Are Environmental Non-Governmental Organisations Involved at All? The Current Specifics of Slovakia's UNESCO Biosphere Reserves Governance

Abstract

The concept of UNESCO Biosphere Reserves (BRs) governance provides a paradigm shift to the traditional concept of governance of nature protected areas applied in national parks (NPs). Specifically, this shift mandates BRs governing bodies to prepare and implement socio-economic development programs/projects within legally protected territories, thereby entailing the active participation of a diverse range of stakeholders with an interest in conservation efforts in BR governance. In contrast to this, however, three out of four UNESCO BRs fully or partially located in Slovakia (respectively their Slovak parts) overlap with respective Slovak NPs. Our research, which concerned both (i.) the analysis of the content and the application of the relevant Slovak laws and (ii.) a collection of data from the Slovak eNGO representatives interested in this topic, resulted in an inability to identify a single eNGO representative involved in thegovernance of any of the Slovak BRs. Moreover, this lack of involvement of eNGO representatives conflicts with the recently approved legal requirement to involve representatives of legal entities operating in nature and landscape protection in the advisory bodies to the Slovak NPs governing bodies. The research results presented in this article implicitly provide a base ground for a future primary research aimed at shedding more light on whether any of the conservatory participation principles embedded in the relevant UNESCO soft laws are, in fact, applied in the Slovak BRs governance concerning the involvement of eNGO representatives.

Keywords: UNESCO Biosphere Reserves (BRs), governance, environmental non-governmental organisations (eNGOs), national parks (NPs), Slovakia