Abstract
This article examines the intricacy within stylized debates that surround conservation and the regulation of wildlife trade in Southeast Asia. Illegal and unregulated trade in wildlife has been characterized by conservation groups as a great risk for wildlife worldwide and the prime threat for remaining wildlife populations in Laos. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) is the centrepoint of the global discourse on wildlife trade. Popular representations of wildlife trade promoted by conservation organizations construct an image of regulation through CITES as a global necessity. The assumed morality of such interventions can provoke counter accusations about the immorality of impositions by Western conservationists. Yet both of these competing representations of wildlife trade regulation encourage externally-focused moralized debates that obscure the internal dynamics within global conservation, national policy formation and local practice. Recognition of the simplifications that characterize these three domains cautions against any idealized contrast between global hegemony and local resistance in critical studies of conservation. Instead, the focus becomes the contestation that is often hidden within such dichotomies. Keywords: Conservation, wildlife, Lao PDR, CITES
Highlights
Unregulated and illegal trade in wildlife has been characterized by conservation groups as a key – and some suggest 'the greatest' – threat to remaining wildlife populations in Asia (Sautner et al 2002, 2005; see Redford 1992; Robinson and Bennett 2000)
I draw upon the insights of recent political ecology studies of conservation, though this approach has yet to be utilized in studies of the wildlife trade (Adams and Hutton 2007; Delcore 2004; Gezon 2006; Jones 2006; Sodikoff 2007)
The remainder of this paper examines the situation in Laos in order to comprehend the local dynamics that surround the extension of global conservation initiatives
Summary
Unregulated and illegal trade in wildlife has been characterized by conservation groups as a key – and some suggest 'the greatest' – threat to remaining wildlife populations in Asia (Sautner et al 2002, 2005; see Redford 1992; Robinson and Bennett 2000). The recent accession of Laos to CITES provides a valuable context in which to comprehend the dynamics permeating global conservation initiatives, national policy formation and local practice This is so because Laos is commonly imagined as subject to aid donor demands. For the former, my background in ecology enabled me to contribute to conservation-oriented surveys of wildlife hunting and trade in rural areas of central (Khammouane Province, Bolikhamxai Province), southern (Attapeu Province), and northern Laos (Luang Namtha Province) These utilized structured and semi-structured questionnaires, market surveys, focus group discussions and key informant interviews with villagers, traders and officials (Johnson et al 2004a, 2004b; Singh et al 2006). It is important to emphasize that my aim is to problematize notions of morality that are implicit in the conflicting representations of wildlife trade regulation that circulate amongst proponents and opponents of conservation
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