El parque nacional Utría, un lugar-red

Abstract

The social dimension in the framework of Protected Areas Management and Conser­ vation have been increasingly incorporated in the last few years. The main issue, in the Colombian context and those of the so-called Third World cmmtries, is the legitimacy of Protected Arcas at local level and the possibilities to achieve both the goals of conservation and to meet local people's needs. In this respect, this article seeks to contribute to the analysis of social-environmental interactions of Protected Arcas using the concept of Place-Network as a unit of analysis and SocialNetworkAnalysis asan analytical tool to identify and estimare them. Utilising this theoretical and methodological framework, this article also illustrates with a case study, the Utria National Park of Colombia, the relevance of this tools of analysis to facilitate decision making.