversity
offsets, these also depend on the scientific and policy
mechanisms and institutions that measure and prioritize
biological diversity (MacDonald & Corson, 2012). The
result is likely to be unequal bargaining power between the
various actors (buyers, sellers and intermediaries), with
global buyers benefiting from greater experience, knowledge
and buying power (Karsenty, 2007; Bumpus & Liverman,
2008).
Conservation NGOs play a key role in the commodifica-
tion of nature. They have positioned themselves as gate-
keepers between capital and nature and have sought to
increase their influence by providing authoritative knowl-
edge on ecosystem function and management (MacDonald,
2010). Conservation organizations and the environmental
movement more generally have thus moved from being
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critical voices on the margins of capitalism to playing a
central role in creating new profitability frontiers and
enabling capital to expand into new areas (Fairhead et al.,
2012). In Madagascar, for example, a group of conservation
NGOs has formed a partnership with Rio Tinto/QMM,
providing advice on the environmental impacts of ilmenite
mining and helping to negotiate biodiversity offsetting,
receiving funding for conservation activities in the process
(Seagle, 2012).
Dealing with questions of ownership and distribution
(i.e. who owns what, who gets what, and what do they do
with it; Bernstein, 2010) there is concern that the
commodification of nature will result in an uneven
distribution of costs and benefits, with some even losing
access to natural resources. Research on the commodifica-
tion of water has shown what can happen when economic
efficiency is prioritized over social and environmental
equity. While in many cases the privatization of water has
resulted in an overall improvement in water supply, this is
usually accompanied by a large increase in costs for
consumers (Bakker, 2005; Roberts, 2008). This can have
serious socio-environmental impacts. In South Africa
privatization led to significant price hikes and resulted
in poor households being disconnected from the water
supply between 1994 and 2002 (Bond, 2004). In Kwazulu-
Natal this forced the poorest residents to access water from a
polluted river, leading to a cholera outbreak that killed
hundreds and infected thousands more (Bond, 2004;
Roberts, 2008).
Critics of green capitalism see a strong potential for so-
called green grabbing: the appropriation of land and natural
resources by elites both for environmental ends and to allow
further accumulation of wealth (Bumpus & Liverman, 2008;
Fairhead et al., 2012). It is likely that in low-income nations,
in particular, the potential wealth to be gained from
commodified environmental services will lead to a strong
incentive for elites (local, national and international) to take
control of natural resources (Sandbrook et al., 2010). Green
grabs could thus mirror the spate of recent agricultural land
grabs, which have seen a range of corporate and state
interests securing access to land for the cultivation of food
crops and biofuels, dispossessing rural households in the
process (Cotula & Vermeulen, 2009; Demirbas, 2009; White
et al., 2012). Green grabs have already been documented in a
number of different contexts and geographical locations. In
Tanzania and Colombia the desire to secure the cultural
environmental services that bring western ecotourists has
led to the enclosure of land and the redefinition of rights to
use natural resources, with communities excluded from
their previous livelihood activities (Benjaminsen &
Bryceson, 2012; Ojeda, 2012). In Madagascar protected
areas have been expanded to accommodate biodiversity
offsets related to mining operations, limiting local access to
forests (Seagle, 2012). In Uganda, households have lost
access to land acquired by a Norwegian company for carbon
forestry (Nel & Hill, 2013).
Dispossession doesn’t necessarily have to include
outright land grabs and the alienation of existing claimants,
but may also occur through the restructuring of rules that
govern access to and use of natural resources (Fairhead et al.,
2012). In the State of Chiapas in Mexico there is evidence
that smallholder farms are changing land-use strategies and
planting carbon sequestering trees as a new source of
income (Osborne, 2011). While in this case tree planting has
helped many households to secure land rights and generated
alternative sources of income, there have been important
differences in the distribution of costs and benefits between
and within households. To benefit from carbon offset
payments, households have had to shift from short-term
food production (for subsistence and cash) to managing
longer-term forestry-based income. However, poorer
households have been unable to give up short-term food
supply and many have complained about the insufficiency
of carbon payments in relation to the considerable labour
requirements. In some cases, the shift in balance away from
short-term food supply has resulted in tensions within
households (largely between men and women) about
livelihood priorities (Osborne, 2011).
