Discursive claims to knowledge: The challenge of delivering public policy objectives through new environmental governance arrangements

Journal of Rural Studies 37 (2015) 1e9

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Discursive claims to knowledge: The challenge of delivering public policy objectives through new environmental governance arrangements Elizabeth Dinnie*, Anke Fischer, Sally Huband The James Hutton Institute, Craigiebuckler, Aberdeen AB15 8QH, United Kingdom

a r t i c l e i n f o

a b s t r a c t

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Land and game management in Scotland is following wider rural governance trends in becoming both multi-level and multi-actor, aiming to meet multiple objectives. However, these recent changes have not yet resolved many disputes over land and game management. This paper explores the reasons for this lack of success. Our research investigated discourses on changes in land management objectives and governance. We found that many game managers perceived changes in public policy objectives, coupled with social changes, as an attack on their traditions and heritage and a threat to cultural and economic interests tied to long-standing practices based on knowledge and ties to the land. In defence, game managers utilised a discourse claiming that only those with a long-standing association with the land had the true knowledge to manage the countryside, and this knowledge could not be learnt by others. This inherently irrefutable discourse united a heterogeneous coalition of land managers, who would otherwise disagree on specific issues, and, coupled with private property rights, helps to explain why recent governance arrangements have not been more successful in implementing policy changes aimed at delivering wider public benefits. © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Discourse Game management Land management Public interests Rural governance Scotland

1. The shift to multi-level, multi-actor governance Over the last two decades, governance in modern, and particularly ‘western’ societies, has shifted from top-down, formal, coercive powers exercised usually by a nation state to explicitly include multiple actors at multiple levels. Such new forms of governance e here denoting the activity or process of governing (Rhodes, 1995) e disperse responsibility away from centralised authority to partnerships or more autonomous units composed of a range of actors from the market, state and civil society (Cheshire et al., 2007). In the environmental and land use sector these changes, coupled with associated policy and social changes, are closely intertwined with a hegemonic discourse which argues that previous top-down, centralised decision-making has failed the environment because it results in confrontation and lack of cooperation between actors (Hajer and Wagenaar, 2007). This discourse of ‘new governance’ claims that better decision-making, and hence action towards environmental goals, will be achieved through

* Corresponding author. Tel.: þ44 (0)1224 395388. E-mail address: [email protected] (E. Dinnie). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jrurstud.2014.11.008 0743-0167/© 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

inclusive processes of collaboration and consensus-building, which may take more time and effort, but ultimately result in increased support for decisions and a greater likelihood that actions will be delivered (Lockwood, 2010; Macnaghten and Urry, 1998). In Scotland changes in environmental governance are entangled with other governance changes (such as the re-establishment of a devolved Scottish parliament) and the development of new policy agendas on rural development, national parks and land reform. These agendas, combined with elements of political modernisation (Arts et al., 2006) that called for public participation, benefit and access sharing (e.g., CBD, 1992), encouraged the inclusion of actors from governmental and non-governmental organisations in decision-making processes. As a consequence, actors who previously had little or no say in how land, game and wildlife should be managed were now able to have their voices heard. Such changes also meant that those who had traditionally held responsibility for decisions regarding the management of land, game and wildlife now found others involved in decision-making processes, and wider public interests, such as access taking and biodiversity, included in land management objectives (Woods, 2003). Because of its history and pattern of land ownership, the impact of these changes in Scotland has taken a very particular form.

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In Scotland, the long history of land management for private use led to the development of a suite of traditions, customs and ways of life which governed land, game and wildlife management (see Section 2.2). However, recent governance changes have not replaced older, traditional institutions and ways of life, but have led to the formation of new institutions and collaborative arrangements which now exist in parallel to older practices (Fischer et al., 2013a). This means that although international regulations and conventions, such as the Convention on Biological Diversity (1992) and the EU Habitats Directive (Council Directive 92/43/EEC, 1992), and national legislation (e.g., the Land Reform (Scotland) Act, 2003; National Parks (Scotland) Act, 2000) support the diversification of land management objectives, successful policy implementation depends to a large extent on the support and cooperation of people who hold the property rights, including private land owners. However, in Scotland newer approaches have so far met with only limited success in achieving public policy objectives. This is particularly visible in the area of land management for game such as red deer and red grouse: Disputes over the right way of managing the land for these species (and that had developed over decades) are still ongoing, despite the intentions of inclusive governance approaches and public policy objectives that embrace multifunctionality (see Section 2.3). In order to understand why recent governance changes have not been more successful, we conducted face-to-face interviews with a sample of land managers and combined these with an analysis of consultation documents on the Wildlife and Natural Environment (WANE) (Scotland) Bill. This paper thus explores how traditional land owners and managers in Scotland perceive recent governance arrangements, and the more inclusive agendas and social changes associated with them. In the next section we outline, from the literature, the context of game management and hunting in rural studies before turning to the institutional development of land and game management in Scotland (Section 2.2) and recent governance shifts and associated policy changes, pointing out how these are linked to continued tensions over land and game (Section 2.3). We then describe our methods and approach to analysis. Findings from the analysis of consultation responses to the WANE Bill, and from interviews with land managers are presented in Section 4, followed by discussion of how discourses as responses to governance change draw on ideas of legitimacy, ‘real’ knowledge, identity and rurality (Section 5). 2. Background 2.1. Game management and hunting in rural landscapes The literature is rich with studies which explore the social and cultural significance of hunting as a ritual activity. For example, Milbourne (2003) explored the effects of hunting with dogs on the social and cultural life of the English and Welsh countryside. In an earlier study, Cox et al. (1994) examined the rituals and culture of those engaged in red deer stalking in England. Other studies in the context of the UK government's decision to ban hunting with hounds in 2004 (Marvin, 2000; Hillyard, 2007) have sought to examine its social context or political significance as a new social movement (Woods, 2003). In Norway, Krange and Skogen (2011) argue that young, working-class male hunters' antagonistic attitudes to wolves and attachment to hunting and a rural way of life enabled them to reflexively create an identity for themselves that strongly, but not exclusively, included elements of rural tradition, thereby breaking down rural-traditional and urbanemodern associations through their everyday practices. Identity construction was also a focus for hunters in Ontario when the legitimacy of the annual bear-hunt was questioned by non-hunters (Dunk, 2002).

