Ruination conservation: Protecting life in Anthropocene ecosystems. Peñuelas Reserve, Chile

This article introduces the concept of ruination conservation to analyze how environmental protection is enacted in novel ecosystems under conditions of damage, hybridity, and institutional precarity in the Anthropocene. Moving beyond conservation models that seek to restore pristine nature, we examine conservation as a situated practice oriented toward sustaining life in irreversibly altered landscapes. Drawing on a deep qualitative research conducted in the Lago Peñuelas National Reserve in central Chile between 2023 and 2026—including 15 ethnographic fieldwork visits, 21 in-depth interviews, and documentary analysis—we conceptualize conservation as a form of socio-ecological care shaped by historical interventions, infrastructural decay, and competing land uses. We identify three defining features of ruination conservation. First, it entails the acceptance of ecological impurity, where native and exotic species, as well as hybrid forms of life, coexist within degraded environments. Second, it operates under conditions of precarity, where limited resources, porous territorial boundaries, and institutional fragility constrain conservation practices. Third, it is fundamentally reactive, oriented toward managing ongoing disturbances—such as wildfires, drought, and resource extraction—rather than achieving long-term ecological restoration. Through this case, we show how conservation in novel ecosystems often involves negotiating unstable socio-ecological balances amid conflicting valuations of nature and persistent environmental pressures.