Aumentar o reducir el pasivo:

I n December 1989 a World Heritage Committee meeting in Paris formally accepted a revised nomination from Australia leading to the creation of the Tasmanian

Wilderness World Heritage Area and its inscription on the World Heritage List. A much larger area than the former Western Tasmanian Wilderness National Parks World Heritage Area, it satisfied all four criteria for l isting as a natural property. The area was:

• an outstanding example representing the major stages of the earth's evolutionary history; and

• an outstanding example representing significant ongoing geological processes and biological evolution;

and contained

• superlative natural phenomenon, formations and features; and • the most important and significant natural habitats where threatened

species of animals and plants of outstanding universal value from the point of view of science still survive.43

Similarly, the Committee determined that the rich undisturbed suite of Pleistocene and more recent coastal Aboriginal sites, as well as the remains of the Macquarie Harbour penal settlement, met three of the criteria established for cultural property. These sites, the Committee determined:

• bear a unique testimony to a civilisation which has disappeared;

• are an outstanding example of a traditional human settlement which is

representative of a culture which has become vulnerable under the impact of irreversible change; and

• are tangibly associated with events of outstanding universal significance.44

43 Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage, Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area: 1992 Management Plan, Hobart, Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage, 1992, p. 1 3 .

Once the nomination of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area had been accepted, the Tasmanian Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage set about planning for its management.4S The task was immense. Of those areas that now lay within the new World Heritage Area, only the long-established Cradle

Mountain-Lake St Clair National Park had a current management plan. Many of the new areas, in European terms alone, had experienced forestry activity, mining, grazing, hunting, hydro-electric development and a variety of forms of recreation, and many of these land uses were continuing. While a place of internationally important natural and cultural values, it was also important in various social and economic ways to the Tasmanian economy. The context of the proposed planning process was also challenging. The creation of the TWWHA had been occasioned by rancorous conflict and the boundaries of the area were more the product of political accommodation than the result of careful conservation planning. There were also well-developed expectations about what the Plan might deliver. The Wilderness Society, for example, wanted the removal of introduced trout from streams, the cessation of the production of detailed maps, the removal of buildings, the closure of roads and, above all, the banning of a range of recreational practices such as hunting, horse riding, four-wheel driving and the use of companion dogs - all activities it regarded as inconsistent with wilderness.46 Groups comprising the Tasmanian Traditional and Recreational Land Users Federation had also clearly

flagged their position arguing strongly for the retention of a range of traditional practices and the maintenance of a rich and valued cultural landscape.47

45 From the 1980s to the late 1990s the Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service went through a number of name changes, amalgamations and organisational realignments in response to government initiatives. In 1987, for example, the Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service amalgamated with the Tasmanian Lands Department to form the Department of Lands, Parks and Wildlife. In 1989 the new department became the Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage. In 1993 an amalgamation with the Department of the Environment led to the creation of the Department of Environment and Land Management and in 1998 further amalgamations, this time with the Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries, saw the creation of the Department of Primary Industries, Water and Environment. In 2002, the Parks and Wildlife Service was split off and became part of a new Department of Tourism, Parks, Heritage and the Arts. In order to avoid confusion, the term the 'Parks Service' will be used as a shorthand to designate that division of the larger department or entity that is responsible for the planning and management of the protected area estate in Tasmania throughout this period.

46 Wilderness Society, World Heritage Area Draft Management Plan: Initial Submission, 26/2/90, prepared by the Wilderness Society World Heritage Area Management Group, submission held by the Department of Primary Industries, Water and Environment,

Tasmania; Wilderness Society, 'Input urgently needed for World Heritage Area management guidelines in Tasmania', Wilderness News Emergency Tasmanian Edition, February, 1990.

47 See, for example, The Combined Riding Groups, 'Horse Riding on the Central Plateau: a Submission to the Government of Tasmania', unpublished submission in possession of author, 1990.

