Beyond ecological protection: unravelling the Social Matrix and biocultural drivers of heritage tree conservation

The long-term persistence of heritage trees is shaped by ecological suitability, species traits, land-use pressure, and climate, and may also depend on social arrangements that sustain protection across generations. Yet existing conservation frameworks rarely specify how cultural meaning, governance, knowledge, livelihoods, and collective capacity combine to produce durable stewardship. We conducted a theory-building evidence synthesis of published and selected comparative cases spanning sacred groves, church forests, fengshui forests, heritage-tree governance, and agricultural heritage landscapes across distinct institutional and cultural settings. The analysis addresses the social conditions under which protection is sustained. Comparative analysis identified six interacting dimensions of this social structure, namely culture, institutions, knowledge, economics, emotion, and organisation, which appear to operate through four functional pathways to support collective conservation action. The synthesis suggested that resilience was associated with pathway integration rather than with any single protective mechanism: cultural norms internalised protection, institutions established enforceable boundaries, economic benefits aligned livelihood interests with conservation, and organisational capacity converted dispersed commitments into monitoring and dispute resolution. Evidence from three multi-decadal or multi-generational trajectories were consistent with a bidirectional feedback loop in which strengthening social capacity preceded ecological recovery, whereas institutional erosion preceded conservation decline. We suggest extending the evaluative unit from tree condition alone to include the health of the Social Matrix, indicating that long-term heritage-tree conservation appears to depend on simultaneous attention to social relations, collective capacity, and ecological outcomes.