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Wildlife and Society
The Science of Human Dimensions
By Michael J. Manfredo, Jerry J. Vaske, Perry J. Brown, Daniel J. Decker, Esther A. Duke ISLAND PRESS
Copyright © 2009 Island Press
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-59726-934-6
CHAPTER 1
Introduction: Perspectives on the Past and Future of Human Dimensions of Fish and Wildlife
Perry J. Brown
From fear to full stomachs, from curiosities to art, fish and wildlife are a part of the human psyche. We have chased and been chased by wildlife throughout our sojourn on the Earth. With primitive weapons and modern cameras we have approached fish and wildlife and all that they bring to our lives. But despite our forever association with wild animals, the emergence of an academic field of human dimensions of fish and wildlife is relatively recent. Over the past fifty years this field has emerged, evolved, and taken root.
Before we dissect the field into all its component parts, we will present an overview of its emergence and some of its evolutionary highlights, and we will give perspective to its future. One fundamental premise is that people are interested in and care about fish and wildlife, and it is their relationships to animals and their habitats that are critical to sustaining animal diversity and the benefits arising from our association with these critters.
Americans' burgeoning use of the outdoors following World War II set the stage for the study of human dimensions of fish and wildlife to emerge. To be sure, before the 1950s in the United States naturalist and scientific writers were beginning to note the relationships between people and wildlife, both the pleasures and the controversies. Aldo Leopold, for example, clearly pointed us to the social and political world of wildlife management. But during the 1950s, as more and more people poured into our national parks and monuments, national forests, fish and wildlife refuges, and private recreational lands and forests, human dimensions issues became more and more prominent. Recognition of this changing use of the American landscape was institutionalized in the establishment of the Outdoor Recreation Resources Review Commission ([ORRRC], 1958), initiation of massive development programs of both the National Park Service (Mission 66, 1956) and the U.S. Forest Service (Operations Outdoors, 1957), and new laws affecting use and management of wildlands such as the Multiple Use Sustained-Yield Act (1960), the Wilderness Act (1964), and the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act (1964).
For a glimpse of this use of the outdoors, we can look at the statistics on fishing and hunting produced for the ORRRC and for later National Surveys of Fishing, Hunting, and Wildlife-Associated Recreation. From a baseline in 1960 of 260 million fishing occasions, ORRRC projected that by 2000 there would be over 520 million occasions (ORRRC 1962). The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reported that we had taken 454 million fishing trips by 1991, indicating that we were well on the way to meeting the prediction (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service 1991). Similarly for hunting, ORRRC used a 95-million-occasion baseline and projected participation at 174 million occasions by 2000 (ORRRC 1962), yet in 1991 we had already exceeded the projection with 214 million trips (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service 1991). In the consumptive wildlife areas of fishing and hunting, use was skyrocketing; adding to that were the growing urban and nonconsumptive uses of fish and wildlife.
Three groups of human dimensions scientists began to respond to the issues of growing use and interest in fish and wildlife. Biologists and naturalists were called upon to provide insight to policy makers responsible for fish and wildlife management. A classic case of this was the work of the Craighead brothers, who reviewed bear management in Yellowstone National Park in relation to human encounters with bears and some of the management practices that were causing problems for both bears and management (Craighead, Sumner, and Mitchell 1995). Economists such as those at Utah State University also responded with studies of the use and value of wildlife, especially by hunters and fishers (Wennergren 1964, 303; 1967). Finally, an emerging group of noneconomic social scientists became engaged in trying to characterize both the users and the phenomenon of human relationships with wildlife (Hendee and Potter 1971). From these early efforts sprung what we now characterize as the human dimensions of fish and wildlife.
In the early 1970s, human dimensions study got a real boost when John Hendee and Clay Schoenfeld developed a human dimensions session at the 38th North American Wildlife and Natural Resources Conference and then published the nineteen papers that were presented (Hendee and Schoenfeld 1973). These papers stretched from defining and evaluating recreation quality to assessing elk behavior in relation to human activities such as cattle grazing, recreation, and traffic. Human dimensions sessions were organized at subsequent North American Wildlife and Natural Resources Conferences, thus stimulating a vital field of inquiry.
