HUMAN DIMENSIONS OF WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT (HDWM)

M. Nils Peterson and Shari L. Rodriguez

Fisheries, Wildlife & Conservation Biology Program

Department of Forestry & Environmental Resources North Carolina State University

Raleigh, NC 27606, USA

HDWM

►Portions of wildlife management that focus on the interactions between people and wildlife or between people regarding wildlife

Imperatives for HDWM

►Professional►Moral►Learning from constituents►Investing in social capital►Contributing to long term conservation solutions

Exercise

►What skills and abilities will you need to avoid becoming an “idiot savant wildlife manager?”See: Jacobson, S.K. and M.D. McDuff. 1998. Training idiot savants: The lack

of human dimensions in conservation biology. Conservation Biology 12(2): 263-267.

Cutler, M. R. 1982. What kind of wildlifers will be needed in the 1980s? Wildlife Society Bulletin 10: 75-79.

The Evolution of HDWM►The client model

Sportspersons paid for & received services from wildlife managers

►The stakeholder model Identifying stakeholders, incorporating their input into

decision-making, resisting special interest groups, weighing stakeholder opinions, & employing effective communication strategies

►The citizen model Adding duties associated with citizenship to the

entitlements associated with being a stakeholder

Social Structural Approaches► Political economy

Addresses how production, buying, selling and governance interact to shape society

►Biological basis of human interactions with wildlife Humans as hunters

►Humans are preprogramed for inter- & intra-specific aggression due to selection for hunting success

Humans as hunted►Natural selection makes people fear wildlife because humans were

historically hunted by large carnivores before becoming hunters themselves

Biophilia►Humans have an instinctive bond with living systems

Social Structural Approaches

►Coupled human-natural systems modeling The simulation of human society, its environment and

interactions between the two systems using physical or mathematical models

►Economic valuation The act of assigning value to an object Often involves determining the potential market value of an

object

Social Psychology

►Attitudes Positive or negative evaluations of an object which include

affective and cognitive dimensions

►Values Assigned value – meaning, goodness or worth placed on an

object Held value – beliefs formed early in life that differentiate good

from bad and are difficult or impossible to change

►Value orientations Basic beliefs a cultural group brings to bear on decision

making

Social Psychology

►Behavior An individual’s conscious or involuntary action or

reaction to an object or environment

►Models for predicting behavior towards wildlife The norm-activation model Rational choice models

►Theory of Reasoned Action (TORA)►Theory of Planned Behavior

Social Psychology

►Risk Studies The study of actions or events that may lead to

consequences harming people or things humans care about►Unknown dimension – applies to risks that are non-

observable, new, unknown to those exposed, have delayed effects and lack scientific knowledge about them

►Dread dimension – applies to risks that are uncontrollable, dreaded, catastrophic, fatal, difficult to reduce, pose risk to future generations, demonstrate increasing levels of risk and have involuntary exposure

Descriptive Research

►Quantitative examinations of populations or phenomenon “What”, “where”, “when”, and “how much”

questions

Philosophy►Ethics

Philosophy that provides the moral justification for wildlife management decisions

►Justice Philosophy associated with the distribution of benefits

and costs associated with wildlife management

►Science Philosophy of the norms, methods, and biases of

wildlife science

Public Involvement►How to Use Public Involvement

Trinity of voice theory►Access – sufficient opportunity for public to express

opinions►Standing – respect & legitimacy given to public

perspectives►Influence – public’s ideas are considered in the

management decision

Public Involvement

►When to Use Public Involvement Decision tree (Fig. 23.3)

Decision tree for selecting public involvement methods for wildlife management decision making, adapted from (Lawrence and Deagen 2001).

Qualitative Approaches “How” and “why” questions Emic perspective

►A description of human behavior or belief that comes from within the culture

Ethnomethodology, focus groups, participatory action research, long interviews

Most useful social knowledge comes from qualitative inquiry

Qualitative Approaches

Criteria for evaluating quantitative research

Criteria for evaluating qualitative research

internal validity credibility

external validity transferability

reliability dependability

objectivity confirmability

Credibility emerges from: triangulation, informant validation, larger numbers of informants, longer time in the field, and using the actual words of informants

SUMMARY

► Future wildlife managers need HDWM skills more than any other type and have since the 1980s

► HDWM is evolving from providing a service for hunting groups to facilitating partnerships with diverse stakeholders

► Several key HDWM research programs ranging from social psychology to philosophy inform modern wildlife management

► Public participation is a powerful wildlife management tool, buts its success depends on careful consideration of 6 dimensions of social context