Wild horses in a 'European wilderness': Imagining sustainable development in the post-Communist countryside

Cultural Geographies

Volumn 12, Issue 3, 2005, Pages 292-320

  Schwartz, Katrina Z S ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

NATURE CONSERVATION; POST-COMMUNISM; RESTORATION ECOLOGY;

BALTIC STATES; EASTERN HEMISPHERE; EURASIA; EUROPE; LATVIA; NORTHERN EUROPE; WORLD;

EQUIDAE; EQUUS CABALLUS;

EID: 21544481717     PISSN: 14744740     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1191/1474474005eu331oa     Document Type: Article

References (100)

1. Pronounced PUH-peh.
2. See e.g. D. Massey, 'Questions of locality', Geography 78 (1993), pp. 142-9.
3. As Petr Pavlinek and John Pickles note, the considerable political and media attention given to environmental 'hot spots', such as the highly polluted 'black triangle' of coal-fired power plants on the Czech-German-Polish border, 'have given rise to a widely held and publicized view of environmental devastation across CEE': a view that overlooks 'the protected natural areas that still cover an estimated 30 percent of the area of CEE'. P. Pavlinek and J. Pickles, Environmental transitions: transformation and ecological defence in Central and Eastern Europe (London, Routledge, 2000), p. 41.
4. In September 2002, for example, WWF-Austria sponsored an international conference in Vienna, 'Enlargement enriches the EU', on the prospects for rural development and biodiversity conservation in the East European candidate countries.
5. The accession countries are the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia, as well as Cyprus and Malta.
6. Indeed, one analyst 'produced a ten-page listing of the most common definitions used in the decade of the 1980s'. S. Baker, M. Kousis, D. Richardson and S. Young, 'Introduction: the theory and practice of sustainable development in EU perspective', in S. Baker, M. Kousis, D. Richardson and S. Young, eds, The politics of sustainable development: theory, policy and practice within the European Union (London, Routledge, 1997), P. 5.
7. Sustainable development has been denounced as 'a convenient ... expression of political correctness,... sufficiently vague to allow conflicting parties, factions and interests to adhere to it without losing credibility'. D. Richardson, 'The politics of sustainable development', in Baker et al., Politics of sustainable development, p. 43.
8. For a nuanced analysis of the genesis, meanings and uses of the concept of biodiversity, see D. Takacs, The idea of biodiversity: philosophies of paradise (Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996).
9. P. Stott and S. Sullivan, 'Introduction', in P. Stott and S. Sullivan, eds, Political ecology: science, myth and power (London, Arnold, 2000), p. 1.
10. Ibid., p. 1.
11. J. McCarthy, 'First world political ecology: lessons from the Wise Use movement', Environment and planning A 24 (2002), p. 1286.
12. Stott and Sullivan, 'Introduction', p. 5.
13. See also e.g. R. L. Bryant and S. Bailey, Third world political ecology (London, Routledge, 1997);
14. and R. Peet and M. Watts, Liberation ecologies: environment, development, social movements (London, Routledge, 1996).
15. Stott and Sullivan, 'Introduction', p. 6.
16. See e.g. B. A. Cellarius and C. Staddon, 'Environmental nongovernmental organizations, civil society, and democratization in Bulgaria', East European politics and societies 16, (2002), pp. 182-222;
17. S. Franklin, 'Bialowieza Forest, Poland: representation, myth, and the politics of dispossession', Environment and planning A 34 (2002), pp. 1459-85;
18. Pavlinek and Pickles, Environmental transitions
19. C. Staddon, 'Localities, natural resources and transition in Eastern Europe'
20. A. Tickle and I. Welsh, eds, Environment and society in Eastern Europe (New York, Longman, 1998);
21. and D. Turnock, 'Sustainable rural tourism in the Romanian Carpathians', Geographical journal 165 (1999), pp. 192-9.
