CONSERVATION PRINCIPLES

1. Carrying Capacity of the Environment

In ecological terms, the carrying capacity of an ecosystem is the size of the po
pulation or
community that can be supported indefinitely upon the available resources and se
rvices of that
ecosystem. Living within the limits of an ecosystem depends on three factors:
the amount of resources available in the ecosystem;
the size of the population or community; and
the amount of resources each individual within the community is consuming.
source: http://www.sustainable-environment.org.uk/Principles/Carrying_Capacity.p
hp
2. Biophilia
The term "biophilia" literally means "love of life or living systems." The bioph
ilia hypothesis
suggests that the positive emotional response that adult mammals have toward bab
y mammals
across species helps increase the survival rates of all mammals. The hypothesis
helps explain
why ordinary people care for and sometimes risk their lives to save domestic and
wild animals,
and keep plants and flowers in and around their homes. In other words, our natur
al love for life
helps sustain life.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biophilia_hypothesis
3. Doctrine of Hardlook
Hard-Look Doctrine is a principle of Administrative law that says a court should
carefully
review an administrative-agency decision to ensure that the agencies have genuin
ely engaged in
reasoned decision making. A court is required to intervene if it becomes aware, e
specially from
a combination of danger signals, that the agency has not really taken a hard look
at the salient
problems.
Source:http://definitions.uslegal.com/h/hard-look-doctrine/
4. Principle of Standstill or non regression
International law forbids nations to amend or repeal laws designed to protect th
e environment
Source: http://perc.org/blog/principle-non-regression-environmental-laws-cant-be
-repealed
The Principle of Non-Regression is an International Law Principle requiring that
those which
have already been adopted by States not be revised, if this implies going backwa
rds on the
subject of standards of protection of collective and individual rights.
Source: http://iucn.org/news_homepage/news_by_date/2010_news/august_2010/?5888/N
ON-
REGRESSION-PRINCIPLE-KNOWLEDGE-FORUM
5. Tragedy of the Common and Malthusian theory
The tragedy of the commons is an economics theory by Garrett Hardin, according t
o which
individuals, acting independently and rationally according to each one's self-in
terest, behave
contrary to the whole group's long-term best interests by depleting some common
resource.
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons
6. River Continuum
The River Continuum Concept is used today mainly for environmental assessment of
rivers.
River studies that assess riverine biological communities and have determined th
e species
composition of an area can then be compared with the ideal species composition f
rom the River
Continuum Concept. From there, any variations in species composition may shed li
ght on
disturbances that might be occurring to offset the system.
Source:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/River_continuum_concept#Development_and_application
_of_the_concept