An important aspect of the CRIMEANTHROP (Criminal Justice, Wildlife Conservation and Animal Rights in the Anthropocene) project was to assess to which degree freeborn animals have rights that are reflected in the implementation of two important conventions, or as consequence of the two conventions. Both were established to protect wildlife species from extinction: CITES, The Convention of Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (1973) and the Council of Europe's Convention on the Conservation of European Wildlife and Natural Habitats (1979), known as the Bern Convention. It is important to emphasize that the goal with these conventions is not to offer individual freeborn animals protection from harm and abuse, not even to individuals pertaining to species that are protected because they are endangered. Generally, although they may be included in animal welfare legislation, wildlife is not protected from harm, on the contrary they are hunted for entertainment in countries that are parties/members of these conventions.

In the countries that are included in the case studies of this book, there are thus hunting traditions, for example, the infamous fox hunting of the upper class in the UK from horseback with the use of dogs; the rabbit hunting in Spain with the use of greyhounds (galgo), who are very often mistreated and killed when the hunt is over; the wild boar hunting in Germany and Poland, and the widespread practice of catching and killing songbirds in Italy and around the Mediterranean sea for food or decorations, which is criminalized due to the devastating effects this practice has had on the bird populations (see Chapter 5 by Lorenzo Natali, Ciro Troiano, Sara Zoja and Anita Lavorgna, this volume; Brochet et al 2016). The threat to Europe's birds due to loss of habitat and legal and illegal hunting led to the establishment of the EU Birds Directive in 1979,1 which together with the Habitats Directive implements the Bern Convention in the EU.

In Norway, like in many other countries, most species that are not threatened with extinction are ‘huntable species’, for example in the hunting season 2022– 23, according to Statistics Norway, 49,301 deer and 27,487 elks were legally killed, while 21,030 red foxes lost their lives to a hunter's rifle in the 2021– 22 season, many after first being trapped.

Introduction

In this chapter, we aim to answer three main research questions concerning the social and legal factors that affect the fight against the illegal killing of wolves in Poland: What factors influence the jurisprudence of this country's courts in cases concerning these theriocides? What social factors entail that the illegal killing of wolves may be tolerated by the general public in Poland? Finally, what are the greatest difficulties facing law enforcement agencies in effectively counteracting the illegal killing of wolves in this country?

The data obtained for this study were acquired from a scientific literature review, and analysis of law and court judgments published in the Commercial Law Information Systems mostly used in Poland (Grobelny and Wysocki 2018) as well as on the portal of Polish common courts’ judgments (http://orz ecze nia.ms.gov.pl) and websites of wildlife foundations that monitor such cases (that is, Stowarzyszenie ‘Z Szarym za Płotem’, Fundacja WWF Polska, Stowarzyszenie dla Natury ‘Wilk’). The current standardized texts of legal Acts were obtained via access to the Internet Legal Acts System (ISAP). It should be noted that there are no official statistics for crimes related to protected species of wildlife, including wolves, in Poland, but wolf theriocides reported by the general public to the law enforcement authorities in Poland every year are significant and increasing (Paquel 2016).

Research conducted by Nowak et al (2021) showed that between 2002 and 2020 there were 91 cases of slain wolves, of whom 54 (59.3 per cent) were shot and 37 (40.7 per cent) trapped. The illegal shooting occurred in the geographical ranges of all wolf populations that are present in Poland: Central European, Baltic and Carpathian. These figures are not reflected in official statistics, and even less in the outcomes of proceedings involving prosecutions or court judgments. According to studies conducted in 2017, the number of people convicted each year by criminal courts for crimes against animals (both domestic and wild) has remained at a similar, low level since 2010. For example, in 2017, 1,869 people were convicted for crimes against animals; in 2016 the number was 1,673; in 2015 it was 1,846 (Czarna Owca Foundation 2018).

We live in the midst of a nature crisis in which we face not only global warming, but also the serious loss of other species. The causes are anthropogenic, through which species are driven to extinction due to climate change, loss of habitat, hunting and wildlife trade. This represents a threat to ecosystems, to all living beings and therefore to the world as we know it. According to the last Living Planet index (WWF 2022), the world has suffered an average decline of 69 per cent in monitored species populations since 1970. This book addresses this crisis with results from research on the implementation and enforcement of two nature conservation conventions as a starting point, The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES, 1975), and the Council of Europe's Convention on the Conservation of European Wildlife and Natural Habitats (the Bern Convention, 1979).