Generally, these studies addressed the practices and culture of hunting itself and its potential for the creation of identities in their societal context, rather than the implications of institutional structures related to land management such as property rights on hunting (Hillyard, 2007). A small number of other studies (Cox et al., 1996; Macmillan and Leitch, 2008; Phillip et al., 2009) provide insights into the links between hunting, land management and governance. Here, we bring these two strands of the literature together and investigate how larger societal changes, which manifest themselves in governance changes, are linked to game managers' understandings of their own practices and identities. 2.2. The history of game management in Scotland In Scotland, game management, and land management for game, have traditionally been governed through formal and informal institutions closely associated with the private sporting estate (Wightman et al., 2002; Lorimer, 2000). Sporting estates are typically classed as landholdings ranging in size from 2500 acres to over 30,000 acres, where the dominant or exclusive activity is the management of game for sporting purposes, and which employ game keeping and other staff to manage and administer the estate (Wightman et al., 2002). The sporting estate is itself the outcome of widespread social and cultural changes occurring in Scotland during the nineteenth century. During this time, the Scottish Highlands were redefined and transformed from a largely agrarian peasant economy, organised in kinship groupings, into a capitalist hunting estate economy organised around the private ownership of large areas of the countryside (Wightman et al., 2002). In the context of this redefinition, the Highlands provided a landscape in which new industrial elites could create the rituals and challenges associated with stalking and shooting (Macmillan and Leitch, 2008). Through a set of widespread social and cultural changes, both deer stalking and game bird shooting became, in some upland areas, dominant forms of land use. These activities provided, and continue to provide, important social and economic functions for rural communities (Macmillan et al., 2010). Nowadays, principal game species are red deer and grouse in the uplands, and pheasants and roe deer in the lowlands. Deer and grouse are managed wild game, while pheasants are generally reared and released prior to shooting. Other species, especially of game birds, are also shot, but at a lower intensity. Although there have been changes over the last 100 years, private land ownership still represents a significant proportion of land ownership in Scotland, particularly in the Highlands (Callander, 1987), and therefore remains an important influence on land management objectives. Changes in estate ownership since the nineteenth century include a reduction in the number of larger estates, an increase in the number of smaller estates and an increase in the amount of land owned by non-governmental organizations (NGOs), the state and public agencies such as the Forestry Commission (Wightman et al., 2002). While many of these estates have diversified their objectives to include other activities such as tourism and renewable energy, many privately-owned estates have retained traditional estate practices and functions. Owners still tend to be non-resident and the infrastructure (lodges, roads, paths, fencing) of the nineteenth century remains largely intact (Lorimer, 2000). Management is highly traditional with many practices, codes of conduct and dress remaining similar to their Victorian origins (Macmillan and Leitch, 2008; Wightman et al., 2002). Although the social characteristics of owners might thus have changed since the nineteenth century, including greater numbers of businesspeople, agriculturalists and

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owners from outside the UK, the practice of estate management in many places remains highly traditional and controlled by elites, and is characterised by assumptions concerning class (Milbourne, 2003). 2.3. Tensions from recent governance changes in game management in Scotland Two areas of tension between old and new governance arrangements are particularly pertinent. First, changes in land ownership mean that more land is now in the hands of public bodies, such as the Forestry Commission, and conservation NGOs, such as the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB). This has led to a situation where different land use objectives are increasingly found adjacent to one another, often leading to tensions and conflict (Cannadine, 2005). Second, public policy objectives are increasingly pushed up the political agenda. Following the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003 (http://www.legislation.gov.uk/asp/2003/2/contents), the Scottish parliament has passed legislation to change the way land and game are managed. The recent Wildlife and Natural Environment Act (Scotland) 2011 includes objectives such as managing land for biodiversity and climate change, and proposes changes to the regulation of deer management away from self-regulation towards more collaborative approaches. The creation of membership organisations such as the Moorland Forum (http://www. moorlandforum.org.uk/), the incorporation of the Deer Commission for Scotland (DCS) within Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH), and changes to the voluntary Deer Management Groups (DMGs) all aim to foster greater cooperation through increasing understanding between different stakeholders and provide platforms to give such multiple interests a voice, thus reflecting the new rhetoric of partnership and stakeholder democracy in which different actors come to be seen as collaborators in environmental management (Macnaghten and Urry, 1998). These arrangements are not only the consequence of a global change in the policy discourse (Section 1), but are also the outcome of interactions between ‘new’ and ‘old’ landowners. The inclusion of a wider range of actors in land management debates can result also in a greater awareness among new audiences of how land is managed for game, and to further demands to be included in decision-making processes and the institutional and governance support to have interests heard (Arts et al., 2006). Hence, current policy increasingly focuses on the need for land management, including private land management, to deliver multiple, integrated benefits (both public and private), which adds new dimensions to the scope and impacts of estate management decisions (Glass et al., 2011). However, ‘new’ participatory governance arrangements have not necessarily led to the delivery of desired multiple public policy objectives. Evidence of the tensions between different objectives can be seen in continuing rises in deer numbers, which have brought deer managers into conflict with nature conservation interests over grazing and browsing damage (Phillip et al., 2009), with other land users over crop damage and disease transmission, and with road users over deer-related road traffic accidents. Although considerable effort has been invested into resolving these conflicts through research and by various legal and policy measures to promote ‘sustainable’ deer management (for example, Defra and Forestry Commission England, 2004; Scottish Government, 2007) no clear strategic solution is in sight. Whilst the government has statutory powers to intervene to reduce deer numbers, these are rarely used. The preferred approach, voluntary action by landowners, for example, through Deer Management Groups, is deemed to have been only partially successful in tackling the

