SMU Issues of Wildlife Protection & Illegal Wildlife Trade Critical Commentary Critical commentaries are an analysis of all four readings for a given topic

SMU Issues of Wildlife Protection & Illegal Wildlife Trade Critical Commentary Critical commentaries are an analysis of all four readings for a given topic, and involve three key steps: reading, synthesis writing, and critical evaluation. no outside sources can be used only the attached readings i will attach down here.

instrusctions of the paper:

Write a two-page (700-900 words, not including the References section) critical reflection on all of the week’s readings which i will attach below, including comments about common themes, the utility of the arguments presented, strengths and limitations of the ideas and arguments presented, and missing or future directions for research on this topic. That is, you are expected to critically engage with the main arguments advanced in the readings and comment on this engagement.

Each commentary should focus on responding to the following questions:

-What are some general ideas, concepts, arguments, or themes that run through all or most of the readings?

-What are the strengths and/or limitations of the readings’ arguments in relation to each other? (Assess that quality of the argument. Is it defensible?)

-Have the readings changed your understanding of the subject matter or challenged your assumptions? How?

-What future research would be relevant for this topic?

as for referencing

-Critical commentaries should incorporate all four of the required readings for the Topic, and no outside sources

-Use in-text references (in APA format) every time you draw from one of the readings (i.e. author’s last name(s) and publication year)

