In the American West today, an ethic of land and resource preservation has given way to a new regime where recreation is king. So believes a leading expert on tourism and post-industrial economies, Hal Rothman. Rothman is a professor at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas, and the author of several books on tourism and the environment in the West.

In a column posted on the web site New West, Rothman writes that a new generation of public land users is not interested in traditional conservation, but values open space more for what type of activities they can do in it. He writes, “recreationalists, motorized and otherwise, have won. Wilderness is dead; not as reserved land, but as a movement or a viable political strategy. Its constituency is aging and it is losing political support to recreation by leaps and bounds.”

With this new group’s rise to power, Rothman writes, comes responsibility. “The entire recreational community must now develop an ethic of sustainability,” he says, “that will assure that the sports recreationalists choose continue for generations.”

Conflict between recreationalists – those who tend to believe land should be preserved for people to use, rather than purely for environmental reasons – and conservationists has been growing in the West for the past decade, as trails in many areas have become overused by outdoor enthusiasts. In many cases, traditional environmental groups have joined forces with recreation groups from mountain bikers to hunters. But often their core missions are at odds.

Photo credit: National Park Service