| Summary: | In June 1999, a conference to celebrate the half-century of the 1949 National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act was hosted by the Royal Society of Edinburgh. Upon this legislation rested the establishment of National Parks in England and Wales and of the Nature Conservancy throughout Great Britain. The papers gathered here, all by major players on the scene, look back over fifty years of countryside management and nature conservation, assess the current situation, and look forward to prospects for the future. They range from consideration of the origins of the 1949 Act to recalling major incidents and pressures such as the toxic chemical scares of the 1960s, the pressures from post-war forestry and the problems of managing the rising tide of countryside recreation. The changing nature of ecology is examined, along with public attitudes to the environment. The book concludes with a series of forward looks relating to the natural world in Britain, and our enjoyment of it, in the 21st century.
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