For decades, literature on the management of green and blue spaces and their uses has been founded in two distinctive sources. The academic repository, comprising primarily peer-reviewed journal papers, has tended to detract practitioners for their very nature of academic design, composition, debate and discourse traditionally deployed. Yet within these works, a critical voice on both practice and theory is developed contributing to enhancements in the management of natural spaces. The alternative body of knowledge comprises practitioner publications and personal accounts. These are frequently descriptively formatted and articulated as prescriptions of best practice in the management of green and blue spaces and on the practical implementation of national and international policies.

Whilst each of these substantial bodies of interrelated knowledge facilitates insights into how the practice of managing green and blue spaces of cultural and environmental importance might be enhanced, the traditional two-pronged approach to literature, has, we contend, not been exploited to their fullest potential. Debates and key challenges, both new and traditional, could be enhanced by refining a model of co-working amongst practitioner and academic authors that might exploit the rigour of academic research with the in-depth expertise and insight of the practitioner across the range of rural and urban green and blue spaces found worldwide.

The importance of progressing this collaborative approach has been made even more important in recent years as a state of political, social, economic and environmental flux has developed worldwide. The results of this state are well known, and examples include at a regional level, the full socio-economic-political impacts of Brexit; at an international level a polycrisis driving the displaced and refugees; wars leading to insecurities of the most basic survival needs; extensive and increasingly intensive impacts of climate change; impacts on post-COVID-19 pandemic societies and threats of additional zoonotic sources of public health concerns.

Such events have resulted in multiple changes to environmental, political, economic, technological and social systems, impacting on how green and blue spaces worldwide are being managed. In order to contribute to their long-term and sustainable management, this information needs to be captured, reported in documentary sources and research is required to enable the potential for refreshed if not revised practice. Many of the most current challenges in the management of greenspaces and protected areas and voids in current literature will be addressed in this book ‘Managing Protected Areas: People and Places’.

As with any publication project, relying upon specially commissioned papers and the constraints of people with busy and challenging work schedules, our original concept for the book shifted over time. Initially, we had an idea to present a more structured and ‘siloed’ work, with chapters grouped under thematic concerns. In each case an academic would be working alongside a practitioner, and essentially would engage in a dialectic approach, working towards a synthesis of background ideas and a melding together of theory and practice. Essentially this ethos has been preserved, but the end result the reader experiences here, has evolved over the last two highly eventful years worldwide and has involved a great deal of conversation and debate. We feel the present result is actually far better, capturing many of the key issues and new ways of thinking that have evolved around the relationship between people and green and blue spaces worldwide as they have unfolded.

We have attempted to move beyond purely the confines of natural heritage and have brought together a range of authors from many different academic and practice-based backgrounds. This makes we feel, for a stronger and more diverse volume and one which we think essentially captures the key themes, issues and debates around wider approaches to the management of natural heritage and cultural heritage in the twenty-first century. This book frequently considers applied research and practice. It is therefore not only aimed at academics, practitioners and policymakers working in the area of natural heritage and cultural heritage, it also provides for many insightful debates of universal value, demonstrates the application of theoretical frameworks in practice and addresses voids in our knowledge base, providing for alternative and practical solutions. As such there will unquestionably be utility in this work for the undergraduate and postgraduate students of social, environmental, health and political sciences. We engage with place and space on a quotidian basis and, as we emphasise here, there are many challenges and dangers which we face. Above all, this book we believe emphasises the key principle that people and places are essentially interlinked and interdependent. Through recognising these interconnections, we demonstrate importance for a sustainable approach to managing green and blue spaces that is underpinned by encouraging and maintaining the importance of peoples and places.

In the 16 specially commissioned chapters that follow, you will find a number of different voices from different backgrounds, working at the regional, national and international scales of engagement. There are some resonant names, and perhaps others that may not yet be known within the world of natural heritage management. We urged at the outset that the authors took a personal and (if they needed to) challenging and provocative (in the best sense) overview. We encouraged a personal, expressive and reflective writing style, admitting to problems where they were found and seeking ways to do things better. The tone we hope is constructive and proactive and not in any sense redolent of professional navel gazing.