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problem of deer overabundance (SNH, 2010; http://www.snh.gov. uk/docs/A415809.pdf, page 15e17). Cull levels on hill ground are the same as they were 10 years ago and local cull targets agreed between the DCS (prior to merger with SNH) and Deer Management Groups are rarely met (Macmillan and Leitch, 2008). Further evidence of the limited success of new governance arrangements to support public policy issues can be found in the case of red grouse management (Marshall et al., 2007; Redpath et al., 2004). Conflicts over grouse centre on the (illegal) killing of birds of prey in order to maximise the number of grouse available for shooting in the autumn. Despite legislation and the efforts of government agencies and non-governmental conservation organizations, the illegal killing of raptors continues on many moorland areas and is considered to be one of the principal threats to UK populations of hen harriers, peregrine falcons and golden eagles (Redpath et al., 2013). Here, we address the question why and how tensions over game management persist in the face of newer governance arrangements that originally aimed to reconcile multiple objectives and expectations in relation to land management. While it seems obvious that multi-actor and multi-level governance has become a factor that contributes to (rather than resolves) the persisting problems around game management, the processes and dynamics with which conflicts over the governance of game management are played out are much less clear. Our study aims to fill this gap. 3. Methods Rather than setting out with a clearly defined research hypothesis which we then systematically ‘tested’, the methodology followed an inductive and iterative approach (O'Reilly, 2005). Our starting point was to explore land and game managers' reactions to recent governance changes to game management in Scotland. We used a discourse analytical approach. Discourses are here understood as ‘a specific ensemble of ideas, concepts and categorisations that is produced, reproduced and transformed in a particular set of practices and through which meaning is given to physical and social realities’ (Hajer, 1995). Here, we reconstruct discourses on game management in Scotland from different sources, focussing mainly on those from land managers, building them up from components that can be regarded as storylines (Hajer, 2006), i.e., central ideas that summarise and function as a shorthand for more complex debates or argumentation. As such storylines are embedded into practices, institutions and related social representations, we then interpret the storylines and the resulting discourses in the context of wider discourses on land management, and in relation to discourses on modern, multi-actor environmental governance (Section 1). Unlike Mischi (2012) who employed ethnographic, somewhat indirect methods to make inferences about hunters' responses to EU policy, we draw here on two types of data, (i) written consultation responses of land management organisations, and (ii) semistructured interviews with game managers. Documents included six consultation responses to the Wildlife and Natural Environment (Scotland) (WANE) Bill from the most prominent Scottish organizations representing ‘traditional’ private interests in land and game management1 and also the Scottish government summary analysis report of the responses (Section 4.1). The public consultation ran from June to September 2009.

1 Association of Deer Management Groups (Scotland) (ADMG), British Deer Society (BDS), Scottish Gamekeepers' Association (SGA), British Association of Shooting and Conservation (BASC), Scottish Land and Estates (SLE), Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust (GWCT).

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Views were sought on modernisation of statute, addressing current provision, and how to enhance the sustainable management of the natural environment for the public interest. The consultation addressed policy on deer management, game law (game licensing and poaching), invasive non-native species, muirburn, the administration of species licensing, the implementation of Ministerial commitments on snaring, the protection of badgers and a number of issues relating to the operation of SSSI statute. To flesh out the formal expressions of discourse provided by organisations of land and game managers, twelve semi-structured, wide ranging and open ended interviews, including some small group discussions, plus observation of land managers at work, were carried out with nineteen game managers (e.g., professional stalkers, landowners, gamekeepers), mostly from Deeside in northeast Scotland. These conversations with a purpose (Brewer, 2000) followed a discussion guideline that explored game managers' views on the land, on shooting/stalking and on their own practices with regard to land and wildlife management. Conversations were recorded and field notes were taken; voice files were transcribed. In a first step of the analysis of both the consultation responses and the interviews, we explored the ideas and themes expressed in the data in a grounded fashion. Based on the main themes identified, we then developed a broad coding structure that included categories such as “own role in nature and society”, “knowledge generation” and “relationships between land uses”. These categories served to identify the storylines used by our interviewees, presented in Section 4.2. 4. Findings Analysis of policy response documents and interviews showed recurring storylines relating to changes to game and land management, and the emergence of a strong discourse which resisted and challenged these changes. We first present the storylines emerging from the policy responses, and then go on to explore those from the interviews, which show how such challenges are experienced in practice. 4.1. ‘Public interests’ are not in the public interest Analysis of the consultation responses to the Wildlife and Environment (Scotland) Bill showed that game and land managers perceived an increase in the degree to which so-called public interests influenced land and game management. They noticed this increasing influence, for example, in an apparent greater use by public bodies of the term ‘public interest’. Open critique of this development might be perceived by non-landowners as undemocratic, and would thus be problematic. However, our analysis suggested that land managers challenged the nature of these so-called public interests in two other, more implicit ways. First, they questioned if the true interests of the public (and especially the rural public) were represented by recent and proposed changes. For example, the SGA:

