Recent studies have highlighted that illegal activities occurring within protected areas, including the poaching of fauna and flora, cannot be addressed with increased law enforcement alone. Moreover, research on the increasingly militarized nature of front-line conservation efforts has pointed to potentially detrimental aspects of such approaches. This has led to a shift in focus to identifying ways to further engage local communities in the prevention and reduction of wildlife crimes. However, few studies have examined the potential for changing the responsibilities of front-line conservation personnel or their views on such changes. Such insight is vital in forecasting the successful adoption of, or possible resistance towards, a more community-oriented policy. We examined rangers’ perceptions in Uganda to assess their attitudes towards traditional enforcement strategies and alternative, non-enforcement approaches for reducing illegal activities in protected areas. Our findings suggest that although respondents believed that traditional enforcement strategies (e.g. foot patrols) are important and effective in reducing wildlife crime, these strategies on their own were insufficient to address illegal activities. Study participants emphasized the importance of expanding the role of front-line rangers, in line with approaches suggested in the policing literature. We discuss the implications of our findings for transdisciplinary conservation science research and front-line conservation policy and practice.

Investigating the human dimension of conservation science warrants an interdisciplinary approach. Criminologists and criminal justice scholars have begun to empirically examine various issues that are directly related to conservation, including wildlife law enforcement. This qualitative study of job satisfaction among law enforcement rangers in a protected area in Uganda contributes to both criminal justice and conservation science. Based on interviews and participant observation we identified four main themes that contributed positively to the job satisfaction of rangers: their role in aiding Uganda's conservation efforts and national development; financial stability and familial support; conducting frontline work and establishing ownership of the Park; and opportunities for personal and social development. We discuss the implications of our findings for Park management capacity building as well as for future interdisciplinary and qualitative scholarship in conservation science.

In many countries law enforcement rangers are frontline guardians responsible for the management, monitoring and protection of protected areas and wildlife species. To date, little research has been conducted on law enforcement rangers and their perceptions of stress. This exploratory study contributes to both the criminological and conservation literature by exploring an important human dimension often neglected in conservation science research: law enforcement rangers. Similar to previous research on police occupational stress, it is expected that law enforcement rangers experience stressors unique to their profession. Utilizing an ethnographic case study approach based on interviews and participant observation, this research examines ranger perceptions of occupational stress in a protected area in Uganda. Findings indicate that law enforcement rangers are exposed to various occupational/task-related, external, internal, and occupation-related personal strains. Results from the study have implications in understanding, reducing and preventing occupational stress in rangers, as well as in capacity building for park management.