-Complete each reference is APA format 828307
research-article2019
EUC0010.1177/1477370819828307European Journal of CriminologyBrisman and South
Article
A criminology of extinction:
Biodiversity, extreme
consumption and the vanity
of species resurrection
European Journal of Criminology
1­–18
© The Author(s) 2019
Article reuse guidelines:
sagepub.com/journals-permissions
https://doi.org/10.1177/1477370819828307
DOI: 10.1177/1477370819828307
journals.sagepub.com/home/euc
Avi Brisman
Eastern Kentucky University, USA
Nigel South
University of Essex, UK
Abstract
This article explores an issue pertaining to the commodification of nature and related market processes
– reviving extinct species. It begins by offering an overview of the aesthetic, economic, scientific and
ethical reasons to preserve biological diversity. The article then considers how and why biological
diversity is actually being reduced at an unprecedented rate – the ways in which, and the explanations
for why, human acts and omissions are directly and indirectly, separately and synergistically, causing
extinctions, quite possibly of species that we do not even know exist. From here, the article draws
on the growing body of research on resurrecting species – a process known as de-extinction – to
contemplate the questions raised about the permanency of extinction, as well as whether we should
revive extinct species and the meaning and criminological implications of doing so.
Keywords
Biodiversity/biological diversity, consumption, de-extinction, extinction, hunting/poaching,
wildlife (crime, trade, trafficking)
Introduction
Significant international work in recent years has drawn attention to ‘animal abuse,’
‘wildlife crime’ and, more broadly, harms and crimes affecting non-human species
(Bayrachnaya et al., 2018; Beirne, 1995, 1997, 1999, 2009, 2014; Gibbs et al., 2010;
Corresponding author:
Avi Brisman, School of Justice Studies, College of Justice and Safety, Eastern Kentucky University, 521
Lancaster Avenue, Stratton 467, Richmond, KY 44075-3102, USA.
Email: avi.brisman@eku.edu
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European Journal of Criminology 00(0)
Maher and Sollund, 2016; Maher et al., 2017; Moreto, 2018; Nurse, 2013, 2015; Pires
and Clarke, 2011; Sollund 2011, 2013a, 2013b, 2015; Wyatt, 2013). In some respects,
this work has been pioneering. In other ways, it builds on the past work of others and
serves as a reminder of the historical complexity of human–non-human relations. Bryant
(1979: 412) made an early call for the study of ‘zoological crime’ – a term coined to refer
to the violation of ‘animal related social norms . . . [that] may well be among the most
ubiquitous of any social deviancy.’ Beirne’s (1995) essay, some 16 years later, was, in
part, a frustrated reaction to the failure to respond to Bryant’s proposal. Although Beirne
(1995: 5) acknowledged that ‘the field of crimes against animals does not yet constitute
a recognized, let alone a coherent, object of study,’ he maintained that it would be inaccurate to state that ‘animals are never present in criminological discourse,’ and he noted
the wide range of materials involving animals as central figures in relation to ‘inter alia,
the configuration of rural class relations in 18th-century England, the alleged links
between crime and human nature, and the behavioral manifestations of children who are
likely to be violent as adults.’ For example, the American scholar and linguist, E.P. Evans
(1987 [1906]), had documented the role non-human animals play in human society in
The Criminal Prosecution and Capital Punishment of Animals, and historians, such as
E.P. Thompson, Peter Linebaugh and others, outlined the importance of wildlife in terms
of class oppression, moral economies, property law, and social and environmental transformation (Hay, 1975; Linebaugh, 1976; Thompson, 1975). Game laws and poaching/
anti-poaching activities and initiatives reflect centuries of human relationships with
nature, as have measures aimed at balancing conservation, culling, hunting for sport, and
killing for food. Many sociological studies of deviance and leisure have produced
descriptive accounts of the recreational pursuit of wildlife, abuse of animals and breaking of wildlife protection laws (Eliason, 2003; Nurse, 2013).1 Hence, although Moreto
and colleagues (2015: 360) may, in general, be correct that law enforcement and criminal
justice systems have accorded wildlife offences a ‘low priority when compared to other
crimes (Cook et al., 2002),’ this is not to suggest they have been ignored completely or
have not been regarded as important.
Criminological attention to poaching, trafficking and related animal abuse is now
substantial, and encompasses contributions aimed at market reduction and enhancing
conservation efforts (for example, Lee et al., 2014; Schneider, 2008; Shepherd et al.,
2017). Although all of this represents a welcome shift, attention to the dynamics of the
illegal market for a particular species or the investigation of the scope, extent and geographical range of the international trade in specific wildlife as live bodies or as harvested ‘parts and products’ has overshadowed – and has perhaps come at the expense of
– broader criminological considerations of ‘biological diversity’ (or ‘biodiversity’) loss,
decline and extinction, of which wildlife crime is but one cause.2
In 2016, the World Wildlife Fund for Nature’s Living Planet Report (WWF, 2016: 4)
noted that, for some decades, ‘scientists have been warning that human actions are pushing
life toward a sixth mass extinction’ (see also Kolbert, 2014; Mirzoeff, 2014: 227, citing
Novacek, 2007). The data from the Living Planet Index – which offers an indication of the
state of global biological diversity, based on trends in the populations of vertebrate species
from around the world – show that, between 1970 and 2012, the planet experienced a ‘58
per cent overall decline in vertebrate population abundance’ with populations of vertebrate
Brisman and South
3
species falling, on average, ‘by more than half in little more than 40 years … an average
annual decline of 2 per cent,’ with ‘no sign yet that this rate will decrease.’ (WWF, 2016).
This decline of other species is one measure of the magnitude of human impact on the
planet stemming from the expansion and acceleration of human activity designed to meet
the demands of human survival as a growing global population needs more food, requiring
more human-engineered change to natural habitats (for example, deforestation) and contributing to more over-fishing and over-hunting (EEA, 2015).
