On 27 November 2017, ISS PhD researcher Alonso Ramirez Cover successfully defenced his PhD thesis entitled A political ecology of neoliberal multiculturalism: Social inclusion and market-based conservation in indigenous Costa Rica.
In his thesis, Ramirez Cover investigated how indigenous populations in Southeastern Costa Rica become included or excluded as a result of the implementation of different forms of market-based conservation practices.
He argues that while there is some effort to achieve inclusivity through various natural resourse interventions, social exclusions remain an integral feature of the relationship between modern conservation and indigenous peoples in Costa Rica.