As we moved through the 1970s and early 1980s scientists were expending considerable effort on various topics of the human dimensions of fish and wildlife. For example, in Wisconsin Tom Heberlein and his students were actively applying sociological principles and theories to the field; in Colorado Doug Gilbert was exploring wildlife and other natural resource communications, and Jack Hautaluoma and Perry Brown were exploring the psychological dimensions underlying big-game hunting; in Arizona Bill Shaw was leading us to an understanding of why some people oppose hunting; and at Yale Steve Kellert was teasing out the various values underlying people's relationships to fish and wildlife (e.g., Gilbert 1971; Shaw 1977, 19; Kellert 1976; Hautaluoma and Brown 1978, 271). Economists were continuing to explore the nature of nonmarketed resources with fish and wildlife as prime examples (e.g., Wennergren 1967).
Once we began to notice that more and more people were entering the field, fourteen of us from around the country agreed to meet in Minneapolis at the Minnesota Valley National Wildlife Refuge in the early 1980s to explore how we might organize to promote the field. The outcome was the Human Dimensions of Wildlife Study Group. This group immediately began gathering members, started a quarterly newsletter, and became the focal point for organizing meetings and symposia. The group was important in developing a language around human dimensions of fish and wildlife and in giving the emerging group of human dimensions graduate students a home for their energy and interests.
Other human dimensions activities were under way as well, many of them focused on parks and recreation and on public policy regarding natural resources. Some of the same people involved in the fish and wildlife work were involved in these realms, but there were other people as well. Thus, a significant collection of human dimensions of natural resources scientists was developing. The culmination of this activity was the first conference devoted to social science in natural resources, held at Oregon State University in 1986 and hosted by Don Field and Perry Brown. A wide variety of social scientists studying a wide variety of topics, including the human dimensions of fish and wildlife, attended the conference, which now occurs somewhere in North America every other year. The conference became truly international in 1997 when Mike Manfredo organized the first non–North American version of the conference in Belize. This conference also occurs every other year but outside North America, attracting many researchers from around the world.
Another significant conference that occurred in the mid-1980s dealt with the topic of valuing wildlife (Decker and Goff 1987). Many of the academic and agency scientists involved in developing the field of human dimensions of wildlife made presentations at this New York meeting, and the resulting book is a wonderful compilation of ideas the scientists were investigating at that time.
The International Association for Society and Resource Management and its journal, Society and Natural Resources, and another journal, Human Dimensions of Wildlife, first published in 1996, eventually replaced the Human Dimensions of Wildlife Study Group. This evolution was natural, demonstrating the maturity that the field was developing across the broad area of natural resources and the environment.
During this period of development, an active congressional natural resource and environment agenda, coupled with some activities in individual states, spurred the need for human dimensions work. The Multiple Use Sustained-Yield Act (1960), the McIntire-Stennis Cooperative Forestry Research Act (1962), the Wilderness Act (1964), the Land and Water Conservation Fund Act (1965), the Water Quality Act (1965), the National Historic Preservation Act (1966), the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act (1968), the National Trails System Act (1968), the National Environmental Policy Act (1969), the Clean Air Act Amendments (1970), the Endangered Species Act (1973), the Resources Planning Act (1974), the National Forest Management Act (1976), the Federal Land Policy and Management Act (1976), and state environmental policy, wildlife, recreation, and parks legislation all set the stage for important human dimensions research and study and the incorporation of many voices in natural resources decisions and management.
Especially in response to much of this legislation we began to ask questions about integration in natural resource management and how we might integrate social information with biophysical information. The general feeling was that social assessments were not being used since they simply were sections of plans and reports that were separate from other sections dealing with resources and management. What social scientists, biologists, and resource managers had failed to do was to identify where we were working within planning and management models. Most social information fits on the demand side of the planning equation. Although the demand side certainly is relevant for identifying what and how we need to inventory and manage on the supply side, most of us have training and information on the supply side, and that bias exacerbated the problem of using social information in natural resource planning and management. We tried to integrate demand-side information with supply-side information, but it did not work. Social factors drive resource management as demand and policy variables, not as supply variables. Thus, we were struggling with not only what to integrate but also how to integrate. As separate chapters whose fit was undefined and as products from researchers who advocated human dimensions considerations but made little effort to demonstrate their relevance and practicality, social information was generally lost to the decision-making system. That did not make social information any less relevant; it simply rendered such information less useful because people did not know what to do with it.
This became a big issue in the controversy surrounding the spotted owl and development of the Northwest Forest Plan. In the 1990s, when the issues were more bold and recognized as more complex than previously thought, nearly everyone began to talk about the need for human dimensions information, pronouncing that "we know that social values drive our decisions." But actions do not always follow talk. FEMAT (Forest Ecosystem Management Assessment Team), for example, brought social scientists to the table, but their work seemed more like window dressing than the base for understanding the forest management issues and potential resolution of them in the U.S. Pacific Northwest. Although we learned a lot from FEMAT, raised some significant questions, and developed some new technologies for social analysis, the Columbia River Basin and other megastudies repeated the fundamental problem of not recognizing the relevance of social information. Again, social scientists assembled important human dimensions information and developed some technologies for its analysis and display (especially spatial technologies), but it appears that they were constantly in a battle to work their way into the dominant biological, supply-side paradigm guiding assessments and plans.
