"The Bear, the State and Society" - a sociological perspective on a problematic from the sphere of nature preservation

Authors:
Ştefan Ungurean ( Faculty of Sociology and Communication, Transilvania University Braşov),
George Predoiu ( Faculty of Silviculture and Forest Engineering, Transilvania University Braşov),

Cristian Bălăcescu ( Faculty of Economic Sciences - Institute for Enterprise Administration, Transilvania University Braşov).

"LIFE - Enhancing the Conditions Regarding Large Carnivores Preservation - Transfer of the Best Practices " (Bulgaria, Greece, Italy and Romania) is a project consisting of two pursuits. The first one, focused on quality (thematic coding, nVivo processing) the implication of the state's institutions in the preservation of bear populations. The second one, focused on quantity (SPSS processing) is concerned with  the way the members of 'affected'  communities relate to the bear. Discourses of truth assert that institutions don't speak 'a single language', the network - mixture of sovereignties and disciplinary powers (Foucault) - allowing the bear to escape control, given the fact that it doesn't dispose of a specific space, he becomes more and more visible, meeting man, considered to be 'sacred', but also a profit source. Mirror of the self, we perceive them as beings which have to be protected as long as they don't enter our space, but also of the civilization, built upon the Enlightenment's definition of modernity, man 'answers' -  the animal ("the other absolute") 'reacts'. The replacing option "who suffers - who doesn't suffer" (Derrida), the empathy, base of the reconciliation of man and nature, doesn't seem, for the time being, possible. The proposed suggestion, having its own problems: to address the problem of bear preservation in terms of a theory of public goods (Olson) by starting from Sloterdijk's concepts of 'park' and 'taming' (heideggerian applications).

(Conference of the Department of Sociology and Social Work - Bucharest University - May 2011)