The Service's own initial position was broadly ecocentric in orientation. In a Draft Management Strategy released in December 1 989 designed to give 'an overview of the planning procedure and timetable as well as draft objectives, concepts and policies', the Service placed great value on the maintenance of the 'pristine and remote character of the WHA'.48 The maintenance of wilderness quality, it argued, 'is the best management strategy for conserving the significant natural and cultural values of the WHA in the long term'.49 Accordingly, it continued, 'conservation of natural values will be achieved by retaining the majority of the area in an

undeveloped condition and attempting to minimise external influences in order that natural processes continue unimpeded.'50 This commitment to the

maintenance and enhancement of wilderness quality as a planning outcome before the planning task had commenced, it may be argued, had certain implications for the planning style adopted by the Service. The World Heritage Convention, Marcus Lane notes, prescribes exacting goals of management commensurate with the international significance of the properties inscribed on the World Heritage List. 51 The application of these predefined goals in a planning context typically requires a strongly centralised, top-down form of planning which, Lane argues - drawing on the planning literature - undermines conservation objectives by 'causing local conflicts, exacerbating problems with local acceptance and producing behaviours not conducive to conservation'. sz Planners working on properties listed under the

Convention, Lane suggests, thus face a particular dilemma where the prescriptive goals of management planning are often opposed to the need to 'rna tch

management priorities to local circumstances' and to ensure that 'socio-economic integration is a fundamental feature of effective conservation management'. 53 Whatever the particular merits of Lane's argument may be in relation to the World Heritage Convention per se, it is clear that few planning scenarios could be more prescriptive than the maintenance of wilderness. If wilderness quality is to be strictly maintained, there can be little, if any, compromise. On this basis, therefore, the wilderness presumption of the Tasmanian Park Service planners necessarily involved the adoption of a strongly centralised 'command' style of planning in an effort to guarantee the desired outcome. Typical features of this style of planning, as Lane

48 Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage, Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area

Draft Management Strategy, December 1989, unpublished, p. 2. 49 ibid., p. 13.

so

ibid., p. 15.

S l _{Marcus Lane,'World Heritage Convention: A Dilemma for Conservation Planners',}

Australian Parks and Recreation, Vol. 32, No. 4, 1996, p. 16.

5� ibid., p . 17.

reveals, are the use of compulsory targets as a method of implementation, the use of sanctions as the predominant form of control, the production of a formal document as the predominant orientation of planning, and elevation of the bureaucratic specialist into the role of expert. 54 The outcomes of the adoption of this style of planning by the Parks Service, in a political environment marked by conflict and lack of trust, were immediately evident.

The Draft Management Strategy also outlined the planning process the Service i ntended to follow in developing the Management Plan. It proposed, for example, a two-stage process which gave the public two opportunities to be formally involved in the planning process: first, in providing initial comment as part of what the Service called 'the public participation program' and, second, in formally responding

to the Draft Management Plan. 55 The Service launched the first stage of its

consultation strategy - the public participation program - in December 1 989 with the production of a series of posters, displays, articles, advertisements and the launch of a series of 'planning note sheets' on a range of management issues. The planning note sheets played a particularly important role in shaping the form and content of later debate. Designed to 'assist people in making considered and focussed submissions',56 each note sheet contained questions which were intended to guide the public in the type of response that would assist in formulating

management policies. Consistent with their command planning style, the subjects were carefully chosen by the Parks Service. Not surprisingly they concerned

themselves not so much with threats to the conservation of threatened species or the protection of ancient archaeological deposits - that is to say, with threats to the World Heritage values - but with perceived threats to wilderness quality with

subjects including aircraft use, campfires, fire management, huts, four-wheel driving, and horse riding.57

54 Marcus Lane, 'The Importance of Planning Context: The Wet Tropics Case', Environmental and Planning Law Journal, October, 1997, p. 370. In the Tasmanian case the requirements of the World Heritage Convention, the joint management arrangements between Tasmania and the Australian government and the wilderness issue collectively conspired to impose a top­ down planning approach. Given the modernist underpinning of Park Service philosophy, however, it could be argued that top-down planning styles are the preferred model of national park planners.

