A property rights framework for analyzing management options for wildlife: a case study of chronic wasting disease in Canada

Abstract

Although property rights have been used to understand numerous wildlife issues, such as extinctions, they have rarely been used to provide insights into specific management options. We present analytical frameworks that may be used to characterize property rights to wildlife for the purpose of understanding the implications of management actions for various stakeholders. The frameworks consider multiple types of values, including consumptive, non-consumptive, and passive-use values. Our case study involves the emergence of Chronic Wasting Disease (CWD) and its potential influence on the rights of stakeholders (i.e. the general public and hunters) in Alberta, Canada. Populating the framework for each stakeholder with characteristics of current property rights allow us to identify: 1) how the emergence of CWD could influence stakeholders’ current rights, 2) how management actions could change property rights and associated incentives; and 3) management options that have not been considered.

Keywords:

• property rights
• wildlife management
• chronic wasting disease
• stakeholders
• wildlife values

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplemental data

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed here.

Notes

1 We develop the concept of property rights used in this paper more fully in section 2. But as a quick preview, our use of the term property rights is not based solely on concepts of real property (e.g. land). Rather, we follow concepts of Bromley (1991), where property rights are made up of some type of natural resource asset (e.g. wildlife) and sets of social conditions. Taken together, the asset and social conditions create a benefit stream, or property right, with associated incentives that influence the ways that rights are used.

2 For a review of legal concepts of property rights see Kaplinsky and Percy (n.d.).

3 While indigenous people are also hunters of cervid resources, they are not included in this study because there are different sets of regulations that apply, and they may have benefit streams that are not accessible to other hunters. Considering these property rights is beyond the scope of this study.

Additional information

Funding

The authors would like to thank Genome Canada/Genome Alberta (Grant No. RES0034611) for funding this research, as part of the larger grant Systems Biology and Molecular Ecology of Chronic Wasting Disease project. Support for the larger grant was also received from Alberta Prion Research Institute and Alberta Agriculture and Forestry through Genome Alberta, the University of Alberta, and the University of Calgary.