22. In my doctoral dissertation ('Wild horses and great trees: national identity and the global politics of nature' (doctoral dissertation, Univeristy of Wisconsin, Madison, 2001)) and in a book manuscript currently under review, I trace the construction, contestation and reproduction of these two discourses from the 'national awakening' of the 1850s through to the present day. Evidence for the displacement of initially powerful internationalist narratives by agrarian nationalism from the 1920s onward was gathered during two years of ethnographic fieldwork in Latvia, in 1995-6 and 1998-9, and during a brief visit in June 2002. Along with observation in numerous policy-making settings, I conducted some 160 semi-structured, in-depth interviews with government officials in the environmental, agricultural and forestry sectors; conservation advocates; local authorities and activists in rural townships; private landowners; logging executives; ecotourism promoters and providers; and international consultants. Ethnographic data are supplemented by a broad sampling of primary written sources, including the writings of seminal nineteenth-century national entrepreneurs, canonical Latvian literary texts and periodical literature from the 1920s up to the present.
23. I presented an early version of this argument in 'Nature, development, and national identity: the battle over sustainable forestry in Latvia', Environmental politics 8 (1999), pp. 99-118.
24. V. Liepins, 'Baltic attitudes to economic recovery: a survey of public opinion in the Baltic countries', Journal of Baltic studies 24 (1993), p. 193. Agriculture was ranked first as the 'main basis for economic development' by 68% of respondents in Latvia.
25. A. Boruks, Zemnieks, zeme un zemkopiba Latvija: no senakiem laikiem lidz musdienam [Farmer land and agriculture in Latvia: from ancient times to the present] (Riga, Gramatvedis, 1995), p. 393.
26. Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia, Chief economic indicators 2002 (Riga, Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia, 2002), p. 6.
27. Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia, Statistical yearbook of Latvia 1998 (Riga, Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia, 1998), p. 54.
28. Latvian State Institute of Agrarian Economics, Latvijas lauksaimnieciba 1998: politika un atiistiba [Latvian agriculture 1998: policy and development], Working Papers 7/1999 (Riga, Latvian State Institute of Agrarian Economics, 1999), p. 116.
29. See e.g. S. Baker et al., Politics of sustainable development;
30. G. Beaufoy, D. Baldock and J. Clark, The nature of farming: low intensity farming systems in nine European countries (London, Institute for European Environmental Policy, 1994);
31. H. Buller, G. Wilson and A. Holl, Agri-environmental Policy in the European Union (Aldershot, Ashgate, 2000);
32. H. Clout, 'The European countryside: contested space', in B. Graham, ed., Modern Europe: place, culture and identity(London, Arnold, 1998);
33. Commission of European Communities Directorate General VI/A1, Towards a common agricultural and rural policy for Europe: report of an expert group (Brussels, European Commission, 1997);
34. and D. McCracken, E. Bignal and S. Wenlock, eds, Farming on the edge: the nature of traditional farmland in Europe (Peterborough, Joint Nature Conservation Committee, 1995).
35. B. Ilbery and I. Bowler, 'From agricultural productivism to post-productivism', in B. Ilbery, ed., The geography of rural change (Harlow, Longman, 1998).
36. Ibid., p. 102.
37. e.g. C. Potter and P. Goodwin, 'Agricultural liberalization in the European Union: an analysis of the implications for nature conservation', Journal of rural studies 14 (1998), pp. 287-98.
38. In Latvia, this aid has been provided by a range of bilateral, intergovernmental and non-governmental donors, including PHARE (the EU's aid programme to Eastern Europe), UNDP, the UN- and World Bank-administered Global Environmental Facility (GEF), WWF International, Birdlife International and the governments of Denmark, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden.
39. To name the most important: the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance Especially as Waterfowl Habitat, the Convention on International Trade with Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), the Bern Convention on the Conservation of European Wildlife and Natural Habitats and the Rio Convention on Biological Diversity.
