Journal article
Trends in Wildlife Management and the Appropriateness of Australian University Training
Conservation Biology, Vol.13(4), pp.842-849
1999
Abstract
That the greatest challenges in conservation are often not technical but rather economic or sociological has been expressed for at least the last 20 years. This raises the question of whether the training offered to tomorrow's conservation practitioners prepares them sufficiently to deal with the human dimensions of conservation. We analyzed 747 papers from seven wildlife management and conservation biology journals to determine the trends in this area of conservation management between 1985 and 1995. We found that over that time the emphasis stayed on single-species issues with a science focus, but there was a marked shift toward conservation biology issues, management-oriented research, and discussion of economic and social factors relevant to management. We also examined the handbooks of 11 Australian universities to analyze the content of 439 compulsory subjects in 12 degrees that we judged could produce wildlife managers. More than 68% of subjects were from a basic science or technology discipline, 16% from resource management, and only 13% from economics, humanities, communications, or planning. Thus, many of the skills required by contemporary wildlife managers must be learned in postgraduate training or on the job. Much of the undergraduate training syllabus, in Australia at least, does not reflect trends in the practice of wildlife management today and will not provide tomorrow's managers with the range of disciplinary understanding required. We were able, however, to identify three types of undergraduate training-ecological system managers, environmental managers, and human system managers-and we found that the curricula in human-system management contained increased emphasis on socioeconomic issues relevant to management.
Details
- Title
- Trends in Wildlife Management and the Appropriateness of Australian University Training
- Authors
- G S Baxter (Author)M Hockings (Author) - University of QueenslandR W (Bill) Carter (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Science, Health and EducationR J S Beeton (Author) - University of Queensland
- Publication details
- Conservation Biology, Vol.13(4), pp.842-849
- Publisher
- Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Inc.
- DOI
- 10.1046/j.1523-1739.1999.98274.x
- ISSN
- 0888-8892
- Organisation Unit
- School of Law and Society; University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland; School of Social Sciences - Legacy; Sustainability Research Centre
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 99449713602621
- Output Type
- Journal article
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632 Record Views
InCites Highlights
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- Web Of Science research areas
- Biodiversity Conservation
- Ecology
- Environmental Sciences
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Source: InCites