GWS members includes researchers, managers, administrators, educators, practitioners, and others who are interested in conservation.
GWS operates one level up from that endeavor by bringing specialists together from across disciplines to look for interdisciplinary solutions to conservation problems.
GWS was founded in 1980 by Robert M. Linn and Theodore Sudia, both former chief scientists of the U.S. National Park Service.
Members come from fields such as archaeology, biology, history, social science, air and water quality, environmental ethics, and many others.
Recent conferences have included sessions on inventory and monitoring,[2] remote sensing,[3] wilderness,[4] climate change,[5] and cultural heritage interpretation.
[6] Between 1981 and 2018, GWS published The George Wright Forum: the society's journal on parks, protected areas, and cultural sites.