The Many Boar Identities: Understanding difference and change in the geographies of European wild boar management

Abstract

Wildlife management across Europe is increasingly characterised by a ‘war on wild boar’. In response to epidemiological and economic threats to pig production and agriculture, state agencies, policymakers and hunting organizations have altered their management as they attempt to contain wild boar. Through a cross-section overview of eight European countries with differentiated strategies – the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Great Britain, Norway, Poland, Spain, and Sweden – we analyze five critical components of contemporary wild boar management: categorizing, responsibilizing, calculating, controlling, and sanitizing. We consider three critical triggers that change how wild boar and, by extension, a range of other ‘wild’ species are managed in relation to the aforementioned categories: (over) abundance and population growth, biosecurity crises, and technological innovation. While these triggers, on one hand, might streamline transborder management policies, we show how wild boar also uproot longstanding wildlife management cultures by transforming hunting traditions, landowner-hunter relations and meat handling practices.