Such arguments have been made before in relation to
community-based conservation (Hulme & Murphree,
2001). Although some households may benefit from new
sources of income (especially those that can afford to
abandon short-term subsistence activities), poorer house-
holds are often the most directly dependent on access to
natural resources such as forests and thus stand to lose the
most from any schemes that redefine resource use and
prioritize environmental services over other livelihood
options. It is likely that many attempts to commodify
environmental services will keep some individuals, house-
holds and communities in poverty traps as they are forced to
forgo more lucrative activities in order to protect environ-
mental services (Karsenty, 2007). These previous experi-
ences together with more recent case studies should serve as
a reminder of the complex multi-scalar political economy of
green capitalism. They suggest that winners and losers are
likely to be at multiple spatial levels, with uneven outcomes
within households, between households, between com-
munities, up to the international level.
Conclusion
Green capitalism is increasingly seen by many as the only
realistic way of achieving conservation goals. The expansion
of green capitalism has seen a proliferation of attempts to
commodify nature. For scholars drawing on political
economy, this is part of a long historical process of capitalist
expansion and the search for new profitability frontiers.
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This has often been achieved by moving assets from the
public domain to the private sphere, a process that Harvey
(2005) labeled ‘accumulation by dispossession’. However,
green capitalism differs in important ways from previous
waves of capitalist expansion.
The first significant difference is in the types of objects
and processes being commodified. The greening of
capitalism involves commodifying aspects of nature that
have never previously been commodities, for example
carbon sequestration and other ecosystem functions. The
second difference is in the diversity of actors and the role
played by conservation organizations. Whereas in previous
forms of commodity expansion conservation NGOs were
absent or only on the periphery, and often critiqued
business practices and relentless economic growth, many
have moved closer to those at the heart of the process
(Fletcher, 2012). Conservation NGOs are acting as media-
tors, facilitators and expert consultants in the commodifica-
tion of nature (Bumpus & Liverman, 2008; Brockington &
Scholfield, 2010; Fairhead et al., 2012). Finally, green
capitalism differs in the speed of change. The last decade
has seen an expansion in the aspects of social and natural life
that are treated as commodities. As Karl Polanyi (1944)
argued, it isn’t just the direction and extent of social change
that is important but the rate of change, since it influences
whether and how societies can adapt or push back against
such changes. Green capitalism proposes significant and
rapid changes in the relationship between society and
nature, seeking to mediate it principally through com-
modity exchange and market forces. The danger is that in
the rush to commodify nature, conservation serves the
interests of capital, rather than markets serving the interests
of biodiversity conservation. Perhaps it is time to slow down
and start asking questions.
The differences in the types of objects and processes
being commodified, the role of the various actors involved
and the speed of change under green capitalism ultimately
raises questions about the power relations at the heart of
green capitalism. Who will be the winners and losers and
who will decide? Green capitalism is likely to have its own
distinct political economy, with its own divisions of labour
and elites, raising questions that need to be addressed
urgently. For example, how is property being restructured
under green capitalism and to what extent does restructur-
ing lead to dispossession? How are costs and benefits
distributed at different points of the commodity chain,
between different stakeholders and at different spatial levels?
Who exercises power in a green capitalist mode of
production and how?
These questions point to a bigger question. As Michael
Sandel (2012,p.10–11) has argued, ‘without quite realizing it,
without ever deciding to do so, we drifted from having a
market economy to being a market soc iety.. . The great
missing debate in contemporary politics is about the role
and reach of markets’. Political economy reminds us
that particular modes of production are not inevitable.
The question shouldn’t be whether we can place a financial
value on nature, as if there is no other choice. The question
is should we?
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Biographical sketch
IVAN SCALES is a geographer specializing in environment and
development issues, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa. His research
emphasizes the role of political, cultural and economic factors in
shaping the way natural resources are used and contested. Current
research projects investigate the diversity of environmental values,
agriculture and food security, tropical deforestation, and community-
based approaches to conservation.
Paying for nature 231
Oryx
, 2015, 49(2), 226–231 ©2014 Fauna & Flora International doi:10.1017/S0030605314000015