believe that the government needs to differentiate between what is genuinely within the public interest and the changes demanded by influential pressure groups. (SRPBA2) The Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) suggests that a wide range of public policy objectives are together referred to as “the public interest”, but we would suggest that this is a flawed concept as public policy objectives are driven by the Government of the day. An independent definition of public interest may therefore be required. (SRPBA) So, in the landowners and managers' view, so-called public interests were simply a front for what the government of the day, or, even worse, what ‘influential pressure groups’ wanted. As in the interviews, respondents to the proposed legislation challenged policy makers about whether the correct people had been consulted on the proposed changes to game and wildlife management: The Association would also like clarity from the Scottish Government as to the relevance of the consultees listed, as we have some concerns that not all interested parties may have been alerted to the implications of the proposals. (SRPBA) Land managers also considered the timing of the consultation (which took place over the summer months) to be during the busiest time of the year for land managers, and which would inevitably lead to some people not responding. In their view, the reluctance or oversight of the government in this respect delegitimised the consultation and showed a lack of knowledge of the land sector. Further, land and game managers perceived the government to pay too little attention to the landed sector, yet to expect them to implement changes which placed an additional burden on the rural economy in general and rural businesses in particular. The costs arising from this legislation would thus fall disproportionately on rural sectors: However, we note with real concern that the main impact of this legislation will fall on those owning, managing and making a living from rural land, land occupiers, and their staff. (SRPBA) In other words, there was clear evidence from the consultation responses that land managers felt that proposed changes to game and wildlife management were not properly informed by those who would be affected by these changes, and that the costs of implementing proposed changes would be borne disproportionately by the rural sector, with few, if any, of the benefits. The implicit inference here then was that those who will enjoy the benefits will not bear the costs. This set up a clear divide between those responsible for managing game and wildlife, but who felt they had not been properly consulted on proposed changes, and those informing and making policy changes relating to land and game management.

… are not confident that ‘public interest’ in the context of Deer yet recognises the balance to be struck between economic, environmental and social benefits in rural Scotland. Second, land managers challenged the nature of public interests by questioning the link between public interests and public bodies, such as the government: We do not believe the removal of economic activities from our uplands such as farming, forestry for timber production, field sports and renewable energy production is within the public interest. We

4.2. Fencing off regulation; maintaining the status quo in deer management One area where the consultation debate around public interests was particularly strong was in proposed changes to deer

2 In 2011, SRPBA was renamed Scottish Land and Estates. We used the label SRPBA here as this was the organisation's name at the time of the response to the consultation.

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management. In the eyes of the consultees, public interest manifested itself here in relation to the regulation of stalkers' competence, and fencing. In the debate about changes to skills and competence of those taking or killing deer, public interest was seen to be represented by the government's attempt, supported by EU policy, to replace the current system of self-regulation, based on long-standing tradition, history, culture and heritage, with a set of rigid rules and top-down governance. Proposed changes included mandatory testing of those killing deer, and the establishment of a register of competence. These changes were rejected in the consultation responses as being bureaucratic and unnecessary because existing measures of competence were considered to be fit for purpose: The SGA supports the platform of self-regulation and best practice that has been established, allied to the heritage of knowledge accessible by stalkers in Scotland.’ (SGA) Furthermore, the SGA and SRPBA responses argued that the proposed changes were unnecessary since the ‘problems’ that the measure was designed to address did not exist in the first place: We believe that there has been a complete lack of robust evidence cited to demonstrate that there is a current deer welfare, public safety or human health problem arising out of issues of competency … we consider that this is a perceived problem, rather than a real one, that does not justify the extra administration that would be required to resolve in the way suggested within the proposals in the consultation. (SRPBA) Proposed changes to assessing and regulating stalkers' competency were interpreted by game managers as an attack on and devaluation of traditions, practices and ways of life which had resulted in strong self-governance and served perfectly well for generations: The consultation suggests that the Scottish position on competence for shooting deer is anomalous within Europe, where systems of hunting licences and tests are in place. This fails to recognise the long heritage of professional stalking in Scotland which does not exist in other parts of Europe, and which itself provides significant input to supervision and best practice. (SGA) The issue of public interest also raised its head in debates about fencing. Discussions about fencing have in the past featured in decisions over managing competing land uses, especially in the Scottish uplands in relation to forest regeneration (Midgley, 2007; Holl and Smith, 2007) in the face of high deer densities. Fencing is considered by some to be unsightly, expensive, limiting access for recreational land users and undesirable in conservation terms, most notably in relation to capercaillie (Macmillan and Leitch, 2008). The use of fencing is therefore unpopular with policy makers, conservationists and recreationists although it is widely supported by game managers as a way to manage diverse land use objectives. It can therefore be interpreted, at a symbolic level, as a way to draw a clear line between ‘public interests’ (e.g. forest regeneration) and sporting interests such as stalking and shooting game birds, as these different activities seem unable to coexist without fences, in the game managers' view. Those who want more forests, or crops, should fence them in; the burden of cost and maintenance does not fall on the game manager as, according to them, game, in the form of wild deer, are part of a well-established status quo, provide an important economic and social benefit to remote rural communities, and can only be fenced out, not in. In the consultation responses the government was routinely and

