Raptor persecution, conflict, and coexistence

Abstract

How a society views wildlife—the values and meanings people attach to and the emotions evoked by a raptor species—determines the negative to positive outcomes of human–raptor interactions and raptor conservation writ large. Interactions of raptors and humans are shaped by legacies and contemporary patterns of persecution, conflict, and coexistence. Those interactions are steeped in historical and emergent ecological, social, political, cultural and economic realities. Those realities are likewise steeped in deep-rooted beliefs about the relationship between humans and nature. Views, values, meanings, and emotions are, therefore, central to raptor conservation and management. History reflects that societies view and value raptors, like other wildlife species, varyingly across continuums of threat/nonthreat or predator/pest, which convey specific sociocultural meanings and consequent actions. Societies either conflict or coexist with wildlife based on how they define species in relation to material, physical, and psychological boundaries associated with shared spaces, resources, and livelihoods. For contemporary raptor conservation and management, the human dimensions (HD) field and associated programs of human–wildlife interactions (HWI) are central to understand those boundaries.