Africa: Living With Danger – How Moral Dilemmas Shape Conservation in Africa

Living with wildlife in Africa comes with real danger – and tough moral choices. A growing body of research shows that the voices of the people living alongside lions, elephants – and armed poachers – are often the ones least heard in global conservation debates.

Night had settled over Tanzania’s Burunge Wildlife Management Area when a lion broke into a boma. It seized a calf and began dragging it towards a gap in the fence. The owner, a young woman, clutched the calf’s head, straining with all her strength as the lion pulled back. By the time neighbours arrived the lion had retreated. The calf survived with minor injuries. The fear lingered.

Dr Darragh Hare first heard the story during a research visit. What struck him was not only the danger but the response. The woman was not demanding that the lion be killed. She wanted people advocating for more lions to understand the cost of living with them – the losses, the fear, the calculations families make every night.

Across much of Africa, such encounters are part of daily life. Yet debates about wildlife management – trophy hunting, ivory trade, anti-poaching enforcement – often unfold in distant capitals.

Hare directs the Morally Contested Conservation (MCC) project, a research collaboration examining how people in east and southern Africa, as well as in Western countries, think about controversial conservation issues. Since 2021, the team has worked in transfrontier conservation areas in Kenya, Tanzania and the Kavango-Zambezi…