The modern green establishment, in contrast, is preoccupied with microscopic and long-term, diffuse effects on large populations and their quantification by means of large computer models. It is T. R.'s political legacy that conservatives should be reclaiming today, for purely practical political reasons, to begin with. The wilderness-centered environmentalism that T. R. stood for is more popular than ever, especially in the politically critical West. But conservatives can get beyond that kind of cynical calculation and should. The logic for a government role in wilderness conservation is easy to square with a political perspective that strongly favors free market forces in other arenas.
Private conservation is important.
Markets can't produce what we value because it's not packaged, traded, bought, or sold, because it's spontaneous, open, and free. The central objective of wilderness conservation, after all, is to ensure that in some places, nothing much is done at all. Nothing is the one thing that big government is capable of doing quite well. Even conservatives can believe in government's ability to do that. T. R. certainly did.