In the new millennium’s politics, polar bears play the part whales played in the 1980s. From a theatrics-as-protest perspective, their shape lends itself better to impersonation than that of a rainforest or whale. Activists take advantage of this. Dressed as polar bears, they show up in the most unlikely places—the Kremlin, or Ottawa’s Parliament Hill—as nonhuman “climate refugees. In an act billed as “part protest, part performance,” Greenpeace paraded a mechanical polar bear the size of a double-decker bus through central London, as part of its Save the Arctic campaign. Fifteen puppeteers operated Aurora the bear, which had an articulated head and neck, a mouth like an ice cave, and the real bear’s “slightly lazy” ambling gait.

When climate change became a pressing political issue, zoos that had closed polar bear exhibits or were planning to do so because of their high costs reversed course, making sure polar bears were on hand. In part, this reflected zoo visitors’ growing interest. But zoos also stepped up their breeding programs when the species was listed as threatened—many of their bears were well past the reproductive age. They soon increased their holdings also with abandoned cubs and “problem” bears removed from the Arctic.

Like captive breeding programs and reintroduction efforts in general, science-assisted interventions in the field raise the question of what constitutes wildness, or the bearness of polar bears. One of several emergency actions proposed to relieve starving bears has helicopters airlift food to the “most accessible” ones—at a cost of thirty-two thousand dollars per day. (Similar programs already exist for intensely managed animal species and populations such as the California condor, black bears in Washington, and brown bears in Eastern Europe.) Other last-ditch efforts biologists suggest include relocating bears farther north, where sea ice will last longer; moving more bears to zoos; and even euthanizing those unlikely to survive on their own. Some Inuit who decry even the radio-collaring of polar bears as disrespectful to the animals and who are tired of “outsiders” meddling say to just let them be.

With the polar bear caught in the media’s limelight, some Canadians began to consider it a more fitting national emblem than the beaver. In an attempt to oust the official signature animal—“the dentally defective rat”—one senator reminded her fellow citizens that a country’s symbols are not constant and can change over time. The polar bear would be perfect for the part, with its “strength, courage, resourcefulness, and dignity.” An opponent countered that “you can’t beat a beaver for stoic hard work and industry,” a perfect metaphor for the pioneering Canadian spirit. Such resistance shows the difficulties of rebranding, with brand loyalty in this case entrenched for more than thirty-six years.

When the senator pitched it as a new national symbol, the polar bear had already reinvigorated Canada’s oldest trade, which the animal rights movement’s stance against wearing fur had previously damaged. Since the bear’s numbers were thought to have declined and restrictions on hunting it consequently increased, its value as status symbol rose, to a level comparable to its first appearance in Europe during the Middle Ages. Sports hunters now pay up to thirty thousand dollars to shoot a polar bear in Canada. In the last five years, the price of pelts alone doubled, with the best selling for twenty thousand dollars or more. Even in small amounts, legal polar bear hair, used in fly-fishing, is hard to obtain. Like real flies, lures made with the hollow hairs settle gently on water. There is no equivalent, and patches of pre-treaty skin with hair sell for six dollars per square inch in the United States.

All this encourages poaching, especially in Russia, where forty to two hundred bears are killed each year. Their skulls and skins enter the market with false Canadian documentation, the forging of which itself is a lucrative business. The resurgent demand for fur rugs, claws, carved masks with polar bear fur, and similar items comes largely from Russia and China, where a growing middle class spends money on status symbols that are passé in the West. South Koreans, on the other hand, buy dried polar bear gallbladders for “medicinal” uses, at three thousand dollars a piece.

Canadian politicians say that initiatives to outlaw such trade or hunting are based more on emotion than on science and that the hunting quotas are sustainable. (Inuit and trophy hunters kill about six hundred polar bears per year.) In the feelings it awakens, this controversy resembles the “seal wars” of the 1970s and 1980s, when big-eyed, white “baby” harp seals clubbed on sea ice caused furor and even French sex symbols became activists. Impassioned appeals, however disguised, come from both sides. “A ban would affect our ability to buy the necessities of life, to clothe our children,” an Inuit representative at the 2013 CITES conference said. “We have to protect our means of putting food on the table and selling polar bear hides enables us to support ourselves.” Perhaps by intention, this statement counts on our empathy, on our instinct to nurture and protect the human young and frail.

The same Native spokesman redirected the discussion toward the root cause of the polar bear’s plight. He accused the United States of compensating for its lack of action on climate change and pollution of the Arctic from drilling and mining, of using the polar bear as a blunt tool, because it is “the perfect poster child.”

