Corruption is a complex phenomenon with various confounding effects and, in their separate replies, both Ferraro (2005) and Katzner (2005) note that in some cases corruption may have short- and long-term benefits for conservation by limiting extractive and destructive development activities. We agree, and we also acknowledge that better governance does not necessarily lead to better conservation; a cursory look at Conservation International's biodiversity hotspots (Conservation Interational, 2005) shows that these threatened regions occur in countries with both high and low governance levels.