Have We Ever Been Natural? Rethinking Nature Conservation in the Anthropocene

The Anthropocene challenges the premise of separate natural and human spheres that underlies the human/nature dualism in conservation. Using a conceptual analysis of proposed Anthropocene starting points (golden spikes), we argue that this distinction arises from historical conceptions that produced what we term an “exhibitionary order of nature”—the 18th-19th century practices of collecting, cataloging, and displaying nature that established baselines still used in conservation today. This order focuses on preserving idealized pristine ecosystems while obscuring the contexts in which modern conservation ideology emerged. Contemporary conservation increasingly recognizes the entanglement of human and nature in anthropogenic landscapes, while the human/nature dualism still shapes practices of defining and managing protected areas. Drawing on science and technology studies, political ecology, and decolonial thought, we examine the origins and impacts of this dualism and propose that the Anthropocene demands transcending it to develop conservation approaches that embrace the naturalness of nature-culture hybrids.