State Intervention to Protect Endangered Species: Why History and Bad Luck Matter

Abstract: Illegal exploitation threatens the survival of many species, and anti-poaching legislation ("protection on paper") does not protect species. State enforcement is needed to support and supplement the formal status of endangered species, but state enforcement can be a source of instability leading to the demise of species if ad hoc rules are followed blindly. We demonstrate this with a model of poaching, wildlife, and government wildlife enforcement, but our findings apply more generally. Crucial assumptions of the dynamic model are that both poaching and enforcement effort increase or decrease whenever poaching effort and enforcement are relatively profitable or unprofitable activities, respectively. We found that multiple steady states may characterize the system's equilibrium. Depending on initial populations, the initial extent of state involvement, and random events, animal populations may be severely depleted or unexpectedly built up during transition phases. Our findings highlight the importance of history and luck in protecting endangered species.