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repeatedly criticised for abandoning fencing as a way to manage different land use objectives in close proximity: In a proportion of Scotland's uplands, deer are the predominant herbivore and recreation the main objective because the economic returns from food and timber production on this land do not justify these activities. In many upland areas deer managed for sporting purposes, timber production and sheep grazing symbiotically exist alongside other land uses such as grouse shooting, hill walking and renewable energy production. On many properties crops such as timber and livestock, including deer, are successfully managed in close proximity to each other by the use of fencing. (SRPBA) Furthermore, lack of fencing for forestry or crop protection resulted in deer welfare issues, because deer migrated to areas where the food supply was plentiful and then needed to be removed through mass culling. This then led to questions about stalkers' competency such as those discussed above, and, in the eyes of game managers, reduced deer to the status of vermin rather than the iconic species that game managers would like it to be. The removal of forestry fencing for capercaillie conservation, badly designed forestry schemes and fence placement, and, in areas where deer are resident, the unfenced improvement of hill ground in upland farming, have led to an ever increasing demand to cull deer at night and during the closed season. (SGA) In other words, the policy of rejecting fencing as an option to sustainably manage deer was portrayed as misinformed and as showing a lack of understanding, especially in recent years, of how to manage multi-functional land use: Where herbivores are perceived to be having an adverse impact on vegetation we learned over two centuries ago that the most cost effective solution is to fence herbivores out of such areas. The only parameter that has changed since the 1996 Act3 seems a willingness to accept the traditional tried and tested solution of fencing as an acceptable solution. (SRPBA) Here land managers drew on the story of a long-standing, collective association with the land to show their deep-seated knowledge of issues which those without this association lack. Land managers also pointed to the reintroduction of fencing as a solution to public safety issues, such as the increasing number of road traffic accidents (RTAs) involving deer. The link between RTAs and stalkers' competence was again refuted; increased regulation around assessing competency would thus not address the problem of increasing RTAs. The only sensible way to separate wild deer and cars was through fencing. The consultation states that as issues of deer in towns and on Scotland's roads increase, concerns are likely to rise, indicating that public concern would be addressed by registration and demonstration of knowledge. The SGA feels that this link is misleading. For instance, Road Traffic Accidents in known hotspots can be prevented through fencing. This has nothing to do with competence or registration of stalkers. (SGA) For land managers then, debates over fencing highlighted the lack of understanding of public policy makers regarding multifunctional land management in areas where deer were present.

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The Deer (Scotland) Act.

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Responses to proposed changes in deer management, particularly those relating to stalkers' competency and fencing, thus demonstrated that land managers perceived changes which were said to be in the public interest as both ill-informed, and as an attack on their traditions, skills, heritage and understanding.

4.3. The increasing presence of an urbanised public in the countryside

Such interference and unsolicited opinions could come from both visitors, i.e., people living in town, and incomers, i.e., residents of the rural area: The most difficulty I have is with people who have moved into the area because of the oil, got a good job and then bought a house in the country. They get a 4x4 and a couple of dogs and they think they are suddenly country people. (Freelance gamekeeper) 4.4. Fieldsports and game management under public attack

Interviews with game managers showed how changes in widening public interests were experienced first-hand. These changes pick up on some of the themes mentioned in responses to the WANE Bill discussed above, in particular the perceived lack of understanding of state and public actors (including NGOs) in the management of the countryside. Our interviewees described two recent, major changes that strongly impacted on contemporary game management. First, in their view, the general public had become estranged from countryside matters. For example, many people did not engage with the provenance of their food anymore as they simply bought it in supermarkets. As a result of this divorce from direct experience and instigated by the media and the educational system, people had adopted very strong views on countryside management that were seen as misguided and directed against the sporting industry: A: I think society itself is getting further and further away from the hunting, the need to hunt to survive sort of thing. S: There is so much animal welfare now. […] A: Tremendous amount of misguided people. We have a friend, how do you put it, “everything has the right to life”. Y: But yet all eat meat. Well all, I mean the vast majority of people eat meat and they are quite happy to pick it off the supermarket shelves. […] They are so displaced. A: They are so set on. S: On nature. A: On nature and what they see on television. […] People just don't see it. Education, I don't know what you call it. They get brainwashed in the schools. (Group engaged in pheasant rearing and shooting on a small estate) Second, at the same time and somewhat ironically, land managers perceived the actual presence of this urban, estranged public in the countryside was increasing, facilitated by urban sprawl, counter-urbanisation and increasing mobility. A: I think it has made a tremendous difference, just access to the countryside, you know. Forty years, 50 years ago if you lived 20 miles away it was the other side of the country. Now it is ten minutes in the car. (Group engaged in pheasant rearing and shooting on a small private estate) As a result of the combination of these two developments, the countryside was seen to be frequented nowadays by an urbanised public that regarded itself as competent and knowledgeable, and that held strong views: Countryside seems to be everybody knows best. I meet on average one person per day who tells me how to do my job better than I do. Sorry mate, I've only been doing it for 20 years. (Countryside ranger on a mixed private estate)