Species loss is usually regarded as a conservation issue, giving value to non-human animals only at aggregated species level, rather than recognizing their individual intrinsic value (Sollund 2019), a perspective that is reflected in the two conventions. As a result of the focus on species conservation, the harms and loss of life resulting from anthropogenic acts such as hunting and wildlife trades that affect individual animals, their flocks and families, are usually overlooked. While a considerable amount of research on conservation is taking place within the natural sciences, and despite a growing body of work within the social sciences, there is still a lack of literature that combines conservation studies with a focus on animal rights and welfare, and animals’ intrinsic value. This is an aim of this book, which is a fruit of the CRIMEANTHROP project; Criminal Justice, Wildlife Conservation and Animal Rights in the Anthropocene (2019– 23).

The CRIMEANTHROP project

This major research project, led by Ragnhild A. Sollund, ran for four years, from 2019 to 2023. It included case studies from the UK (by Tanya Wyatt), Spain (by Teresa Fajardo), Germany (by Christoph H. Stefes) and a larger study comprised of three case studies in Norway (by Ragnhild A. Sollund, David R. Goyes as a post-doctoral researcher, and PhD fellow Martine S.B. Lie). In this volume, the initial case studies have been added to by contributions from other scholars in order to cover human– wildlife relations more broadly and in other countries.

Introduction

One feature of the Anthropocene – the proposed name of the current geological epoch because of the noticeable, significant and damaging effects humans have had and are having on the planet (Crutzen 2002) – is the significant loss of biodiversity and increased rate of extinctions. One million species face extinction due in part to overexploitation and illegal trade of wildlife (IPBES 2019) and the rate of extinctions (largely the result of human actions) is 100 to 1,000 times higher than at other points in history (Wilson 2016). Whereas debates and efforts regarding biodiversity loss and extinction are often centred on Africa, Asia and the Americas, Europe too, including the UK, is facing a biodiversity crisis. According to Sir David Attenborough, ‘It's tempting to assume loss of wildlife is a problem happening on the other side of the world. The truth is the UK is one of the most nature-depleted countries on the planet and the situation is getting worse’ (The Guardian 2021). Recognition of the poor state of nature in the UK is increasing and is contributing to a rewilding movement to restore the environment. As the Chief Executive of the UK Wildlife Trusts, Craig Bennett, has said, ‘Just protecting the nature we have left is not enough; we need to put nature into recovery, and to do so at scale and with urgency’ (The Guardian 2021).

This chapter is a side exploration emerging from a larger study (Criminal Justice, Wildlife Conservation and Animal Rights in the Anthropocene – CRIMEANTHROP – see the introduction to this collection). The study unpacked whether species justice (both at the individual and systemic level) and ecological justice (at the level of biodiversity) (White 2013) can be achieved by adapting the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) and the Convention on the Conservation of European Wildlife and Natural Habitats (Bern Convention), or whether justice can only be achieved when individual non-human animals are granted rights (Nussbaum 2006; Sollund 2013). (See the Special Edition of the Catalan Journal of Environmental Law for findings of CRIMEANTHROP.)

Introduction

In the past seven decades, more than 2,000 treaties that pertain to wildlife have been ratified (Brandi et al 2019). Treaties are written agreements of two or more states, regulated by international law – the international community entrust them with the task of preserving wildlife. Yet this plethora of international wildlife treaties cannot automatically be equated with increased preservation of wildlife. From 1970 to 2016, ‘between 17,000 and 100,000 species’ have become extinct (van Uhm 2016: 19), and there has been ‘an average 69% decline in the relative abundance of monitored wildlife populations around the world between 1970 and 2018’ (WWF 2022: 5). Beyond being ratified, wildlife treaties need to be implemented to have an effect.

Treaties impact reality through a chain of effectiveness that extends from the international to the national to the local (Liljeblad 2004). The links of the chain are: international proposition, state ratification, domestic implementation through legal action, domestic resource allocation, and local behavioural change (Underdal 1992; Jackson and Bührs 2015). A whole field of research – regime effectiveness studies – exists to analyse each of the links in the chain and evaluate the conditions under which a treaty will be effective (Underdal 1992).

