Forest regeneration is a major land-use change in European uplands, and whether or not this is a desirable change for biodiversity is disputed. While this debate seems to be largely situated in the field of natural sciences, this paper aims to also examine its social dimensions. To do so, we adopt a comparative discourse analysis with four cases of protected areas in France, Spain, and Scotland. We draw on a conceptual framework highlighting both the ecological and social factors underpinning the construction of environmental discourses. It notably emphasises the role of interests, ideas and institutions, and the power dynamics underpinning discourse-coalitions. We show how diverging discourses emerged, gained ground, coalesced and competed differently in different contexts, explaining the adoption of seemingly opposite discourses by protected area authorities. These findings reaffirm the need to conceive environmental governance as an on-going deliberative process in order to achieve environmental justice.

森林更新是欧洲高地的主要土地利用变化，这是否对生物多样性而言是理想的变化尚有争议。尽管这场辩论似乎主要集中在自然科学领域，但本文旨在研究其社会层面。为此，我们对法国，西班牙和苏格兰的四个保护区案例进行了比较话语分析。我们采用一个概念框架，重点强调支撑环境话语建设的生态和社会因素。它特别强调了利益，思想和制度的作用，以及话语联盟的力量动力。我们展示了各种不同的话语如何在不同的背景下出现，发展，融合和竞争，解释保护区当局采用看似相反的话语。这些发现重申，有必要将环境治理视为正在进行的审议过程，以实现环境正义。