The Role of Aesthetic Considerations in a Narrative Based Approach to Nature Conservation

The claim presented here is that aesthetic considerations are an essential part of place narrative, and are thus essential to ethical environmental decision-making. Holland’s narrative-based approach to nature conservation is taken as a starting point from which an argument is developed to show how his approach can be extended to include the aesthetic. Aesthetic experience of place is important because it gives us knowledge by acquaintance of the place, because it gives meaning to our relationship to the place, and because it reveals and gives insight to meaningful relationships within the place. The narrative approach allows these experiences and meanings, which are problematic to other approaches, to be captured and included in environmental decision-making.