Interestingly, several of our interviewees mentioned that whilst the increasing presence of the urban public in the countryside was a general phenomenon and there were “some real horror stories” in other places, they regarded themselves lucky, as in their area they had “still pretty good country persons living amongst us” (Gamekeeper on a private estate). Others described how the character of their work had changed as a response to these larger societal changes. Many stated that an essential part of their job nowadays was to educate and explain countryside management to visitors, tenants and the public in general. For some, however, the recent changes meant that they felt generally criticised and had to defend their job: … but I would say in the last 10 years there has been a phenomenal rise in the number of people who take exception to what I do (Freelance gamekeeper) This perceived increasing public opposition to fieldsports and related game management activities could manifest itself, for example, through vandalism of (legal) traps and snares, deliberate interruption of ongoing pheasant shoots, or dogs being walked through pheasant pens. More indirectly, the increased presence of people in woodlands and other areas at all times of the day (and night) also constrained stalking. For several gamekeepers, this meant that they seriously doubted the future of their profession and of fieldsports more generally. This held especially for pheasant shooting and roe deer stalking which, as lowland activities, were more exposed to urban interference than sporting activities in more remote upland areas: Well, I would think about another five years here and we will not be able to do it. There are going to be so many people walking about. […] I am actually going stopping snaring because of people walking about (Hobby gamekeeper on a previously commercial pheasant shoot) Both international and national legislation were regarded as mirroring and institutionalising the public estrangement from the land. EU legislation that aimed to harmonise rules across countries amplified the divorce between people and the land, as policymaking process was removed from the local situation, attempting to apply the same rules across a huge range of different places. As with the formal consultation responses (discussed above, section 4.2), some of our interviewees argued that traditional governance, based on voluntary approaches, was entirely sufficient to manage the countryside, and that new legislation was not needed: I think they should have more consultation with people in the country. If the country people don't have a problem why should the government have a problem? We have lots of little groups […] they like to think they can influence or they want to influence how nature is controlled or whatever. I think the wrong people are spoken to and there should be more consultation with the people

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who would be affected by the laws but why have a new law? What is wrong with what we have? Unless there is a real need I mean I am not keen on laws. People should have enough up here not to need a law. (Freelance gamekeeper) However, the pressure emerging from perceived public objections to fieldsports and the increasing degree of legislation in combination meant that many of our interviewees felt that their way of life was under threat. The opportunities that we have seem to get endlessly diminished and legislated against, and we do feel e and we have the conversation a lot between us and various friends of ours e that we just feel more and more under siege, under scrutiny almost, and just everything you do, somebody there is waiting to try to prosecute you. (Sport hunter and owner of a bed and breakfast - B&B catering for sport hunters)

4.5. Exclusive knowledge: reasserting control over game management Our interviewees cautioned that an abandonment of fieldsports in Scotland would mean that “a wealth of knowledge” (country ranger on a mixed private estate) and skills, as well as the essential role of the sporting industry for the rural economy would be destroyed. This would also have detrimental consequences for nature conservation, because “there are endless examples of species that have been saved from extinction, literally extinction, because of hunting” (Sport hunter and B&B owner). Importantly, fieldsports and the associated game management were argued to constitute a threatened way of life, and thus an important cultural value that was worthy of protection as such: People in other parts of the world have indigenous rights […] I sort of feel the same thing should apply here, it is part of our way of life. (Sport hunter and B&B owner) Many of our interviewees thus maintained that game management and fieldsport activities were essential for cultural, economic and ecological reasons alike. To restore the full functionality of these activities that had been compromised by the increasing, but misguided public involvement in governance of countryside matters, it was necessary to return to the knowledge base of the game managers. The source and the character of this knowledge was a recurrent element in our conversations, both implicitly and explicitly, and often combined notions of ‘knowing’ and ‘skills’ with normative ideas of a ‘right’ attitude or approach to land management. Only those in possession of this knowledge were regarded as legitimised to determine and make decisions over game management. However, such knowledge could not be acquired through college or university studies: You can just sense the way we look, the way we walk, you know, the way we think, the way we plan, it's just there. […] Either you've got it or you haven't. Very few can get it today so there is more who haven't got it. They still go to Thurso College which is the shooting school, gamekeepering school and haven't got it. (Owner of sporting estates and a fieldsports company) Instead, some of our interviewees implied that they had the ‘right’ approach because of their family heritage, or because of their upbringing in a family of gamekeepers: I am a 13th generation farmer, you know. (Countryside ranger on a mixed private estate)

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This argumentation essentially delegitimised public policies made and opinions expressed by those who did not hold this type of knowledge. Interestingly, the argument was exclusive and essentially irrefutable, and thus ideally placed to essentially devalidate recent policy changes in game management that conceded power to public interests. In addition, it seemed to be brought forward by interviewees from a wide range of backgrounds, including game keepers on lowland pheasant shooting estates, deer stalkers in remote upland areas, hunting farmers, as well as hunting outfitters. It thus appeared to provide an ideal foundation for a discourse coalition (Hajer, 1993), a set of storylines organised around a discourse, which aimed to regain the seemingly diminishing control over land management for fieldsports. 5. Discussion 5.1. Claims to knowledge Our findings suggest that, against a prevailing discourse that promotes inclusive governance, there is a counter-discourse put forward by game managers. This counter-discourse arises from a perception that the discourse on multi-actor governance, which reflects wider social changes, threatens land managers' ways of life and traditional practices through a trend to a stronger public voice in countryside matters. The counter-discourse claims that only land managers have the knowledge and understanding to manage the environment properly; such knowledge cannot be learnt but comes from their long-standing association with the land and the wildlife. Through this counter-discourse, land managers question whether newer public policies as devised and implemented by newer governance arrangements are really in the interests of especially the rural public, thereby challenging the knowledge and authority of policy makers, and framing them as ill-informed and out of touch with the ways of the countryside. This sets up a clear division between those who know and understand the countryside, and those who do not, but who increasingly have a say in and ultimately make decisions on how it should be managed. In the land managers' view, neither the public nor policy makers have an understanding of the countryside, yet they are increasingly involved, in different ways, in governing it. The counter-discourse identified in our analysis thus seems to function as a tool to (re-)create difference between and distinctiveness of group identities, here of game managers e who are in the possession of the right type of insight and knowledge e and the wider public and decision-makers - who are not. These discursive strategies help to create an identity and establish a claim to rights (Nursey-Bray et al., 2010; Dunk, 2002). At the same time, they help to define the ‘opposition’, here, the conjunction of the (non-land managing) general public, NGOs and public bodies with a role in wildlife management. While in this study, these different groups were not further differentiated by our interviewees, future research could investigate the diversity of actors concerned with the rural, and their different roles in the governance of the land. In stressing the role of knowledge to legitimise the previous status quo (i.e. the decision-making powers of land owners and their representatives), the counter-discourse effectively delegitimises modern forms of governance which advocate participation from a wide range of actors and an emphasis on multiple interests and imply that inclusive, participatory processes lead to better environmental management. The argument that knowledge is exclusively held by game managers (Section 4.5) renders the counter-discourse intractable and irrefutable. Such knowledge cannot be acquired by others (incomers or non-rural people), thus any intervention by such outsiders is by definition invalid. This directly challenges the more formal knowledge of the conservation