The authors we have gathered here are in many cases professional colleagues and acquaintances drawn from pretty much a 360° perspective of the management of natural heritage and its relationship with the public. Naturally a good deal of the book focuses upon the disciplines of human and (to some extent) physical geography and its related concerns. So there is a core emphasis upon ecological and environmental issues, as well as elements that relate to the tourist industry and the pressures that sector entails. This is only part of the picture, however. Other themes we articulate are around health and wellbeing, educational outreach and to the far less reported context of spirituality, important themes in the concept of post-COVID-19 approaches to our relationship with natural spaces. So, in this connection the reader will be exposed to ideas drawn from psychology, archaeology, anthropology, religious studies, even Islamic and Jewish theology and to the application of information technologies and virtual reality experiences.

As we have noted above, we have attempted to give a degree of editorial free rein. The only condition that we stress is that each chapter must relate to the core ethos of the book: that the relationship between people and places is something to be celebrated, and promoted in the years after the COVID-19 pandemic and against a background of climate change. We acknowledge the fragility of our natural heritage and do not pretend to offer definitive solutions, instead we hope to provoke a constructive and ongoing debate which is illustrated where appropriate with case study examples. The chapters vary in length and are written in many cases (except for Chapters 2 and 3) from diverse and multiple viewpoints. The chapters are of course fully referenced and the additional of URL links and doi links allows for an easy follow up of the key information. The language is, we hope, accessible, and graphics where added are intended to be informative and to capture the human spirit of the chapters.

The second chapter is written by someone who will need no introduction to many of the readers of this volume. Nigel Dudley’s work on broad-scale conservation, protected areas and society and environment gives him an informed, analytical and evaluative insider’s view on the most current and critical issues facing protected areas in the twenty-first century. In Chapter 2 ‘What does the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) mean for protected and conserved areas?’ Dudley takes a critical and insightful view on the current progress of the GBF and its ambitious attempts to meet the 30 × 30 target of conserving at least 30 per cent of land, inland water and marine ecosystems in protected and conserved areas by 2030. A lively, reporting writing style is retained highlighting the complex and nuanced political contortions of the development of the GBF and its implications for nature conservation.

Chapter 3 ‘landscapes of the romantic sublime: the legacy of nineteenth-century artistic visions and contributions to the development of the management of natural heritage’ sets out a deep culture-historical context for the philosophy of natural heritage management in the UK. It is written by Niall Finneran who is from an archaeological-cultural heritage background demonstrates how the romantic cultural movement of the late eighteenth–nineteenth century framed our perceptions of landscape and informed Victorian management strategies, principles of which remain with us today.

Chapter 4 focuses on a case study drawn from the insular Caribbean. Writing with Niall Finneran is Tara Inniss, a Caribbean academic and heritage practitioner based in Barbados. This chapter, ‘Islandscapes: tourism, COVID, climate change and challenges to natural landscapes. A Caribbean perspective and view from Barbados’ considers specifically the management of the fragile natural heritage of the Caribbean islands. Inniss’ work has focused upon heritage and wellbeing, and she was instrumental in helping frame the UNESCO World Heritage Site management plan for the Garrison site in Bridgetown. She has worked alongside Finneran in mainly an archaeological capacity, but both authors here bring their wider disciplinary and geographical perspectives together to throw light on a somewhat understudied geographical area.

In recent years, the National Trust of England and Wales has come in for some stringent political criticism from certain sectors of the national media and the political world for its attempts to make itself more inclusive and also to reveal hidden histories relating to its holdings (note we make no mention of the concept of ‘rewriting history’!). The National Trust is perhaps the premier management framework for natural and cultural heritage in England and Wales, and building on the historical contexts for its establishment previously discussed in Chapter 3, Chapter 5 (‘managing heritage landscapes of cultural value: a view from the National Trust portfolio in Purbeck, southern England’) brings a practitioner view on the realities of managing a prime area of historical and tourist-focused real estate in Dorset, southwestern England: the Isle of Purbeck. Tracey Churcher manages this glorious portion of the National Trust estate in England, her background is in heritage management, and writing with Niall Finneran, the challenges of her daily work in the post-COVID-19 world are laid bare.