40. For wonderful accounts of how Western aid projects require East Europeans to adopt 'project-speak', and of the frequent disconnection between local realities and the lofty abstractions of promoting 'development' or 'civil society', see M. Bruno, 'Playing the co-operation game: strategies around international aid in post-socialist Russia', in S. Bridger and F. Pine, eds, Surviving post-socialism: local strategies and regional responses in eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union (London, Routledge, 1998), pp. 170-87;
41. and S. Sampson, 'The social life of projects: importing civil society to Albania', in C. Hann and E. Dunn, eds, Civil society: challenging Western models (London, Routledge, 1996), pp. 121-42.
42. On the rise of 'peasantism' in the interwar period and its roots in the nineteenth-century 'discovery' of folk culture and peasant virtues, see I. Banac and K. Verdery, eds, National character and national ideology in interwar Eastern Europe (New Haven, CT, Yale Center for international and Area Studies, 1995);
43. T. Hofer, 'The creation of ethnic symbols from the elements of peasant culture', in P. F. Sugar, ed., Ethnic diversity and conflict in Eastern Europe (Oxford, ABC-Clio, 1980);
44. G. Ionescu, 'Eastern Europe', in G. Ionescu and E. Gellner, eds, Populism: its meaning and national characteristics (New York, Macmillan, 1969);
45. and K. Stauter-Halsted, The nation in the village: the genesis of peasant national identity in Austrian Poland, 1848-1914 (Ithaca, NY, Cornell University Press, 2001).
46. See Schwartz, 'Wild horses and great trees', chs. 2 and 3. On the discursive role of the ethnographic museum,
47. see A. Purs, Latvians as an imagined community', paper presented at the Third Annual Convention of the Association for the Study of Nationalities, New York, 16-19 Apr. 1998. For an account of the role of an open-air ethnographic museum in shaping both national and local identities in Sweden, national and local identities in Sweden.
48. see M. Crang, 'Nation, region and homeland: history and tradition in Dalarna, Sweden', Ecumene 6 (1999), pp. 447-70.
49. D. Beitnere, 'Vai latvieši ir tikai zemnieki?' ['Are Latvians only farmers?'], Karogs 11 (2002), p. 153.
50. A. D. Smith, National identity (Reno, University of Nevada Press, 1991), p. 64. There is a rich and growing literature on nationalist constructions of landscape, much of it published in this journal. To cite just a few geographically diverse examples:
51. see P. Gruffud, 'Remaking Wales: nation-building and the geographical imagination, 1925-50', Political geography 14 (1995), pp. 219-39:
52. J. A. Kasparian, "We are our mountains": nation as nature in the Armenian struggle for self-determination, Nagorno-Karabagh', in L. Chorbajian, ed., The making of Nagorno-Karabagh: from secession to republic (New York, Palgrave, 2001);
53. D. Lowenthal, 'European and English landscapes as national symbols', in D. Hooson, ed., Geography and national identity (Oxford, Blackwell, 1994), pp. 15-38;
54. an T. Selwyn, 'Landscapes of liberation and imprisonment: towards an anthropology of the Israeli landscape', in E. Hirsch and M. O'Hanlon, eds, The anthropology of landscape: perspectives on place and space (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1995);
55. J. Bell, 'Redefining national identity in Uzbekistan: symbolic tensions in Tashkent's official public landscape', Ecumene 6 (1999), pp. 183-213;
56. Crang, 'Nation, region and homeland'; C. Ely, 'Critics in the native soil: landscape and conflicting ideals of nationality in imperial Russia', Ecumene 7 (2000), pp. 253-70.
57. C. Ely, 'Critics in the native soil: landscape and conflicting ideals of nationality in imperial Russia', Ecumene 7 (2000), pp. 253-70.
58. A. Melluma, Latvijas PSR aizsargajamas dabas teritorijas [Protected Nature Areas of the Latvian SSRI (Riga, Zinatne, 1979), p. 11.
59. M. Birze, 'Vai Latvijai paredzets Irijas variants?' [Will Latvia go the way of Ireland?'], Diena (17 Feb. 1998), p. 13.
60. IUCN East Europe Programme, The wetlands of Central and Eastern Europe (Gland, Switzerland, IUCN, 1993), p. 22.
61. Pronounced ROO-tsuh-vuh (ROO as in wood). Liepaja is pronounced LEA-pab-yuh (LEA as in year).
