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Abstract:Because of their status ofres nullius—owned by no one—property theory is underdeveloped in regard to wildlife. In this article, wildlife is seen to be sometimes subject to a shadow ownership by class interests in society. Hunters accuse protected wolves of being the "pets" or "property" of an urban-based conservationist middle class. This phenomenon fragments the common fauna and undermines responsibility taking and policy compliance for wildlife that is seen as being owned by an oppositional social class. Using an empirical case study of Swedish hunters, we show how responsibility for wildlife has become entangled with property rights. A historical materialist analysis reveals that hunters once experienced ownership of wildlife by the nobility as co-opting state coercive power. Today, however, aristocracy is replaced by a new elite class of conservationists. Noting the hunters' tendency to evoke quasi-aristocratic virtues of ownership, we advance recommendations for an alternative approach. We appeal to deliberative democracy to promote the "communing" of wildlife across classes in fora that withstand co-optation by class interests.

Context
In many countries, hunting has emerged as a major source of funding for wildlife conservation and research or habitat acquisition. In some countries, recent declines in recruitment of hunters have generated concerns about the consequences of the rapid demographic change within society in general, and among hunters in particular. Gaining a better understanding of how these demographic changes influence dedication to and motivation for hunting has therefore become an important task.

Aims
Our aims included documenting the demographic transition among Danish hunters, and identifying correlates of hunter recruitment age, motivations and dedication.

Methods
We addressed these aims using a national survey of Danish hunters in 2000 (n = 1186) and 2006 (n = 701). Survey data were analysed using multiple regression models.

Key results
Whereas recruitment numbers remained stable, the average age of recruitment for hunters increased from 21 to 34 between 1984 and 2006, and the percentage of new hunters younger than 20 declined from 63% to 19% during the same period. Respondents who hunted to experience nature were recruited at older ages than other hunters. Recruitment age was negatively related to number of days hunting per year and relative importance placed on hunting as a recreational activity, and positively related to being recruited by friends, female gender, being married, and having an urban childhood.

Conclusions
The global demographic transition towards an older and more urban populace may drive a change in hunter demographics rather than a decline of hunting.

Implications
The present study suggests that hunting can persist in the face of rapid demographic change. However, the study also indicates several important structural barriers for new hunters, favouring those hunters being economically most well off and leading to a decline in hunting dedication. To meet these challenges, the study suggests that modifications will be needed in hunter education programs and hunter recruitment campaigns, so as to maintain hunting as a significant positive factor within wildlife conservation.

Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- List of Tables, Figures, and Photos -- Preface -- Editors' Introduction: Why Action Research for Democracy? -- PART I Renewal of Working Life and Welfare Institutions Through Democratisation: Openings Created by Action Research and Interactive Research -- 1 Interactive Research: A Joint Learning Process with the Unions -- 2 Design as a Democratic Process-and Implications for Innovation -- 3 Democratising Innovation Policy with Gender-Scientific Participatory Research -- 4 Empowering Dialogues: A Way to Democratise Knowledge Production? -- 5 New Forms of Public Participation: The Festival of Difference as Action Research on the Road to a More Inclusive Labour Market -- 6 Redefining Democratic Welfare-Openings and Future Orientations: Action Research in Danish Day Care Centres -- 7 Action Research with Teachers: Action and Critique in a Project on Multicultural Education -- 8 Educational Action Research and the Development of Professional Teacher Knowledge -- PART II Action Research: Rethinking the Societal Role of Science: Democratisation, Sustainability and Historical Experience -- 9 Can Action Research Strengthen Democratic Dimensions in Gender Mainstreaming Processes? -- 10 Organising Research Institutions Through Action Research -- 11 Towards Democratic Scientific Inquiry? Participatory Democracy, Philosophy of Science and the Future of Action Research -- 12 Artistic Sense in Action Research -- Postscript -- Contributor Biographies -- Index.