Currently, there is widespread recognition that we need to hear many relevant voices; that human dimensions information is important for defining resources and identifying what to inventory and manage; and that human dimensions information is important to understanding how people can participate in natural resource decisions.
The many voices enfranchised since the 1980s give urgency to our work as social scientists and human dimensions practitioners. As we have moved from a model of natural resource management in which an elite called the shots to a much more collaborative and diffuse model, our work has become more critical. The book Nature and the Human Spirit (Driver et al. 1999) is convincing about the many relevant voices with fascinating and important perspectives. And human dimensions is the scientific arena that will uncover these perspectives.
As we have moved into the twenty-first century many of the same themes continue for human dimensions study, but it seems there now is more recognition of the profound changes that are under way in our administration and management of natural resources, and maybe in many other ways that we govern ourselves. These changes, and those to come, have made human dimensions information a necessity for fish, wildlife, and other natural resource management. This information is not a luxury. We need information on the who, what, where, when, and why for all those interested in or affected by natural resource decisions anytime we are allocating and managing natural resources.
With the many voices of interested and affected people, with the complexity of the decisions that need to be made, and with the long-term consequences associated with most decisions, how can we not know what is perceived, preferred, and required and that what we do has impact on people? As we discovered in the 1970s and '80s, we also need to develop techniques for people to effectively voice their observations and concerns, to affect collaboration in planning and decisions, and to provide continuing involvement long past the initial decisions.
Finally, we need to dedicate ourselves to helping others learn how to use human dimensions information. We can learn a lot and we can slowly let our learning seep into fish and wildlife decisions, but the pace of change in natural resources does not allow us such luxury. What we learn needs to be used now, and it is on our backs to help people see the relevance of the information and ideas we generate. It is our job to work with administrators and managers to challenge and support their decisions and to help them learn how to listen to people and to process human dimensions information.
LESSONS FROM OUR HISTORY
This brief history suggests a convergence of several important events and people who effectively led us to where we are today. This is likely always the case as fields of science emerge and evolve, but some emerge and evolve faster and more efficiently than others, and the fifty years or so of human dimensions emergence seems particularly fast. Here are a few of the important lessons over this fifty-year period.
First, managers, policy makers, and scientists must recognize that people are important in sustaining fish and wildlife. They must recognize that animals, their populations and habitats, will not be sustained, even if we have all the biological and physical knowledge we can ever obtain, unless people want fish and wildlife and are willing to make policies and sacrifices to sustain them. Thus, sustaining and managing fish and wildlife will depend on people, which means that managers must understand these people and their relationships to fish and wildlife. As managers and policy makers have recognized this fact, they have stimulated development of human dimensions science.
Second, there is a time when the issues and the people are ripe for a field of science to emerge. In the United States it was necessary to have growing interest in fish and wildlife, or crises associated with their management, to lead us toward the questions we needed to ask. In response to these questions, the human dimensions of natural resources surfaced and became linked to the biological information that managers and policy makers were already using.
Third, patience is needed; fields of science evolve as issues unfold and as capacity to do more and more complex science develops. From the small group that began human dimensions research, even before it had that label, the cadre of people working in the field has grown considerably, their skills have sharpened, and their perspectives have multiplied. The emergence of new issues has brought new people and new perspectives into the cadre over time, and these new issues have led us to consider different biological questions along with the human dimensions questions.
Fourth, the commitment and compassion of those involved is necessary, and they need to sustain this commitment and compassion for a long time. Today's old-timers such as John Hendee, Tom Heberlein, Bill Shaw, Steve Kellert, Jim Applegate, Tommy Brown, Perry Brown, and a few others have remained involved for decades, a few of them even in retirement. With the next generations of professionals such as Dan Decker, Mike Manfredo, Jerry Vaske, Mike Patterson, Tara Teel, and many others, we have been fortunate in building a field of science and drawing to it many from the social science disciplines.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Wildlife and Society by Michael J. Manfredo, Jerry J. Vaske, Perry J. Brown, Daniel J. Decker, Esther A. Duke. Copyright © 2009 Island Press. Excerpted by permission of ISLAND PRESS.
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