Chapter 6 ‘Between high and low tide. Participatory approaches to managing England’s coastal and riverine natural and cultural heritage: a case study from the CITIZAN initiative’ is written from a maritime-archaeology perspective. It essentially draws attention to the importance of collaborative and participatory approaches to the conservation of the fragile coastal cultural and natural heritage of the UK. The lessons learned here are equally applicable in other geographical contexts, as the authors (who both have worked with the Coastal and Intertidal Zone Archaeological Network initiative, or CITIZAN) outline. Sea level rise is a real fact, and it is threatening many coastal assets. Oliver Hutchinson has been working on the frontline of community focused heritage leadership in the Essex region, and alongside Niall Finneran outlines the rewards (and pitfalls) of a collaborative public-facing approach.

Chapter 7 brings us back to the Caribbean but a quite different social, cultural and economic context from that offered by Barbados. Haiti is one of the poorest islands in the Caribbean and a nation state that faces real developmental challenges. Unlike the rest of the Caribbean, tourism here is relatively under-developed. We have asked three Haitian scholars and practitioners, Hugues Séraphin, a tourism academic, Jocelyn Belfort, a PhD student in Paris, and Godson Lubrun, who works at the Ministry of Tourism in Haiti, to offer their thoughts in a contribution entitled ‘Managing a UNESCO World Heritage Site in a post-colonial, post-conflict and post-disaster destination. The case of the Haitian National History Park’. They touch upon the value of local guides, and the pride in which the community take in a site with a very real social memory. Although this chapter focuses more upon a cultural heritage site, the implications for broader audience engagement are foregrounded.

In recognition that much of what constitutes best practice in protected area and spatial management of green and blue spaces relates to principles of project management, we turn in Chapter 8 to ‘sustainable project management of green spaces, protected and conserved areas—opportunities, challenges and pitfalls’. Malgorzata Radomska’s expertise in generic project management, anchors this chapter on academic theories in responsible management, operational excellence and leadership skills. Two of the authors, Richard Clarke and Denise Hewlett have considerable and wide-ranging experience around the design and delivery of multiple projects and programmes in the natural environment. Richard Clarke has a long track record in working alongside environmental organisations in the UK, particularly as the national policy and development manager for the National Association for Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (NAAONBs) . Denise Hewlett brings her international academic and practitioner expertise to bear on the issues and problems in sustainable management of projects in the planning and management of green spaces and protected areas.

We then change the tone towards a wellbeing and spiritual focus. Chapter 9, ‘(Re)connecting with Nature: exploring nature-based interventions for psychological health and wellbeing’ is led by Debra Gray, a social psychologist at the University of Winchester with an interest in the relationship between place and participation, and on the link between collective participation, social identities and health and wellbeing. This chapter considers the work she has led alongside Denise Hewlett and two of the Stepping into Nature project leads at the Dorset AONB, Julie Hammon and Stephanie Aburrow, on the strategies and projects deployed in making nature more accessible to a wider range of stakeholders and above all the part that this plays in fostering wellbeing. This issue has come to the fore in the post-COVID-19 world.

Chapter 10, ‘Significant spaces: exploring the health and wellbeing impacts of natural environments’ draws upon a wide range of differing perspectives. Led by Denise Hewlett, and involving expertise drawn from social psychology (Gray), statistical analysis (Gunton), tourism (Agarwal), landscapes planning and management (Hewlett), projects in nationally important protected areas and networks (Munro), microbiome sciences (Breed, Skelly, Weinstein) GIS analysis (Terradillos) and data gathering (Lavrushkina and Byrne) this chapter picks up on some of the case study ideas laid out in Chapter 8. It offers both a wider perspective on how we can most effectively and sustainably use the natural environment to improve people’s health and make a positive difference in their lives and introduces a conceptual framework that determines what it is about natural environments that impacts and enhances our health and wellbeing.

