Mainstreaming ecosystem services: The hard work of realigning biodiversity conservation

Abstract

For over two decades, proponents of “ecosystem services” approaches have endeavored to transform the field of biodiversity conservation. In this article, I examine the work of the Natural Capital Project to show how the “mainstreaming” of ecosystem services has required not just hard work but specific forms of work performed by specific types of actors with specific sets of capabilities working through characteristic sorts of organizational contexts. I draw on key theorizations from organization studies to interpret the politics of ecosystem services and conceptualize the conditions (fragmented fields), practices (bricolage), actors (institutional entrepreneurs), and power relations (hegemonic) which have together comprised this work and underpinned ongoing efforts to realign the organizational forms and functions of mainstream conservation. I emphasize how tracing these micro-social foundations—the embedded agencies of those using ecosystem services to contextually negotiate real-world conservation interventions—is crucial to understanding the dynamics of broader and increasingly pronounced macro-institutional shifts in conservation.