cs_19_63R2 Conservation and Society AOP: 1-11, 2020 1 1 2 Special Section: Rewilding ‘Feral Political Ecologies 2 3 3 4 4 5 The Reintroduction of Beavers to Scotland: Rewilding, Biopolitics, and the 5 6 Affordance of Non-human Autonomy 6 7 7 8 Kim J Warda,# and Jonathan Priorb 8 9 9 10 aSchool of Geography, Earth and Environmental Science, Plymouth University, Plymouth, UK. 10 11 bSchool of Geography and Planning, Cardiff University, Cardiff, Wales. 11 12 12 13 13 #Corresponding author. E-mail:
[email protected] 14 14 15 15 16 Abstract 16 17 17 Rewilding is a distinctive form of ecological restoration that has emerged quite publicly within environmental 18 18 policy and conservation advocacy circles. One of the fundamental tenets of rewilding is its emphasis on non-human 19 19 autonomy, yet empirical examples that examine non-human autonomy are currently limited. While there is a growing 20 20 body of literature on the biopolitics of broader environmental conservation strategies, there is comparatively little 21 21 scholarship on the biopolitics of rewilding. This paper argues that autonomy should not be used as a boundary 22 22 marker to denote ‘wild’ non-humans, but as a situated condition that is variable across locations. It offers an 23 23 empirical study of the biopolitics that govern the different expressions of non-human autonomy at two different 24 24 locations in Scotland, where beavers have been reintroduced. The fndings reveal how, depending on location and 25 25 context, modes of governance related to rewilding strategies co-exist and interplay with animal autonomy and 26 26 forms of power in contradictory ways.