Conservation

Is African wildlife threatened by the economic practices of Africans? Should trade in ivory and rhino horn be banned altogether? The issue of wildlife conservation in Africa has captured the public imagination in the industrialized world, where the prevailing view is that wildlife must be saved and preserved at all costs in the interests of global environmental good. However, casting wildlife conservation as a politically neutral issue masks the complex economic, political, and social realities of African communities. In Killing for Conservation, Rosaleen Duffy presents the search for a solution to the human versus wildlife conflict in Zimbabwe as a case study of wider issues in the realm of global environmental politics. What are the economic consequences of a strict preservationist policy for local economies versus a more balanced approach to sustainable utilization? Should the international community deprive developing countries of the right to use their natural resources for the economic benefit of their populations? How can community development and wildlife preservation be welded together to serve the needs of both? Duffy’s keen analysis underlines the essentially political nature of conservation amid international rhetoric that presents it as an apolitical matter of saving animals.