For more than a century, conservationists have worked to preserve natural ecosystems by creating national parks and protected areas. Today the Earth faces a global biodiversity crisis, with more than 1 million species at risk of extinction. This makes it even more important to conserve places where at-risk species can thrive. In 2022, governments around the world committed to protect 30% of the entire planet by 2030, nearly doubling the current coverage. They also agreed to respect the rights of Indigenous peoples, whose lands contain large shares of the world's remaining natural ecosystems. But such promises have often been broken. Historically, governments and private conservation organizations have typically insisted that only pristine, human-free parks can properly conserve nature. In many places, including U.S. national parks, authorities have forcibly removed people who lived on and cared for those lands for centuries. I am a lawyer and law professor, and my work has focused...
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