Evolving motivations for participation in community-based conservation: a relational perspective
File(s)
Published online version
Author(s)
West, Lindsey
Luhanga, Isabellah
Mapunda, Irene C
Fish, Robert D
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Successful outcomes of community-based conservation, both ecological and social, rely on local actors being motivated to engage at the outset of the programme and to sustain their motivation over time. Using semi-structured interviews, we explore the motivations of 22 community Conservation Officers who have participated in marine turtle conservation in Tanzania for more than two decades. We focus on factors that motivated initial participation, as well as those that contributed to sustaining their participation over the past 20 years. Our study reveals the intricate dynamics of motivational processes, including the influence of values, identities, autonomy, agency, and power, which are shaped by relationships between nature, people, and place. With these findings, we challenge dominant assumptions about economic motivations and highlight the risk of over-reliance on monetary incentives to drive participation in community-based conservation.
Date Issued
2026-10-01
Date Acceptance
2026-09-02
Citation
Ambio, 2026
ISSN
0044-7447
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Journal / Book Title
Ambio
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s) 2026. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
Identifier
10.1007/s13280-026-02491-y.www.kva.se/en
Subjects
Community-based conservation
Marine turtles
Motivation
Participation
Relational
Tanzania
Publication Status
Published online
Date Publish Online
2026-10-01