– Now it’s nature’s turn, said Climate and Environment Minister (Ap) Espen Barth Eide after the nature agreement was hammered out in Canada just before Christmas. Then he went home and defended the decision by the predatory game boards that 21 of Norway’s around 120 wolves should be killed within the wolf zone in Norway. The tribunals and Barth Eide believe that the felling will “contribute to conflict mitigation and to increasing confidence in game management”. A number of nature conservation organizations complained about the decision. The felling was temporarily halted. But on Friday 3 February the Court of Appeal finally decided that it should take place. Law is law. But another, perhaps more fundamental, question is how we can think about wolf hunting from a moral perspective. Is it right or wrong to trap wolves? news has asked two moral philosophers who have researched exactly this. FOR: Erica von EssenProfessor at the Faculty of Social Anthropology at the University of Stockholm and Høgskolen i Inlandet. Research has been funded by the Swedish Hunters’ Association. Has researched hunting ethics and animal protection. Erica von Essen is a researcher at the University of Stockholm and Høgskolen i Innlandet, and has thought a lot about wolf hunting. She herself has been with hunters during license cancellations, and admits that she leans more towards their side of the story. – I have spent a lot of time with the hunters and seen their perspective. I always get critical when I see outsiders commenting solely on the low number of wolves. They don’t understand the connection, says Erica. That does not mean that she believes that all wolves must be killed. – At the same time, I completely agree that the wolf has a right to exist. Many of the hunters I interviewed also thought so. MOT: Morten TønnessenProfessor of philosophy at the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of Stavanger. Former county leader for MDG in Rogaland. Has researched animals, outdoor life, nature and how to define life. Philosopher Morten Tønnessen lives in Stavanger, where he researches life, nature and animals. Morten has also thought a lot about wolf hunting. But Morten has a different perspective than Erica. – Hunting for wolves and felling wolves has too large a scope today. I believe that it cannot be morally defended in a good way, says Morten. That does not mean that all hunting and felling is wrong. – To think that too many wolves are killed is not necessarily the same as being against all hunting or felling of wolves, emphasizes Morten. There is so much that can be said about the matter, so for the sake of clarity, we include a small overview of the usual arguments for and against wolf hunting. Our philosophers can then take a closer look at three important points: Emotions, fear and protection. Lars Gangås shows former Prime Minister Erna Solberg and Minister of Agriculture and Food Jon Georg Dale the dogs that are now used to hunt wolves during the meeting of hunters and representatives of the sheep industry on Hadelandsåsen in 2017. Photo: Torstein Bøe / NTB Feelings: – Gives them the feeling that someone listens Erica highlights the role wolf hunting plays in rural communities. – The license hunt has many functions, and one of them is a kind of opening of the valve for the local population and farmers. It gives them the feeling that someone is listening to them. Because wolves and humans so often end up on a collision course that you have to limit the wolf population, says our Swedish philosopher. – There are a number of problems with coexistence with wolves. Hunting dogs and livestock are lost. So no matter what you do, people will probably shoot wolves, Erica points out. She says that it is important to take into account the opinions and feelings of those who actually live near the wolves. – People in the cities probably like the aesthetic idea that there are wolves in the forest, without having to bear the consequences of them. Morten acknowledges that the problems of coexistence may justify some license suspensions. But not in the way wolves are killed today. – If we look at most wolves as common in Norway, it is often argued that wolves threaten sheep. But the wolves that are killed during hunting or felling of packs in Norway are permanent wolves that are territorial. They typically do not take sheep, points out the researcher in Stavanger. Many people turned up in front of the Storting to demonstrate to preserve wolves and other predators in Norway in December 2019. Photo: Heiko Junge / NTB Fear: Is there a good reason? Erica thinks it is important that we take into account how it feels to live near wolves. But fear in itself is not a good reason for wolf hunting, she believes. – It also does not seem legitimate that an existential fear of wolves should justify killing them. There is no evidence that wolves attack humans. Not where we live today, says Erica. Morten agrees here. – If people walk around and are afraid of being attacked by wolves, but no one is attacked by wolves, then I don’t think fear is a good argument, he says. – The wolf is normally shy and avoids people. For the most part, it does not pose any real danger. The last time a human was killed by a wolf in Norway was 200 years ago, he adds. The Norwegian Nature Inspectorate closely monitors the wolves’ movements in Norway. Here, a young male wolf is radio-tagged in Åmot in Hedmark in 2018. Photo: Heiko Junge / NTB Fredning: – The wolf is protected The wolf was nearly extinct in Norway until the 1970s, when it was protected. Until then, hunting had been going on on a large scale. Norway has also later committed itself to protecting species such as wolves in several international agreements. Then Morten thinks it doesn’t make sense to take out large shares of the wolf population every year. – For it to be meaningful to call the wolf a protected species that has protection, we should kill wolves on a far smaller scale than we do. Every year we kill an equal proportion of the wolf population as of the elk population, despite the fact that one species is protected and the other is not. Still, Erica believes that there is no reason to worry about the wolf. – It is not true that the wolf is an endangered species. Wolves are one of the most common, widespread large mammals on our continent. It has a “Least Concern” status with the World Conservation Union. – Then some argue that the geographically limited populations are in themselves valuable from a genetic point of view. These are pretty arbitrary lines to draw, says Erica. Two wolf pups observed in Elverum in 2017. Photo: Terje Håheim / NTB – A kind of trench warfare The philosophers disagree about the hunt itself, but share the perspective that the debate itself needs to be improved. That we must understand the different considerations. – I think the quality of the debate is a bit average. It’s a kind of trench warfare. People on both sides have their clear convictions, but without there having been any progress over time in understanding each other better. I think we would have had a better debate about wolves and predators if we came to a better mutual understanding of the various considerations, says Morten. What are the two parties arguing about? And how dangerous is the wolf?
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Is wolf hunting morally right? We asked the philosophers – news Norway – Overview of news from various parts of the country