62. World Wide Fund for Nature, Latvian Ministry of Environment and the World Bank, 'Terms of reference: management plans and programmes for Lake Pape and Jurkalne, Latvia (1994-1997)', unpublished document (1994), p. 3.
63. WWFF-Latvia was founded as a Representative Office of WWF-International, under the legal auspices of WWF-Switzerland. Because Switzerland is not an EU member state, WWF-Latvia was barred from receiving EU funds. According to Latvian law, WWF-Latvia was not recognized as a Latvian NGO, and was thereby ineligible for tax-exempt status for domestic fundraising, as well as for competing for Latvian government funds, such as grants from the Environmental Protection Fund. In 2002, WWF-Latvia was reorganized as a non-profit public foundation under Latvian law, thus making it eligible to compete for both domestic and EU funding.
64. WWF Denmark, Management plan for Lake Pape Project Area (Copenhagen, WWF Denmark, 1996), p. 41.
65. F. Vera, 'Metaphors for the wilderness: oak, hazel, cattle and horse' (PhD dissertation, Wageningen, Agricultural University, 1997).
66. J. Bakker, Nature management by grazing and cutting: on the ecological significance of grazing and cutting regimes applied to restore former species-rich grassland communities in the Netherlands (Dordrecht, Kluwer Academic, 1989).
67. M. De Vries, 'Large herbivores and the design of large-scale nature reserves in Western Europe', Conservation biology 9 (1995), pp. 25-33;
68. D. Strijker, F. Sijtsma and D. Wiersma, 'Evaluation of nature conservation: an application to the Dutch ecological network', Environmental and resource economics 16 (2000), pp. 363-78;
69. and S. Van Wieren, 'The potential role of large herbivores in nature conservation and extensive land use in Europe', Biological journal of the Linnaean Society 56 (supplement, 1995), pp. 11-23.
70. W. Overmars, A. van Winden, R. Meissner, W. Helmer and G. Litjens, Lake Pape: restoring a European wilderness. perception of nature and employment opportunity (Hoog Keppel, Netherlands, Stroming BV, 1998), p. 7.
71. Ibid., p. 7.
72. These traits include: 'the ability to ... foal without help, and at an early age; resistance against cold, snow and rain ...; the ability to get nutrients from withered grass, or leaves, twigs and barks; a limited milk supply with high nutritional value in combination with a small udder; a physique that is adequate for the wild terrain; alert and confident behaviour; well-developed motherly instincts; the ability to develop a layer of subcutaneous fat and between the muscles in the growing season to get them through winter without having to draw on muscle tissues' (ibid., p. 51). Equally important in ensuring the horses' survival is their social structure. Koniks live in harem groups comprising a number of mares and one leading stallion; mares pass down knowledge about coping with local environmental conditions and predators from generation to generation, as well as when joining new harems. Over time, for example, the Lake Pape Koniks are expected to become increasingly adept at protecting themselves from wolves, which they had not encountered in the Netherlands.
73. Ibid., p. 47.
74. Ibid., pp. 7, 29.
75. Ibid., p. 30.
76. Dutch conservationists have played an active role in two international networks founded by WWF-International in 1995 and 1998, respectively: the Large Carnivore Initiative for Europe and the Large Herbivore Initiative. See the websites www.largecarnivores-Icei.org and www.largeherbivore.org WWF-International in 1995 and 1998, respectively: the Large Carnivore Initiative for Europe and the Large Herbivore Initiative. See the websites www.largecarnivores-Icei.org and www.largeherbivore.org
77. W. Overmars et al., Lake Pape, p. 57.
78. Schwartz, 'Wild horses and great trees', chs. 6 and 7.
79. P. Zalitis, 'Piepes nav mūsu valsts lielākā bagātība' [Lichens are not our greatest treasure'], Meža Dzīve 12 (1997), pp. 16-17.
80. M. Kaminska, ecosystem inspector, Liepaja regional environmental agency; interview by the author, Liepāja, 13 Jan. 1998.