55 Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage, 'Draft Management Strategy', p. 12.

56 Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage, Managing Tasmania's World Heritage Area Public Participation Program: Summary of Submissions, Hobart, Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage, 1990, p. 3.

57 It is of interest in this regard to note the recollections of Parks Service planner Nick Sawyer that the consultation process leading up to the development of the 1992 Management Plan was, 'wracked with controversy' with the Service accused of bias and, in relation to the planning note sheets, of leading opinion. See Nicholas Sawyer, 'The Development of the 1 999

In early to mid 1 990, after reviewing more than 600 public submissions, the Service began firming up its policy position on a range of issues including those that had been the subject of the planning note sheets. In October 1990, it released the first draft of the Draft Management Plan for internal review. In this draft the ecocentrism evident in the draft management strategy was more strongly expressed. The

management objectives in respect of protection and conservation, for example, were to:

• maintain and increase wilderness quality;

• maintain and restore ecological communities and processes;

• maintain viable populations of all native species;

• maintain and i ncrease scenic quality; • protect the cultural heritage;

• allow natural processes to operate without human disturbance.58

The majority of these objectives, carried through in almost identical form to the final version of the Management Plan in 1 992, are overtly ecocentric. Of particular interest is the relationship they suggest between humans and the TWWHA. The TWWHA is presented as a wilderness refuge whose ecological communities and

processes possess intrinsic value. People are inherently destructive of these values, therefore human influence must be removed. The appropriate human role is to demonstrate humility to the environment not just by ceasing destructive behaviour but by enhancing the environment's ability to determine its own future. Humans 1maintain', 1protect' and 1restore' but do not dominate or direct. Parks Service acceptance of this ecocentric vision of the TWWHA led directly to the elevation of the maintenance of wilderness quality as the dominant management imperative. 1The long term protection of many natural and cultural values', the Service argued in the final Plan, 1Will be assisted by the perpetuation of the remote and undisturbed characteristics of the area and, hence, the maintenance and enhancement of wilderness quality will, in general, be the over-riding objective for management of

Management Plan for the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area (Australia)', in D avid Cole, Stephen McCool, William Barrie and jennifer O'Loughlin (camps), Wilderness Science in a Time o(Cizange Con(ermce - Volume 5: Wilderness Ecosystems, Threats and Management; 1 999, May 23-27, Missoula, MT, _{Proceedings RMRS-Pp15-Vol.15, Ogden, UY. Department of}

Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Research Station, 2000.

58 Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage, Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area:

Draft Management Plan (29 October 1990 version), unpublished working document, 1990, p . 19. The World Heritage Convention requires state parties to 'protect, conserve, present and, where necessary, rehabilitate the natural and cultural heritage'. The objectives stated were the primary objectives for 'protection and conservation'. There were also 'presentation' objectives as well as some unrelated statutory objectives such as the need to minimise hazards to life and property.

future activities and developments in the area'. s9 One key strategy that was adopted early in the planning process to give effect to this objective was the division of the TWWHA into four zones, the Wilderness Zone, the Self-Reliant Recreation Zone, the Recreation Zone and the Visitor Services Zone/Site with the Wilderness Zone

occupying well over half the TWWHA.60

Given the primacy accorded to wilderness, it is perhaps a little surprising to note the lack of precision and specificity afforded its definition in the Plan. 'The term

