Rewilding

Rewilding Conservation: history and practice

The term 'rewilding' became popular around 2010, but before that a group of conservationists working within The British Association of Nature Conservationists (BANC) developed the concepts of Wildland - a term to replace 'wilderness' that would be more appropriate for Britain. Over a period of of years beginning with the National Trust's Centennial Conference in 1995 in Manchester, and BANC's 'Wilderness' conference at the Open University in the same year, a Wildland Network was set up to share experience from a variety of projects. This culminated in the publication of Beyond Conservation in 2005 and in 2008 the inauguration of The Wildland Research Institute under Steve Carver at Leeds University. This work was updated in 2011 with the publication of Rewilding  edited by Peter Taylor, dealing with the history, issues and development of projects in Britain. Additionally, a Wildland Manifesto was published on the website of Ethos Consultancy (now no longer active, see archived material on this website). Peter Taylor has pioneered incorporation of social and spiritual dimensions of rewilding in his book The Spirit of Rewilding (2017) and a chapter in the IUCN Handbook of Rewilding (2024).