This book provides a review of the multitude of conservation concepts, both from a scientific, philosophical and social science perspective.

Kurt Jax is Senior Scientist at the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ in Leipzig, Germany, and Professor of Ecology at the TUM School of Life Sciences at the Technical University of Munich, Germany. He is the author of Ecosystem Functioning (2010).

1. Introduction

2. Situating conservation: definitions, origins, and context

3. Analysing conservation concepts

4. Western and non-Western ideas of nature and nature conservation

5. Moving forward: which conservation concepts for which purposes?

6. Conclusions and outlook