Along with pollution and global warming, these anthropogenically-induced pressures on
the planetary ecosystem are now sending warning signals (Brannen, 2017). Some believe
that, by responding to these signals now, policy changes and technological developments
can help provide remedies; others caution that some change is already irreversible and only
drastic reorganization of global economic and consumption systems can slow down species
decline and extinctions (for a discussion, see, for example, Ripple et al., 2017).
This article considers human contributions to the rate of loss of biological diversity,
beliefs that science and regulation can control the extent and nature of any consequences
(Fukuyama, 2002; Wilson, 1998, 2004), and related efforts to explore the plausibility,
viability and implications of reviving extinct species (Wray, 2017). We first provide an
overview of the reasons for preserving biological diversity, before turning to an outline
of the causes of recent (unprecedented) extinctions. The implications of extinction trends
have been explored thoroughly within relevant natural sciences and some areas of the
social sciences, but not so far within criminology. This article explores the prospects of
species extinction in terms of the merger of conservation and consumerism (for example,
‘conservation tourism’ or ‘sustainable tourism’ – AWF, n.d.; Buckley, 2010), as well as
the bases for denial and deferral of action furnished by faith in the new science of ‘deextinction.’ We conclude by arguing the case for considering ‘extinction’ as a matter of
criminological concern, and for why this is not only justifiable but necessary.
The importance of biological diversity and the problem of
extinction
Article 2 of the Convention on Biological Diversity (known informally as the ‘Biodiversity
Convention’ or ‘CBD’), defines ‘biological diversity’ as ‘the variability among living
organisms from all sources including, inter alia, terrestrial, marine and other aquatic
ecosystems and the ecological complexes of which they are part: this includes diversity
within species, between species and of ecosystems.’3 According to Ledec and Goodland
(1988: 6), in a still well-cited document:
[B]iological diversity usually refers to three elements: (1) the number of different ecosystems
(communities of plants and animals and the environments that sustain them) and their relative
frequencies in a country or in the world; (2) the number of species of animals and plants and
their relative frequencies; and (3) the genetic variation within each species.
It would seem axiomatic that humans should have an interest in preserving biodiversity
without the need for a multilateral treaty but, given the scope and rate of modern extinctions of flora and fauna (Ceballos et al., 2015), a brief overview is in order.
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Ledec and Goodland (1988: 8–9) submit that there exist convincing aesthetic, economic, scientific and ethical reasons to preserve biological diversity – all of which rest
on the assumption that the extinction of species is ‘completely irreversible’ and that, as
such, ‘preserving biological diversity keeps open important options for the future.’
The aesthetic justification is that ‘many wild species of plants and animals are an
irreplaceable source of wonder, inspiration, and joy to human beings because of their
beauty, intriguing appearance, variety, or fascinating behavior’ (Ledec and Goodland,
1988: 14; see also Kahn, 2018). Indeed, the U.S. Endangered Species Act of 1973 (16
U.S.C. § 1531 et seq.) recognizes explicitly the aesthetic (as well as the educational,
historical and recreational) value of flora and fauna – even for those who do not interact
directly with such fish, wildlife and plants. In other words, ‘knowing that wild things
thrive in faraway places can provide sufficient reason for preservation’ (The Stanford
Environmental Law Society, 2001: 4).
The economic justification for preserving biodiversity rests in the belief that many
species of wild plants and animals can be conceptualized as ‘undeveloped resources . . .
[with] significant economic potential that is currently undiscovered, undervalued, or
underutilized’ (Ledec and Goodland, 1988: 9). This resource-oriented view is, of course,
familiar: biodiversity underpins agriculture, fishing, forestry and modern food security,
as well as necessary products and secondary services (medical, pharmaceutical, tourism). Furthermore, as Kahn (2018) notes, ‘ecosystem services’ represent an economic
argument for preserving biodiversity: we benefit ‘because it saves us money (mangroves
prevent coastal erosion that we would otherwise have to handle with an expensive engineering project) or because it contains something of value to us, either now or in the
future,’ such as, pharmaceutical drugs derived from plants, or the way in which we have
relied on horseshoe crabs to ensure the safety of virtually every drug and medical device
in use today (see Krisfalusi-Gannon et al., 2018; Zhang, 2018).
The scientific case for preserving biodiversity rests on recognition of unique biochemical, physiological and population characteristics of non-human species and the
benefits to humans that follow from increasing our understanding of basic life processes
(Ledec and Goodland, 1988: 13–14; The Stanford Environmental Law Society, 2001:
3–4). These benefits exist independent of any potential (or eventual) economic payoff.
Operating from an ethical or moral perspective, some contend that humans should
refrain from engaging in unsustainable practices that ‘could lead to the loss of species
from peoples’ daily lives, customs and conceptual world, thus leaving a culturally and
emotionally poorer world for their children’ (Herbig, 2010: 125). Preservation of biological diversity and protection of the environment for future generations of humans is a
common refrain in environmentalism (see, for example, Brisman and South, 2015a,
2018a). In a slightly different vein, another ethical or moral justification for biodiversity
preservation begins with the recognition that humans are the one species with the ability
to annihilate all other species (intentionally, recklessly, negligently or accidentally) and
thus humans not only should exercise restraint with respect to this awesome power but
have a duty of stewardship – an obligation not to engage in acts or omissions of ecocide
that have significant consequences for biodiversity. The human capacity to create systems of production, operating locally but with global impacts, should demand that
