95
Arctic Yearbook 2013
Bennett
that heritage is ambiguous when thanks to the Nunavut Land Claim Agreement, the Inuit could
potentially enjoy greater access rights to the park than non-Inuit Canadians.
Wrangel Island
zapovednik
On paper, Russian conservation attempts are more strictly dedicated to science than in Canada,
where they are often joined up with economic interests of both Ottawa and indigenous groups. In
1956, the Soviet Academy of Sciences established the concept of the
zapovednik,
literally a ―forbidden
area‖ designated for natural sciences research where there is the ―complete withdrawal of an area of
land – or water, air, underground site – from any economic use, including such non-traditional or
extensive kinds as any form of tourism and recreation‖ (Pryde, 1995: 45). But in reality, a
consumerist attitude towards nature prevailed in the USSR. The environment was something to be
used rather than preserved (Zaharchenko, 1985). This is an attitude that appears to have persisted
throughout the twentieth century and into the present day.
Overview of Wrangel Island
zapovednik
Zapovedniks
were not really pure and unpolluted realms of nature; instead, they were ―complex
organisations, mostly comprising unskilled labourers, drivers, metal-workers, mechanics, electricians,
boilermen and the like‖ (Shtilmark, 2003: 147). Environmental interests became further
subordinated to economic interests in 2000, when President Vladimir Putin abolished the State
Committee for Environmental Protection (
Goskomekologiya
). The agency, which had been similar to