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authorities which is, by and large, learnt. While in our interviews, the nature of different knowledges was not a topic that was explicitly discussed, it did become clear that land managers regarded theirs as the true expert knowledge. This argument was used to back up claims to governance advocating that traditional institutions (such as self-regulation) are sufficient to ensure effective practice. Because the newer governance arrangements did not replace older customs and ways of life, land managers were able to draw on these older institutions, including private property rights, to protect their ways of life. As Cox et al. (1994) point out, land managers show that they are aware that other rural actors object to their practices but, convinced of their own moral rightness, they claim to be misunderstood. 5.2. (Counter-)discourses of legitimacy The land managers' counter-discourse can be contextualised through comparison with the responses by other groups who similarly feel themselves to be under threat from developing, increasingly hegemonic discourses that challenge the status quo. For example, Bergman (2005) describes an emerging discourse in which US-American hunters are portrayed as victims of a change in hegemonic discourses on what constitutes ‘Americanness’ and male strength. As in the US-American case and elsewhere, for example in Canada (Dunk, 2002) and England (Woods, 2003), hunting in Scotland (i.e., shooting and stalking) is not met with unchallenged legitimacy anymore, due to changes in public discourses that have developed detailed and differentiated ideas about the acceptability of different types of hunting (Fischer et al., 2013b). In the American case, Bergman (2005) perceives hunting to wane under the increasing pressure of public opinion. By contrast, counterdiscourses as the one identified in Scotland can be regarded as a means to maintain legitimisation of hunting practices, against the apparent hegemony of views that challenge current game management practices. Dunk (2002) describes how Canadian hunters groups employ the discourse of culture, heritage, rights and the need for tolerance to defend their hunting activities. Such a discourse represents an attempt to claim a legal and moral position similar to that of aboriginal people in terms of the relationship to nature, and in terms of the cultural traditions and the legal and political rights that flow from them. Also in the Scottish case, game managers drew on a language of culture, heritage and traditions to defend their rights. Such a strategy has elsewhere been used successfully by indigenous peoples to defend an ethnic way of life perceived to be under threat from a larger and hostile social majority (Dunk, 2002). However, as with the Canadian case, it is clear that Scottish landowners and managers, despite their attempts to claim a subject position, constitute a traditionally powerful group, even if the source of that power is changing (Samuel, 2000). Other studies note the counter-discourses employed by rural people more generally against the strong trend of ‘modernisation’ and environmentalisation (Mischi, 2012). Benjaminsen and Svarstad (2008) examine a rural traditionalist counter-narrative to a modernist discourse of tourism-centred land use of the Norwegian mountains. As in our Scottish case, this counter-narrative seems to be a reaction to larger-scale changes of modernisation rather than hunting-specific changes per se. Others (Cox and Winter, 1997) have highlighted how country dwellers in England, including hunt supporters, present themselves as a misunderstood and oppressed minority, despite the fact that they possess considerable social and economic resources, thus drawing parallels with hunters' claims that they have become marginalised in relation to the larger population. Such representations seek to draw attention to rural-urban differences and reinforce the idea that

