101 Across the world, institutions at many levels from communities to central governments are responsible for the management of natural resources. Many conservation professionals and organizations assume that a decentralized approach, in which the authority to manage natural resources resides in the hands of local people, is the best way to go. This is an assumption not fully tested, and yet it is one that is critical to understand if we are to effectively achieve conservation. In one of our analytical studies, BSP explored decentralization across 6 case studies and published Shifting the Power: Decentralization and Biodiversity Conservation. Based on this study, we looked across BSP's portfolio of projects to examine the results of decentralization processes to produce this issue of ""Lessons from the Field."" Date: 2000. Authors: Corrine Schmidt. Programs: Analysis and Adaptive Management