The end of the idyll? Post-crisis conservation and amenity migration in natural protected areas Jose A. Cortes-Vazquez 1 Sheffield Institute for International Development, University of Sheffield, 4th Floor ICOSS Building, 219 Portobello, Sheffield S1 4DP United Kingdom article info Article history: Received 14 August 2016 Received in revised form 3 February 2017 Accepted 9 February 2017 abstract The 2008 economic crisis and the introduction of austerity policies and values after the crisis are transforming the management of natural protected areas in the global North. Communities of amenity migrants living in these areas have been impacted by such issues as budgetary cuts and state disin- vestments in conservation. Important threats to their expectations of an alternative life in a natural idyll are changing the attitudes of amenity migrants towards conservation and rural regions. In this paper, I analyse the main changes in their livelihood and lifestyles in two different natural parks in Spain. The main goal of this analysis is to stimulate a debate about the social impacts of new conservation strategies in the post-crisis context, with particular attention to multi-functional, post-productive rural spaces such as amenity destinations. © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The regime of economic austerity introduced in many countries in the global North since the 2008 financial crisis is transforming environmental policies and natural resource governance. This is particularly evident in European natural protected areas. Reduction of public funding, state disinvestments in conservation, prolifera- tion of market-based conservation strategies, and institutional re- arrangements are bringing profound changes to the management of these areas amidst a scenario characterised by widespread eco- nomic uncertainty and growing unemployment (Apostolopoulou et al., 2014; Hodge and Adams, 2014; Apostolopoulou and Adams, 2015). These changes are having a considerable impact on the lives and livelihoods of amenity migrants, who at present constitute one of the principal communities in natural protected areas in the global North. Amenity migration, characterized by a move from cities to rural areas in search of a higher quality of life (Moss, 2006; Abrams et al., 2012), has become a relatively common phenomenon since the 1970's. 2 Because amenity migrants are driven by the desire and expectation of a more relaxed and carefree life closer to natural and cultural amenities, rather than in response to economic or political drivers (Gosnell and Abrams, 2010), it is usually considered a form of lifestyle migration (Benson and O'Reilly, 2009). This paper examines how the re-entrenchment of neoliberal practices of natural resource governance in the post-crisis context, notably in the form of state disinvestments in conservation, in- teracts with ever-increasing economic constraints to generate important impacts on the lifestyles of different communities of amenity migrants in two natural parks in the south of Spain. The study focuses on the outcomes of current changes in park man- agement such as budgetary cuts to conservation practices, loss of conservation jobs in environmental education and park mainte- nance, and cancelation of state incentives to environmentally- friendly activities such as ecotourism amidst a context of chang- ing patterns in this sector that is causing decreasing incomes and growing competition between ecotourism companies and between workers. My analysis approaches the social impacts of post-crisis con- servation on amenity migrants from the point of view of their lifestyles, for two interrelated reasons. First, amenity lifestyle is a project, a search for an alternative life, not merely the result of a move from the city to the countryside, and as such it depends on the production of ‘rural idylls’ (Halfacree and Rivera, 2011). It is therefore inextricably intertwined with the shifts in regimes of production and consumption that were brought forth by the introduction of conservation policies in many rural areas of Europe E-mail address: jacorvaz@gmail.com. 1 Present address: Instituto de Ciencias del Patrimonio, CSIC, Av. de Vigo, Santiago de Compostela, 15705 Spain. 2 Issues of amenity migration can be also found in such geographical contexts as Latin America, although the bulk of case studies refer to European and North American contexts (see Abrams et al., 2012 for a review). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Rural Studies journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jrurstud http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jrurstud.2017.02.005 0743-0167/© 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Journal of Rural Studies 51 (2017) 115e124