urbanites misunderstand the countryside (see also Milbourne, 2003) and therefore should not interfere in how it is run. Such claims to be a marginalised and minority population utilise a discourse that creates the ‘rural’ as a distinct way of life with its own culture and which is perceived to be under threat from a larger and more dominant urban culture. In other places, such as Norway (Krange and Skogen, 2011) and France (Mischi, 2012), resistance to change has been interpreted as a result of class culture and politics, which may express a rural working-class ‘cultural resistance’ to what is seen as urban, middle-class environmental and animal rights activism. In the case of Scotland, resistance to change is from an upper-class elite but it also utilises an alternative discourse of knowledge to defend rights and practices that are perceived as being under threat from a larger and hostile majority. Struggles between an emerging dominant discourse and a more localised and conservative counter-discourse have been observed elsewhere. Adger et al. (2001) suggest that situations in which a discourse that promotes modern, multi-actor and multi-scale environmental management is confronted with a counterdiscourse that takes the perspective of the local population might be ubiquitous. They describe global patterns of managerial discourses and populist counter-discourses e mostly referring to developing countries e on deforestation, biodiversity use, desertification and climate change. It would seem therefore that changes in environmental governance, and possibly governance changes more generally, are accompanied by discourses and counterdiscourses which vie with each other for hegemonic dominance between multiple audiences made up variously of policy makers, the public and those responsible for implementing changes. An interesting aspect of this analysis is found in the observation that this counter-discourse works to unite a group of people in a discourse coalition (Hajer, 1993) that otherwise vary in relation to their particular connection to the land. While our interviewees concurred that their relationship with their environment was very different from the one they had observed in urban visitors and other members of the public, the object of their relationships seemed to vary considerably. For the gamekeeper on a pheasant estate, for instance, this connection was through a particular species, the pheasant. For some, it was through an approach to managing the land for a particular activity (such as grouse shooting or deer stalking). For others, the association was through the countryside in general, with some interviewees referring to a construct that might best be labelled as ‘nature’, describing their relationship to wildlife as well as to the mountains, the weather and the woodlands. The shared discourse of access to exclusive knowledge appeared to act here as a source of cohesion, bringing together land managers whose opinion on other land management objectives would differ, and who might, without a common adversary, have little to share. Woods' (2003) analysis of previous rural protests in which a broad coalition was created through an appeal to a rural identity suggests that such coalitions might be fragile. Woods (2003) shows how rural groups in France, USA and the UK were able to build alliances to challenge what they perceived as unwarranted state interference in a variety of rural affairs. The creation of a ‘rural identity’ was built on a rhetoric which included talk of ‘rights’, ‘liberty’ and freedom from bureaucracy. Ironically, a rural movement led by a one-time paternalistic elite attempted to represent itself as an ‘oppressed minority’ (see above, see also Dunk, 2002). Yet the unity provided by a broad appeal to ‘rural identity’ was fragile and could easily start to lose coherence as different rural residents and visitors began to assert their own preferences and prejudices (Woods, 2003). Furthermore, it is not clear from our Scottish study of the extent to which this counter-discourse created by land managers is perhaps supported by public nostalgia and fondness for ‘the old

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ways’. An avenue for further research could be to examine the extent to which landowners (and others), through the control of cultural and symbolic resources, help to create a romantic ideal concerning their role in managing the Scottish countryside (see Lorimer, 2000; Samuel, 2000) and the extent to which the public are supportive, or not, of this construction. 6. Conclusion Our study adds to the wider literature on the relationship between discourses and institutional change (Section 5.2), and shows that institutional change does not only lead to the formation of (counter-)discourses, but that such counter-discourses, when coupled with existing institutions such as traditions and property rights, can also impact on the implementation of institutional change. It highlights the role of knowledge as a symbolic resource, actively used to legitimise and regain control over the governance of the countryside. Our observations on the recent changes in governance arrangements in Scotland, and the inclusion of public objectives from land management, lead us to conclude that these will have only limited impact when newer institutions are layered over older existing institutions which to a large extent control how land is used and managed, and by whom. Under such conditions, general governance changes towards multi-actor, multi-level governance will likely fail, or at least be slowed down. Despite new directives and institutions at national (Scotland) and international (Europe) levels, culture and institutions, including those of private property, continue to exert substantial control and influence over land use in Scotland. Acknowledgements We would like to thank all interviewees and focus group participants for their contributions, and Sharon Flanigan and an anonymous referee for helpful comments on earlier versions of this manuscript. This work was conducted as part of HUNT-Hunting for Sustainability (http://fp7hunt.net/) and funded by the European Union's Framework Programme 7 and the Scottish Rural and Environment Research and Analysis Directorate, Programme 3. References Adger, W.N., Benjaminsen, T.A., Brown, K., Svarstad, H., 2001. Advancing a political ecology of global environmental discourses. Dev. Change 32, 681e715. Arts, B.J.M., Leroy, P., Van Tatenhove, J., 2006. Political modernisation and policy arrangements: a framework for understanding environmental policy change. Public Organ. Rev. 6, 93e106. Benjaminsen, T.A., Svarstad, H., 2008. Understanding traditionalist opposition to modernization: narrative production in a Norwegian mountain conflict. Geogr. Ann. B 90 (1), 49e62. Bergman, C., 2005. Obits for a fallen hunter: reading the decline e and death? e of hunting in America. Am. Lit. Hist. 17, 818e830. Brewer, J., 2000. Ethnography. Open University Press, Buckingham. Callander, R.F., 1987. A Pattern of Landownership in Scotland: with Particular Reference to Aberdeenshire. Haughend Publications, Aberdeen. Cannadine, D., 2005. The Decline and Fall of the British Aristocracy. Penguin New Edition, London. CBD, 1992. United Nations. http://www.cbd.int/convention/text/default.shtml (accessed 09.04.13.). Cheshire, L., Higgins, V., Lawrence, G., 2007. Introduction: governing the rural. In: Cheshire, L., Higgins, V., Lawrence, G. (Eds.), Rural Governance: International Perspectives. Routledge, Oxford. Cox, G., Winter, M., 1997. The beleaguered ‘other’: hunt followers in the countryside. In: Milbourne, P. (Ed.), Revealing Rural ‘Others’: Representation, Power and Identity in the Countryside. Pinter, London. Cox, G., Hallett, J., Winter, M., 1994. Hunting the wild red deer: the social organization and ritual of a ‘rural’ institution. Sociol. Rural. 34 (2e3), 190e205. Cox, G., Watkings, C., Winter, M., 1996. Game Management in England: Implications of Public Access, the Rural Economy and the Environment. Countryside Community Press, Cheltenham. Defra and Forestry Commission England, 2004. Achieving the Sustainable Management of Wild Deer in England. London.

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