81. J. Priednicks, Latvian Nature Fund director; interview by the author, Riga, 9 July 1999. Interestingly, in 2002 the LDF introduced five Koniks, donated by the same Dutch consultancy (Stifting Ark) that provided the Lake Pape horses, into one of its own project territories, the Lake Engure Nature Park in a coastal wetland on the Gulf of Riga. But the authors of the LDF's Interim Activity Report for the project express similar reservations about management for natural processes, noting that the Konik introduction was 'not foreseen in the project' and that: 'There is an argument between nature conservationists, supporting natural grazing and semi-natural grazing approaches. In our project we are following the principles of semi-natural grazing, as we think that it is more beneficial for local population. But we also want to keep the other options open and test the approach of natural grazing in Engure. Probably, the mixture of both approaches will be the best solution for Engure': I. Racinska, 'Implementation of management plan for the Lake Engure Nature Park', 15 Sept. 2002.
82. For a discussion of agrarian local resistance to wild horse introduction in the United States, see J. S. Rikoon, 'Wild horses and the political ecology of nature restoration in the Missouri Ozarks', paper presented at the conference 'Political ecology at home', Rutgers Geography Department, Mar. 2003. The politics of mammal re-introduction is much more intense when carnivores are involved;
83. see A. Brownlow, 'A wolf in the garden: ideology and change in the Adirondack landscape', in C. Philo and C. Wilbert, eds, Animal spaces, beastly places: new geographies of human-animal relations (London, Routledge, 2000);
84. and M. A. Wilson, 'The world in Yellowstone: science, symbol or politics? Deconstructing the conflict between environmentalism and wise use', Society and natural resources 10 (1997), pp. 453-68.
85. R. D. Fonds, Ir tada vieta pie Baltijas juras: Atklasme par Rucavas pagastu [There is a place by the Baltic Sea: a revelation about Rucava township] (Riga, WWF-Latvia and Rucavas Dabas Fonds, n. d.), p. 11.
86. Ibid., p. 13.
87. Gunta Timbra, Rucava Nature Fund co-founder; interview by the author, Rucava, 22 Feb. 1999.
88. Inara Ruce, Rucava Nature Fund chair; interview by the author, Rucava, 22 Feb. 1999.
89. Martiņš Reķis, WWF-Latvia rural development project director; interview by the author, Riga, 4 Aug. 1999.
90. For a critique of WWF's neoliberal orientation, see K. McAfee, 'Selling nature to save it? Biodiversity and green developmentalism', Environment and planning D: society and space 17 (1999), pp. 133-54.
91. McCarthy, 'First world political ecology', p. 1285.
92. Franklin, 'Bialowieza Forest'.
93. Schwartz, 'Wild horses and great trees', ch. 7.
94. Sceptics may wonder whether Rotberg's motivation was not perhaps more prosaic. After all, in poor countries working for international organizations is often one of the most promising paths to personal enrichment, both licit and illicit (see Bruno, 'Playing the co-operation game', and Sampson 'The social life of projects'). In the case of Latvia, however, far more lucrative jobs in the private sector are readily available to someone with Rotberg's qualifications. There are many paths to wealth in Latvia today, but my observations suggest that working for international NGOs is not among the most prominent. Indeed, at WWF the inability to offer competitive salaries has made it difficult to recruit and retain qualified staff.
95. Ugis Rotbergs, WWF-Latvia director; interview by the author, Riga, 9 July 1999.
96. See Bruno, 'Playing the co-operation game'
97. and Sampson, 'The social life of projects',
98. as well as B. A. Cellarius, 'Linking global priorities and local realities: nongovernmental organizations and the conservation of nature in Bulgaria', in K. Paskaleva, P. Shapira, J. Pickles and B. Koulov, eds, Bulgaria in transition: environmental consequences of political and economic transformation (Aldershot, Ashgate)
99. World Wide Fund for Nature, Privatisation and sustainable forestry in Latvia: Mažole demonstration project. Final report (Riga, WWF, 1999), p. 15. By early 1999, the demonstration site had hosted over 100 visitors from Estonia, Lithuania, Ukraine, Belarus, Georgia, Russia and Hungary.
100. See Cellarius, 'Linking global priorities', for a discussion of the difficulties national environmental NGOs in Eastern Europe often face in establishing meaningful collaboration with local organizations and individuals.