Illegal hunting has constituted an expression of contested legitimacy of wildlife regulation across the world for centuries. In the following report, we critically engage with the state of the art on the illegal hunting phenomenon. We do so to reveal emerging scholarly perspectives on the crime. Specifically, we aim to capture the complexity of illegal hunting as a socio-political phenomenon rather than an economically motivated crime. To do so, we adopt a critical perspective that pays particular attention to the societal processes that contribute to the criminalization of historically accepted hunting practices. To capture perspectives on illegal hunting, fifteen researchers from various countries participated in an illegal hunting workshop in Copenhagen 16-17th June 2014. A primary contribution of the research workshop was to bring together criminologists, sociologists, anthropologists and geographers, each equipped with their own research perspective, to engage in a critical and interdisciplinary discussion on how to apprehend and constructively address the challenges of illegal hunting in contemporary society. A majority of those that attended were primarily based in the Nordic and the UK context, which motivated a strong focus on the illegal hunting that currently takes places in these countries. Similar trends of illegal hunting were identified across Europe, many of which traced from EU legislation on the reintroduction of large carnivores or other controversial wildlife conservation projects. In the workshop, proceedings took the form of individual presentations, plenary discussions and group work. Common themes that emerged from these presentations were: illegal hunting as communicating socio-political resistance; the targeting of specific species based on its symbolism or environmental history; illegal hunting as symptom of class struggles; the role of rewilding and domestication of nature on wildlife regulation; corruption, complicity and conflicts of loyalty in enforcement, and discrepancies and discontinuities in legality. These themes were framed in an understanding of illegal hunting as a complex, multifaceted expression that transgresses livelihood based motivation. Critical discussions conceptualised illegal hunting as a crime of dissent. This meant situating crimes as everyday forms of resistance against the regulatory regime. In so doing, the relationship between hunters and public authorities was highlighted as a potential source of disenfranchisement. In this interactionist perspective, illegal hunting tells us not just about the rationales of the offenders. It also elucidates the broader context in which non-compliance with regulation serves as symptoms of democratic and legitimacy deficits on the state level. Erratic transitions in legislation and a subsequent discord between legal, cultural and moral norms in society were identified as factors that contribute to the conflict. Crucially, the research workshop and the report contribute with three perspectives. First, it emphasizes the need to uncover the grey areas of complicity in wildlife crime. Previously corruption, bribery and selective law enforcement have been associated with wildlife trafficking in the global south, but this understanding is too blunt for the complicity that exists in many other contexts. Here conflicts of loyalty exist across several strata of society and differ in degrees. In highlighting this fact, we show a more opaque and contingent climate of complicity around illegal hunting in Northern Europe and elsewhere. Second, as crimes of dissent seeking to publicise injustices, illegal hunting and its associated resistance tactics are counterproductive by constituting a 'dialogue of the dead'. With this is mean that such communication is prone to distortion, misunderstanding and exaggeration and does no favors to hunters. There is consequently a need to move to a clarity of messages, as in institutionalised diogue processes. Third, hunting regulation cannot be seen in isolation to the broader differences in society in terms of values, economic factors and development. Research questions for future scholarship concluded the workshop and are summarized in the report. In terms of illuminating the junctures at which additional research is needed, these questions may provide important guidance. Above all, the report is intended as help for policy-makers, wildlife managers and law enforcement in better understanding and responding to the complexities of illegal hunting. We hope this will lead to more long-term preventative measures that address the core of the issue rather than proximate causes. The workshop was organized by the Environmental Communication Division of the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences. The event constituted a part of the FORMAS funded research project Confronting challenges to political legitimacy of the natural resource management regulatory regime in Sweden - the case of illegal hunting in Sweden whose members include Erica von Essen, Dr. Hans Peter Hansen and Dr. Helena Nordström Källström from the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Professor Tarla R. Peterson from Texas A&M University and Dr. Nils Peterson from North Carolina State University.

Within a local and national context of escalating conflicts surrounding the management of immigrating wild wolves (Canis lupus) spreading from Germany into Denmark, we invited a group of citizens living in and nearby a Danish wolf territory to participate in an experiment called "The Wolf Dialogue Project". The overall objective of the Wolf Dialogue Project was to explore the possibility of developing a productive alternative to the systematically distorted communication and "High conflict" that characterizes current wolf management, using a critical-utopian dialogue approach guided by Habermasian discourse ethic and a joint fact-finding process, that seeks to empower citizens to take on a shared responsibility for the commons. By purposefully not representing any strategic interests for or against wolves or the existing wolf management regime, the project offered a group of citizens the opportunity to formulate and communicate the problems and concerns they experienced, living in or nearby wolf territory. The project further offered the participating citizens the opportunity to develop counter measures and solutions to their experienced problems, through a facilitated process of social learning and empowerment. The duration of the dialogue project was two and a half years and included a demographic and political cross section of local citizens. Despite difficulties along the way, the outcome of the project was more profound than initially anticipated by the project team. Participants were initially very polarised, and some were opposed to the existing wolf management regime as well as governmental agencies, but they began taking on a collective responsibility guided by the common interest of their community, across individual differences. In addition, the process left a significant mark on the new wolf management plan recommended to the government by the Danish Wildlife Council in 2021. Far from all problems and conflicts were solved by the project, and new problems also emerged as a result of the project, but ...

Abstract
Background
Lead particles from hunting rifle ammunition become embedded in the tissue of shot animals and pose a health risk to predators and scavengers that eat discarded offal or parts of non-retrieved carcasses of shot game animals, as well as to humans who consume game. Copper and copper–zinc alloys are the most widely used alternatives to leaded ammunition. In Denmark, there has been a growing awareness of the toxic environmental effects of lead ammunition and the Danish government, supported by the Danish Hunters' Association, announced in November 2020 a forthcoming ban on the use of lead-based bullets for hunting purposes intended to take effect in 2023. The question that remains to be addressed is how the Danish hunting community perceives lead ammunition as a problem and non-lead alternatives as a solution, and whether the willingness to change demonstrated by the hunters' representatives reflects the attitude of the individual hunters. We studied this in a survey targeting 6000 randomly selected Danish rifle hunters, mapping their knowledge and concerns regarding lead rifle ammunition as well as their use of lead and non-lead ammunition.

