Just as politics created them, politics can undo them. This is something we have to remember. Everyone I know has been involved in trying to bring about change in the U.S. Forest Service. And they are willing and able to try and combine those with necessary issues of community stability and economics. Wilderness does not have to be pristine.
Nothing is ever pristine.
As I say in my book of essays, The Practice of the Wild , I make a distinction between wild and wilderness. That's what the wild is. Yes, there is another sense we need to keep in mind. Thinking of wild land as unmanipulated natural habitat drags you toward the trap of pristinity. Wilderness does not have to be pristine.