Policing Peers and Selves between Law and Morality: A Socio-Legal Perspective on Managing Misconduct in Hunting

Contemporary hunting is at great pains to assert a sovereign jurisdiction to state interference. Hunters sometime view laws as illegitimate and cultivate an informal normative order to guide conduct and to protect the integrity and outside representation of hunting in modernity. This involves policing selves and peers mainly from an ethic of fair chase, which is multifaceted. In this study, we interview hunters who reflect on the dynamics of the fair chase ethic as a guiding principle across various dilemmas, including technological gears, commodification of hunting, game allocation and social sanctions over transgressions. Consistent with our socio-legal theory, we observe hunting’s moral and cultural perceptions of what constitutes fair chase in many situations is at odds with what is legally proscribed. Our final discussion elucidates the implications of hunters turning away from authorities in these situations, concluding with calls for deliberative culture that can re-integrate moral norms and formal laws.