Conservation reserves and parks established in Cameroon's South Eastern Region has precipitated significant socioeconomic consequences on local indigenous Baka communities, offering them little or no opportunities to negotiate free space and access, thereby posing a threat to guaranteeing local livelihoods. This paper discusses the wavering dynamics and epistemologies of fortress conservation, as reflective on local indigenous communities in Cameroon, with case study the Baka Pygmies. Applying an anthropological lens to the analysis, the papers' central theme focuses on deconstructing the polemics and ambiguities surrounding conservation and the promotion of sustainable livelihoods. The paper succinctly discusses how conservation has reshaped and restricted social interactions amongst the Baka and their immediate surroundings, as well as portraying implicitly the human ecological relationships generated as a result. I question further the theoretical assumptions underlying conservation policies and or paradigms, following a brief historical review of conservation subjectivities encountered by the local indigenous Baka community in and around locally established conservation areas. Being an exegetical rather than a reconstructive analysis, this paper contributes to ongoing discourses on environmental sustainability by suggesting pertinent implications for Anthropology and its emerging role in establishing a common ground of understanding as a novel ethnographic approach to political development in Africa.