Sustainability in the Scottish Highlands : A Critical Ethnography of a Community Biosphere

Explores ways to create more just and sustainable futures for people and nature through lessons from a community-governed Biosphere in the Scottish Highlands.

This book addresses the topic of sustainability in the Scottish Highlands, offering a critical ethnography of the Wester Ross UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. It explains what the UNESCO designation means in theory and practice and the community governance model adopted. Framed by critical theory, it unpacks the idea of the Biosphere as an alternative to ‘common sense’, a way to overcome the nature–culture dichotomy and capitalist, colonial ideologies. Zoe Malcolm outlines negotiations of nature–culture relationships, power and scale, focusing on actors within the Biosphere and situating these perspectives in wider national and international contexts. She explores examples such as tourism and place-making, community empowerment, nature conservation, heritage conservation, Gaelic language, crofting and land ownership.