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Hunting for common ground between wildlife governance and commons scholarship.

Publication ,  Journal Article
Smith, H; Marrocoli, S; Garcia Lozano, A; Basurto, X
Published in: Conservation biology : the journal of the Society for Conservation Biology
February 2019

Wildlife hunting is essential to livelihoods and food security in many parts of the world, yet present rates of extraction may threaten ecosystems and human communities. Thus, governing sustainable wildlife use is a major social dilemma and conservation challenge. Commons scholarship is well positioned to contribute theoretical insights and analytic tools to better understand the interface of social and ecological dimensions of wildlife governance, yet the intersection of wildlife studies and commons scholarship is not well studied. We reviewed existing wildlife-hunting scholarship, drawing on a database of 1,410 references, to examine the current overlap with commons scholarship through multiple methods, including social network analysis and deductive coding. We found that a very small proportion of wildlife scholarship incorporated commons theories and frameworks. The social network of wildlife scholarship was densely interconnected with several major publication clusters, whereas the wildlife commons scholarship was sparse and isolated. Despite the overarching gap between wildlife and commons scholarship, a few scholars are studying wildlife commons. The small body of scholarship that bridges these disconnected literatures provides valuable insights into the understudied relational dimensions of wildlife and other overlapping common-pool resources. We suggest increased engagement among wildlife and commons scholars and practitioners to improve the state of knowledge and practice of wildlife governance across regions, particularly for bushmeat hunting in the tropics, which is presently understudied through a common-pool resource lens. Our case study of the Republic of Congo showed how the historical context and interrelationships between hunting and forest rights are essential to understanding the current state of wildlife governance and potential for future interventions. A better understanding of the interconnections between wildlife and overlapping common-pool resource systems may be key to understanding present wildlife governance challenges and advancing the common-pool resource research agenda.

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Published In

Conservation biology : the journal of the Society for Conservation Biology

DOI

EISSN

1523-1739

ISSN

0888-8892

Publication Date

February 2019

Volume

33

Issue

1

Start / End Page

9 / 21

Related Subject Headings

  • Humans
  • Fellowships and Scholarships
  • Ecosystem
  • Ecology
  • Conservation of Natural Resources
  • Congo
  • Animals, Wild
  • Animals
  • 4104 Environmental management
  • 3109 Zoology
 

Citation

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ICMJE
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Smith, H., Marrocoli, S., Garcia Lozano, A., & Basurto, X. (2019). Hunting for common ground between wildlife governance and commons scholarship. Conservation Biology : The Journal of the Society for Conservation Biology, 33(1), 9–21. https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13200
Smith, Hillary, Sergio Marrocoli, Alejandro Garcia Lozano, and Xavier Basurto. “Hunting for common ground between wildlife governance and commons scholarship.Conservation Biology : The Journal of the Society for Conservation Biology 33, no. 1 (February 2019): 9–21. https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.13200.
Smith H, Marrocoli S, Garcia Lozano A, Basurto X. Hunting for common ground between wildlife governance and commons scholarship. Conservation biology : the journal of the Society for Conservation Biology. 2019 Feb;33(1):9–21.
Smith, Hillary, et al. “Hunting for common ground between wildlife governance and commons scholarship.Conservation Biology : The Journal of the Society for Conservation Biology, vol. 33, no. 1, Feb. 2019, pp. 9–21. Epmc, doi:10.1111/cobi.13200.
Smith H, Marrocoli S, Garcia Lozano A, Basurto X. Hunting for common ground between wildlife governance and commons scholarship. Conservation biology : the journal of the Society for Conservation Biology. 2019 Feb;33(1):9–21.
Journal cover image

Published In

Conservation biology : the journal of the Society for Conservation Biology

DOI

EISSN

1523-1739

ISSN

0888-8892

Publication Date

February 2019

Volume

33

Issue

1

Start / End Page

9 / 21

Related Subject Headings

  • Humans
  • Fellowships and Scholarships
  • Ecosystem
  • Ecology
  • Conservation of Natural Resources
  • Congo
  • Animals, Wild
  • Animals
  • 4104 Environmental management
  • 3109 Zoology