Comparing National Park and Related Reserve Policy in Hinterland Areas: Alaska, Northern Canada, and Northern Australia

Abstract

This is a comparative study of national park and related reserve policies and institutional arrangements in three hinterland areas undergoing rising pressure from mineral projects. The areas are the Canadian Northern Territories and Alaska (where interest lies in oil and gas exploitation) and the Australian Northern Territory (where the focus is on uranium extraction). Five elements of policy and institutional arrangements—management field, comprehensive planning and management, system planning, public inquiries, and uses—have been closely studied, with the following conclusions:1. With respect to the management field, a major problem has been division of responsibility among federal and state or territorial agencies.2. Overall comprehensive planning has not been seriously attempted in Canada and Australia, and has not yet met with success in Alaska.3. A system planning approach provides rationale in Alaska and Canada, but is lacking in Australia.4. Local comprehensive planning has been undertaken in the Kakadu National Park area of Australia, and a start has been made in this direction in Canada's northern Yukon.5. Two uses, mining and native activities, pose special problems for national parks and related reserve policy, which is ambiguous on these issues in all cases.6. All three systems represented by these parks in different countries are changing rapidly, and more suitable adaptive arrangements may be made for them in the coming years.