'A Criminology of Extinction:
Biodiversity, extreme consumption and the vanity of species resurrection' by Avi Brisman and Nigel South in (2019)
European Journal of Criminology 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)
The authors comment
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; Maher
and Sollund, 2016; Maher et al., 2016; 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 sixteen 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 (1906/1987) had documented
the role nonhuman animals play in human society in The Criminal Prosecution and Capital
Punishment of Animals, while historians such as E.P. Thompson, Linebaugh and others
outlined the importance of wildlife in terms of property law, moral economies, class
oppression, 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). 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 (e.g., Lee et al., 2014; Schneider, 2008; Shepherd, 2017). While 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 (see, e.g.,
http://www.cnn.com/interactive/2016/12/specials/vanishing/).
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 Novoacek 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 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.” 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 (e.g., 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, e.g., 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). It first provides 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 (e.g., “conservation
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 “de-extinction.” It concludes by arguing the case
for considering “extinction” as a matter of criminological concern, and for why this is not
only justifiable but necessary.
