Rewilding and Reintroductions in Britain Human Interactions with Conservation

About this book

This book examines how rewilding and species reintroductions play a crucial role in conservation and ecological restoration in Britain.

The book examines how humans think about and interact with our environment and nature, and how competing interests surrounding conservation, land-use (in particular agriculture), and social-cultural issues can be reconciled. Rather than taking a stance which is aligned to either conservation or farming, as many other books do, this book examines how these two land uses are being negotiated in the discourse and reconciled in practice. Drawing on research involving visits to rewilding and reintroduction projects and interviews with conservation experts, practitioners and stakeholders, the book examines two landscapes sites – the Avalon Marshes in Somerset and Wild Ennerdale in Cumbria – and three species: cows, the European Wildcat and the Red Kite. It also examines the role played by public figures, whether activists, environmentalists or celebrities, in promoting rewilding. The book argues that rewilding in Britain is domesticated, in that it is more compatible with people and other land use than is often the case with rewilding in other parts of the world. This extends from the smaller scale at which it occurs, to the different names by which it is known, to the way that humans are still intervening in rewilding landscapes, and the very careful consideration which is being given to which animals are involved and how they are managed. Overall, this book provides insights into how rewilding in Britain is evolving with the potential impacts on land use and land use decision making.

This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of rewilding, conservation, ecological restoration, human-wildlife interactions and environmental management more broadly.

Contents

Introduction: Rewilding and reintroductions in Britain: human interactions with conservation

1. Conservation, rewilding and reintroductions in England and Britain
2. 'Rewilding' the Avalon Marshes
3. Wilding the Ennerdale Valley
4. Domesticating rewilding
5. Let live and let die: the biopolitics of rewilding and (self)-governing cows
6. Of kites and men: valuing, categorising and controlling kites in Britain
7. The wildness of cats
8. Gods and monsters: The charismatic megafolk of rewilding
9. Rewilding and reintroductions in the Anthropocene

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Biography

Virginia Thomas is an environmental social scientist. She researches rewilding, human interactions with the environment, and human-animal relations. She holds a PhD in Sociology.