Scholars investigating regime effectiveness face a major challenge: The further away the phenomenon being investigated is from the treaty, the more difficult it is to arrive at decisive conclusions about effectiveness. It is, for instance, risky – to say the least – to claim that the text of a treaty caused the change of behaviour of a society. Too many complex elements are at play to claim causality. This difficulty notwithstanding, scholars can gather data to identify the correlation of treaties with changes in the international, national and local levels. Trends provide insights into how treaties work and the conditions under which they thrive.

We know, for example, that treaties that are broad and with few binding obligations attract more signatory parties than those that are focused and contain compulsory duties (Bodansky et al 2017); preferential trade agreements elicit more domestic legislative action than international environmental agreements (Brandi et al 2019); states with a federal political structure are more likely to allocate resources than unitary states (Mauerhofer et al 2015; see also Stefes, this volume); and, behaviour is more likely to change in states where stakeholders participated in the adoption of the treaty than in those from which stakeholders were excluded (Atisa 2020).

Introduction

Germany is Europe's biggest import country and transshipment point of wildlife products, including live animals for the domestic pet market and hunting trophies (Altheer and Lameter 2020: 2; Fachtagung Artenschutzrecht 2021: 5). Germany is also signatory to numerous regional and international wildlife protection treaties, such as the Washington Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS), and the Convention on the Conservation of European Wildlife and Natural Habitats (Bern Convention). Furthermore, as a member of the European Union (EU), Germany is bound by extensive EU regulations and directives for the protection of endangered species – namely, the various Wildlife Trade Regulations that transpose CITES into EU Law, as well as the Habitats Directive and the Birds Directive (BfN 2010: 15– 17). Finally, Germany is an active participant in international meetings where its delegations regularly advocate for expanding the protection of endangered species (Interviews (Ints) 13, 17; Klaas et al 2016: 23). For all these reasons, we would expect Germany to be an exemplary protector of endangered wildlife at home. Alas, although Germany has faithfully incorporated international treaties and European law into federal legislation, law enforcement is wanting and sentencing is routinely too lenient to have a deterring effect. Germany's wildlife protection legislation is thereby rendered into a paper tiger.

This chapter attempts to explain why Germany's actions at home so glaringly contradict its demonstrated ambitions abroad. Understanding this gap is crucial, as Ragnhild Sollund points out:

The most obvious reason for lack of enforcement is the insufficient allocation of resources needed for the effective enforcement of wildlife protection laws. Germany's federal system further compounds insufficient resource allocation by adding inefficiency to the mix. The enforcement of nature protection laws is left to the 16 federal states (Glaser 2011: 7f).

Introduction

In recent years, the illegal wildlife trade has received increasing attention. In the political debate, the focus is mainly on iconic species such as elephants, rhinoceroses, and tigers, but reptile populations are also seriously harmed by the illegal reptile trade. For example, reptiles are an easy target for criminal groups because they can often survive for a long time under poor transport conditions, reptiles are quiet, and they can easily be transported in suitcases or postal parcels (Altherr 2014). It has been determined that between 2010 and 2014, approximately 64,000 live wild vertebrates with protected status were seized; 95 per cent of these seized animals were reptiles (D’Cruze and Macdonald 2016).

Even though the illegal trade in reptiles is often associated with Asian origin countries, Europe is one of the biggest markets for illegal reptiles. This has been illustrated by research showing that the majority of all live animal seizures in the European Union (EU) over a ten-year period were reptiles (van Uhm 2016a). Sometimes the seizures concern reptile species from Europe, but many reptile species do not occur naturally within the EU. In fact, the majority of the illegal reptiles is first being imported from outside the EU and then the reptiles are freely traded within the EU borders (Gussow 2009; Sollund and Maher 2016; Mărginean et al 2018; van Uhm et al 2019; Sollund, this volume).

The Netherlands is an important player in the illegal reptile trade, both as a transit country and a destination country (van der Grijp 2016; van Uhm 2016b; Janssen and Leupen 2019). For example, the Netherlands is in the top ten of EU countries that import endangered reptile species, but a substantial part of the legal trade actually has an illegal origin (Janssen and Leupen 2019). In addition to many live reptiles for the pet market, reptile products are on the market as belts, boots, bags, meat, medication, shields, skulls, skeletons, teeth and taxidermy (Auliya et al 2016; Harvey 2017). The more scarce, attractive and expensive some rare endangered reptiles become, the more interesting they are on the reptile black market (van der Grijp 2016).