Results
We found that approximately one-fifth of the use of rifle ammunition for hunting in Denmark in 2019 was non-lead. Hunters' knowledge of and concern for the adverse impacts of lead ammunition and the opportunities to switch to non-lead alternatives were generally limited. However, some showed an open-minded attitude and we found that such knowledge and concern increased the likelihood of hunters deciding to use non-lead ammunition. Hunters mainly got their information from hunting organizations and colleagues and expressed a distinct lack of information and guidance on the topic from ministerial authorities responsible for hunting administration.

Conclusions
Some hunters have already changed to use non-lead rifle ammunition completely or in part, and others show an open attitude to discussing the issue and receiving more information particularly from hunting authorities. Some hunters demonstrated a critical or negative attitude towards a change. Communication of the adverse impacts of leaded ammunition in terms of the risk of lead poisoning to wildlife and humans and the opportunities of switching to the existing efficient and safe alternatives is essential regardless of the formal approach and will be crucial for the effectiveness of the regulation announced by the Danish government.

Lead particles from hunting rifle ammunition become embedded in the tissue of shot animals and pose a health risk to predators and scavengers that eat discarded offal or parts of non-retrieved carcasses of shot game animals, as well as to humans who consume game. Copper and copper–zinc alloys are the most widely used alternatives to leaded ammunition. In Denmark, there has been a growing awareness of the toxic environmental effects of lead ammunition and the Danish government, supported by the Danish Hunters' Association, announced in November 2020 a forthcoming ban on the use of lead-based bullets for hunting purposes intended to take effect in 2023. The question that remains to be addressed is how the Danish hunting community perceives lead ammunition as a problem and non-lead alternatives as a solution, and whether the willingness to change demonstrated by the hunters' representatives reflects the attitude of the individual hunters. We studied this in a survey targeting 6000 randomly selected Danish rifle hunters, mapping their knowledge and concerns regarding lead rifle ammunition as well as their use of lead and non-lead ammunition.

Self-policing is essential for addressing wildlife-related crime where illegal activity is extremely diffuse, and limited resources are available for monitoring and enforcement. Emerging research on self-policing suggest key drivers including economics, folk traditions, and socio-political resistance. We build on this research with a case study evaluating potential drivers of self-policing illegal wolf killing among Swedish hunting teams. Swedish hunters marginally leaned toward considering illegal hunting of wolves an expression of resistance (10.30 out of a possible 17 on a resistance scale) and strongly believed outsiders had undue influence over hunting (15.79 out of a possible 21 on an influence scale). Most (73%) Swedish hunters stated they would report illegal wolf killing to authorities, but 20% stated they would handle the infractions through internal sanctions. Viewing illegal hunting of wolves as a form of political resistance, viewing wolf management as being controlled locally, and perceived prevalence of illegal wolf killing among hunting acquaintances were positive predictors of preferring internal sanctions to address illegal wolf killing over reporting the crimes. Resistance and perceived prevalence of wolf killing also predicted preferring no action to address illegal wolf killing. These results suggest that a counterpublic of marginalized ruralism may promote forms of self-policing that rely on internal censure for illegal wolf killing rather than using formal legal channels. Similarly, folk traditions within this counterpublic (e.g., perceptions of prevalence of illegal wolf killing) shape if and how internal sanctions are advocated. Re-engaging marginalized hunting groups and emphasizing the rarity of illegal wolf killing may promote wolf conservation, both in Sweden and in other democratic regimes.

Self-policing is essential for addressing wildlife-related crime where illegal activity is extremely diffuse, and limited resources are available for monitoring and enforcement. Emerging research on self-policing suggest key drivers including economics, folk traditions, and socio-political resistance. We build on this research with a case study evaluating potential drivers of self-policing illegal wolf killing among Swedish hunting teams. Swedish hunters marginally leaned toward considering illegal hunting of wolves an expression of resistance (10.30 out of a possible 17 on a resistance scale) and strongly believed outsiders had undue influence over hunting (15.79 out of a possible 21 on an influence scale). Most (73%) Swedish hunters stated they would report illegal wolf killing to authorities, but 20% stated they would handle the infractions through internal sanctions. Viewing illegal hunting of wolves as a form of political resistance, viewing wolf management as being controlled locally, and perceived prevalence of illegal wolf killing among hunting acquaintances were positive predictors of preferring internal sanctions to address illegal wolf killing over reporting the crimes. Resistance and perceived prevalence of wolf killing also predicted preferring no action to address illegal wolf killing. These results suggest that a counterpublic of marginalized ruralism may promote forms of self-policing that rely on internal censure for illegal wolf killing rather than using formal legal channels. Similarly, folk traditions within this counterpublic (e.g., perceptions of prevalence of illegal wolf killing) shape if and how internal sanctions are advocated. Re-engaging marginalized hunting groups and emphasizing the rarity of illegal wolf killing may promote wolf conservation, both in Sweden and in other democratic regimes. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (10.1007/s13280-018-1072-5) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.