Chapters 11 and 12 are essentially complementary and take a more spiritual and religious direction. In these two chapters, Christina Welch, Reader in religious studies at the University of Winchester works with two religious studies practitioners, a Jewish Rabbi, Neil Amswych, based in the USA, but formerly based in Dorset, England (Chapter 11 ‘Judaism and engagements with nature: theology and practice’) and Fahima Rahman, a young Muslim woman from northern England (Chapter 12 ‘Islam and engagements with nature; theology and practice’). In both chapters, the dialogue is established through Welch’s extensive knowledge of both Jewish and Islamic theology and writings and the practical issues of religious engagements with environmental practice. In the case of Judaism, we see how theology is adapting to the realities of climate change, and in the case of Islam, through Rahman’s personal experiences, we see the real issues around racism and accessibility to green spaces.

Chapter 13 ‘what have we learned from the impact of the Pandemic on our relationship with nature? The importance of views from home’ is written by Marco Garrido-Cumbrera and Olta Braçe who are both geographers based in Spain. Their unique perspective frames how we experience the natural world through our windows. Again considering the health benefits of engaging with the natural world, we see here the importance during the pandemic of being able to view nature and see it, even if we couldn’t necessarily engage with it first-hand. Drawing upon the results of the GreenCOVID survey, and subjects from Spain, the UK and Republic of Ireland, the importance of secondary experience of nature is clearly defined. It is an unusual and compelling study that draws together architectural space, natural space and human perception and wellbeing.

Chapter 14 ‘impacts and lessons learned from the COVID-19 Pandemic for protected and conserved area management’ is authored by a team with links to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (Sharma; Pasha), the World Wildlife Fund (Ferreira) and wider approaches to conservation policy and practice in the Americas (Golden-Kroner). The chapter considers the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on protected and conserved areas and draws upon case studies from across the world, but particularly Latin American and African regions with long-standing economic issues, and highlights the importance of green listing these sites to best achieve a more sustainable and effective management framework.

Chapter 15, ‘tourism and visitor management in protected areas post pandemic: the English context’ focuses on primary research, funded by National Geographic, that evaluated what impact post-pandemic tourism was having on areas of environmental and cultural importance. Presented in this chapter is primary fieldwork and data gathering undertaken at coastal sites in southern Dorset. The relaxing of social restrictions during the Summers of 2020 and 2021 resulted in an almost unprecedented demand for visits to rural locations. Southern Dorset, within easy reach of a large number of conurbations, certainly bore the brunt of this influx of tourists and as we see in this chapter not all of the effects were positive.

Chapter 16 ‘climate change—protected areas as a tool to address a global crisis’ is led by Zachary Cannizzo of the Climate Coordinator with the NOAA Office of National Marine Sanctuaries—National Marine Protected Areas Center, Washington DC alongside Elise Bell of the World Conservation Monitoring Centre, Risa Smith of the IUCN and Tom Mommsen of the University of Victoria in Canada. This chapter provides for a detailed and comprehensive current perspective on the impact of climate change on protected areas and seeks to find ways to use them more proactively as a means for mitigating the worst effects of climate change.

Chapter 17 is written by two psychologists, Simon Grassini and Eleanor Ratcliffe. Entitled ‘the virtual wild: exploring the intersection of virtual reality (VR) and natural environments’, the authors consider the powerful potential for the deployment of VR as a means of simulating human experience of the natural world as a cost-effective and easily accessed tool to improve human wellbeing. Taking a broad view of the technological developments in the area, the authors discuss issues around simulation and stimulation and what is an imaginative and hi-tech methodology for accessing natural spaces.

These chapters represent a broad and in many cases, unique approach to discussions taken on the management of natural spaces. The collection of discussions engages to varying degrees with the social, political, environmental and technological sciences and their value includes the currency of their content. The editors thank all the contributors for their work here and also thank the staff at the publisher for their patience whilst the project came to fruition. It has been a stimulating and thought-provoking experience to share several different yet complimentary perspectives. The relationship between people and places is a profound part of our existence, yet perhaps we take it for granted. It is hoped that the case studies, discussions and arguments presented in this volume will contribute if only in some small part to helping us think through the implications of this relationship. Let us round this introductory section off with a thought-provoking quotation from the Kenyan environmental activist, the late Wangarĩ Muta Maathai (1940–2011), which summarises our position in this book:

We all share one planet and are one humanity; there is no escaping this reality.

https://www.forbes.com/2009/04/21/challenge-africa-excerpt-opinions-business-visionaries-maathai.html?sh=3e59273e1b23.