"wilderness", the Plan notes, 'means different things to different people' but the commonly recognised attributes of wilderness', the Plan states, ' are remoteness and naturalness.'61 While accepting the ecocentric notion that wilderness exists

regardless of whether humans are present to experience it,62 the Plan, nonetheless, defined wilderness in recreational terms as 'land remote from access by mechanised vehicles and from within which there is little or no consciousness of the

environmental disturbance of contemporary people'_63 In this way 'wilderness recreation value' - the human perception of wilderness - became the surrogate for wilderness itself, and, with the use of methodologies to measure view field

disturbance, was rendered capable of being objectively measured. However wilderness was defined, the outcome was the same. The most effective way of enhancing wilderness quality, the Plan argued, 'is to remove redundant structures and close and rehabilitate vehicle tracks that are highly visible'.64 Accordingly, key policies for the Wilderness Zone included·the progressive removal of remaining structures and developments not of scientific or cultural significance, no provision of facilities or tracks and no fuel reduction burning.65

The opening position of the Parks Service then, in developing the Management Plan for the TWWHA, was to align itself closely with the Wilderness Society in projecting an ecocentric vision for how the TWWHA should be managed. It was a vision

59 Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage, Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area:

1 992 Management Plan, p. 17.

60 Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage, Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area: Draft Management Plan (29 October 1990 version), p. 22. The zoning proposal was a consistent feature of all drafts of the Plan, including the final 1992 Plan.

61 Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage, Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area: 1 992 Management Plan, p. 19. This looseness in definition was a feature carried through all drafts of the Plan.

62 ibid. 63 ibid., p. 40.

64 Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage, Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area: 1 991 Draft Management Plan, Hobart, Department of Parks, Wildlife and Heritage, 1991, p. 20.

pregnant with misanthropic intent - it argued not simply that, as wilderness, the TWWHA was best managed by being left alone, but that there was a responsibility to enhance wilderness quality by erasing evidence of past human activity. This was not a view that was broadly shared in the Tasmanian community. The reason for this was that wilderness had many meanings. While for the Parks and Wildlife Service and environmentalists it was a progressive and ethical ideal, for other people, especially those from adjacent communities, it was an oppressive concept, one that sought to erase their history and deny them access to valued landscapes. Rather than seeing wilderness as serving the interests of society, these groups saw it as the tool of an urban elite used for their own ends irrespective of the needs and desires of rural communities and ordinary people. One such group were those folk living adjacent to the Upper Mersey and the Central Plateau. In the period up to the Labor/Green Accord of 1 989, members of these communities came face-to-face with the politics of wilderness in opposing the World Heritage listing of freehold land in the

Lemonthyme, in fighting the removal of the Tiger Hut and in lobbying against moves to ban horse riding from the Central Plateau. Politicised as a result of these experiences they were acutely sensitive to its expression and implacably opposed to its implementation. It was, in fact, the perceived strength of the political

sponsorship of ecocentrism, following the Accord and the creation of the TWWHA, that prompted the creation of Tasmanian Traditional and Recreational Land Users Federation (TIRLUF) in early 1990. These negative views of wilderness were widely held in rural and regional areas of Tasman"ia. In the electoral context, as we shall see, this was politically significant.

The extent to which traditional land users challenged the scope and expression of the ecocentrism displayed in early drafts of the Plan was clearly evident in the development of the critical policies relating to European cultural heritage. There were two important contests in relation to this subject, one concerned with how cultural heritage should be defined and the other revolving around the future of the large number and range of European structures within the TWWHA. In terms of the first contest, TTRLUF groups had a broad understanding of what constituted cultural heritage. The Tasmanian Mountain Cattlemen's Association, for example, saw cultural heritage not simply as the physical artefacts of long use and association but also as comprising intangible values such as 'on-going traditional practices'.66 The Combined Riding Group similarly saw traditional activities such as horse riding as 'a vital and living part of our culture . . . that has been carried on for one hundred and

fifty years'_67 For these groups certain sections of the TWWHA were vibrant, living

66 Tasmanian Mountain Cattlemen's Association, 'Response to the 1991 Tasmanian

Wilderness World Heritage Area Draft Management Plan', p. 7.

cultural landscapes, which provided a context for a contemporary range of

continuing traditional practices such as hunting, horse-riding, walking, fishing and