humans exercise a serious degree of responsibility to, as White (2013: 12) puts it, ‘ensure
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5
that such production methods do not exceed the ecospheric limits of the planet (White
2007).’ Other ethical and moral justifications for preserving biodiversity – ones far less
anthropocentric in orientation – rest on the conviction that ‘animals have intrinsic value
and that, as such, they should not be conceptualized or treated as economic resources’
(Goyes and Sollund, 2016: 95).
The aforementioned aesthetic, economic, scientific and ethical reasons for ensuring
continued biological diversity on Earth reflect a number of different – and sometimes
competing – ecophilosophies (see Halsey and White, 1998; White, 2013). The justification that might resonate the most with criminologists, however, is one based on risk in
relation to the consequences of extinction (Brisman, 2017). Without biodiversity, the
stability, strength and interdependence of ecosystems are weakened and crucial processes of, for example, photosynthesis, water retention and soil nutrition, are threatened
(Tilman, 1999). The fundamental risk, therefore, is that the pace of species extinction
gathers momentum to the point of endangering the existence of all life. Similar to cases
of denial (Cohen, 2001; see also Brisman and South, 2015a, 2015b; Natali, 2010; Wyatt
and Brisman, 2017), strategic ignorance (McGoey, 2012) or omission (van Erp and
Huisman, 2013), here humans are unwilling to fully comprehend or appreciate what
biodiversity loss may mean for the ecosphere and that we may be ‘imperiling our own
tenure on this planet’ (Dawson, 2016: 10).
Despite the aesthetic, economic, scientific and ethical justifications for preserving
biological diversity – as well as the risks to human and non-human life and the planet as
a whole for not doing so – biological diversity is actually being reduced at an unprecedented rate. Admittedly, extinction – the ultimate demise of a species – is actually a
routine occurrence in evolutionary terms (Angelici, 2016; Sodhi et al., 2009), but, over
tens of thousands of years, the process of evolution and the nature of extinction events
have been shaped by the impact of human activities. This significant and adverse influence has been pronounced, such that human-induced extinctions now far exceed natural
ones (Hogan, 2014). From the Pleistocene period of exotic animals and mega fauna to
today, humanity, as Dawson (2016: 8) contends,
essentially ate its way down the food chain when wiping out biodiversity. Africa, our ancestral
home, is virtually alone in harboring some remnants of the Pleistocene biodiversity. . . . [W]e
are witnessing the final destruction of the world’s remaining megafauna . . . .
Dawson’s analysis of human impact merits further discussion here. In short, whereas
the rate of natural extinction of species has ‘usually been slightly less than the rate of
formation of new species through evolutionary processes (Myers 1979)’ (Ledec and
Goodland, 1988: 7; emphasis added), it is the activity of humans that has caused an
acceleration of extinction, with the possibility that now, ‘[m]ore species of the Earth’s
flora and fauna may disappear in the next several decades than were lost in the mass
extinction that wiped out whole taxonomic groups of animals, including the dinosaurs,
65 million years ago (Wolf 1987)’ (Ledec and Goodland, 1988: 7-8).
Although humans are not the first species to have brought about the extinction of
another species, the scale of their impact is without precedent, over millennia threatening
numerous groups of other organisms (Stenøien and Andersen, 2018). The tragedy and
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shame of this is that humanity is ‘the first [species] to be aware of the implications of [its]
actions and to be capable of controlling them’ (Ledec and Goodland, 1988: 8) and yet
remains unwilling to act in response to dire forecasts and warnings (Agnew, 2012; Ripple
et al., 2017). It is beyond shameful, but perverse and criminal, to transform the process
and environmental consequences of the impending extinction of species into an economic opportunity to create a profitable market based on rarity and scarcity – a phenomenon to which we now turn.
Uncontrollable human urges? Conquest, collection,
consumption
The financial and cultural value of scarce ‘things’ has been noted widely (see, for example, van Uhm, 2018). In the past – and today – conditions of near-extinction have stimulated unregulated and criminal markets for the rare or exotic (Schneider, 2012; Sellar,
2017). Courchamp and colleagues (2006) note that the ‘human predisposition to place
exaggerated value on rarity fuels disproportionate exploitation of rare species, rendering
them even rarer and thus more desirable, ultimately leading them into an extinction vortex.’ In some cases – and in addition to rarity and desirability – it is a quality of ‘charisma’ that may make a species particularly popular as an icon of nature and as images
(real or artistically-/computer-generated) in cultural products (film and television, toys,
clothing, and so on). Yet, as Courchamp and colleagues (2018) suggest, it is precisely
such popularity and the widely received presentations of ‘virtual’ populations as apparently thriving that may be helping to create the perception that these species are not at
risk of extinction and need no conservation interventions.
Uncontrolled hunting or poaching – as well as the capture of rare animals as pets
and the (illegal and legal) trade in animal body parts – are obvious threats to some
species’ survival (for examples, see Gettleman, 2017; Nordland, 2018; Nuwer, 2017,
2018a, 2018b; Rivett-Carnac, 2017; Werblow, 2018; Zimmer, 2013). Various other
human activities have also contributed indirectly to species decline, including pollution and atmospheric change (Giller, 2018; Pacifici et al., 2017), as well as deliberate
and inadvertent allochthonous species introduction, which can become serious competitors or predators for autochthonous species (Keller and Perrings, 2011). In the
well-known case of the California condor (Gymnogyps californianus), DDT contributed to eggshell thinning and lower reproductive success (see, for example, Kiff et al.,
1979). Other impacts follow from habitation alteration caused by agricultural intensification, deforestation and industrial development (Maxwell et al., 2016; Zimmer,
2013: 33), as well as war and civil unrest (Brisman and South, 2018b; Daskin and
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