Like the bear Viking merchants traded to Europe’s nobility, the emblem of nature conservation is precious as a commodity and as a pawn in political maneuvers. Even if we never reach the point where polar bears are fed bear kibble from helicopters, bears today, managed and marketed, no longer seem quite “pure” or genuinely wild. While the blending of consumer logos and wildlife might strike some people as odd, it is also no longer limited to the corporate sector. The previous president of Polar Bears International, a former marketing director, was dedicated to turning the bear into a recognizable environmental brand, promoting the bears’ situation through guided tours outside Churchill. Still, overexposure and a desensitized public could weaken the message and the “Lord of the Arctic” fade to a new cliché. Some critics think polar bears have already begun to disappear in the white noise of our culture. “The polar bear has lost a lot of its cachet,” the writer Jon Mooallem said in an interview. “It’s become too political. It doesn’t really resonate with environmentalists anymore and it ticks off everyone else.” Summing up the dilemma of image, Mooallem claimed that, “In the twenty-first century, how species survive, or go to die, may have to do more with Barnum than with Darwin.”

It may have to do even more with Konrad Lorenz, Marshall McLuhan, and Jean Piaget. It has to do more with Lorenz, because he ferreted out 
the dynamics between market forces and ecological catastrophes (outlined in his 1973 book Civilized Man’s Eight Deadly Sins); with McLuhan, because he realized how the medium shapes the message; and with Piaget, because he stressed learning from the past and teaching our children well. These three figures supersede Barnum, as better promotion of the polar bear will only get us so far. What really is needed is a drastic restructuring of our society, or at least, our economic system.

With our tendency to mess things up and then try to fix them—culminating at present in desperate schemes of geo-engineering—we find it hard to accept that perhaps the polar bear’s time is running out. And that ours could be too.

*Michael Engelhard is the author of a new essay collection, American Wild, and of Ice Bear: The Cultural History of an Arctic Icon, from which this essay has been excerpted. He lives in Fairbanks, Alaska and works as a wilderness guide in the Arctic.

When you see piles of fresh fish in a market, do you ever ask yourself whether or not the listed price accurately reflects the actual value of those now-lifeless creatures? How much is one fish really worth? I never thought much about that question until I attended a community meeting in the coastal pueblo of La Ribera, Baja California Sur. Who knew it would be a lesson in value?

The meeting itself was hosted by a group of marine scientists and other scholars from the nearby university in La Paz. The goal of the meeting was to change some minds. You see, fishermen from La Ribera weren’t exactly elated about the nearby Marine Protected Area in Cabo Pulmo (aka the Cabo Pulmo National Park), despite its immense national and international support. Some surrounding communities were not completely sold on the idea of a no-take fishing zone. La Ribera was among them; many residents felt that Pulmo’s MPA only benefited the residents of Cabo Pulmo. A group of marine biologists, economists and other scholars from the nearby university in La Paz (UABCS) arranged a community meeting to try to convince residents of La Ribera otherwise.

About 35 to 40 people showed up. One of the main speakers was a marine biologist who has spent more than two decades working in Cabo Pulmo. He began by talking about the “environmental services” that Pulmo’s MPA provides. He followed up with a brief overview about coral reef systems and how they benefit local communities. Next, he talked about why Cabo Pulmo is so famous–it is one of the few hard coral reefs in this part of the Pacific. This is why it was set aside as a protected area back in 1995.

Reefs provide many things, the marine biologist explained, including basic necessities such as food. Much of the value of reefs can be calculated in monetary terms, he told the audience, but not all of it. He explained that reefs produce billions of dollars annually around the world, and, for some countries, are the base of their economy. Reefs are places where commercially valuable fish live and breed, he added. Then he listed all of the raw materials and products that come from reefs. They also add to the beauty of places, he said, which draws in tourists.

The message: reefs mean money.

This is where things get interesting. He followed up by telling the audience that each fish on the reef is worth about $400 dollars. He was talking in terms of US dollars, not pesos. This is about 6400 pesos. Think about this. The minimum wage in Mexico is about 70 pesos per day (about $4.50 USD). For someone making double the minimum wage (140 pesos per day, or 3360 per month), one fish is equivalent almost two months of work (assuming six working days per week).

The notion of a $400 fish reverberated through the audience. Attention captured.

After the expensive fish bombshell, the marine biologist started to wrap up his presentation by talking about the relations between the communities of Cabo Pulmo and La Ribera. Both are communities of fishermen; both rely on the ocean for survival. He explained how marine reserves and no-take zones work: fish concentrate, populations grow, then they spread out to other places. The protected area at Cabo Pulmo directly impacts the fisheries in La Ribera, he told the audience. The MPA, he said, is like a McDonald’s for various species–they come to the reef, eat, and run. His final point was that there is room for the people of La Ribera to benefit from the conservation of Pulmo Reef–and the growing tourism market. This can happen without direct competition or conflict, he explained. He implored the audience to consider the idea that preserving Pulmo can be complementary for La Ribera, that everyone can benefit from conservation.

At the end of the meeting, the presenters asked the audience to evaluate and comment on everything they heard. All of the responses were positive. All of them. One man stood up: “This is the first time I have gone to one of these meetings,” he said. “Now, I understand the importance of Pulmo,” he declared. He also added that he sees there are many opportunities for his own community to create businesses, to make money. “We just need the training to do this,” he explained. He ended by telling the audience that he has seen the effects of environmental degradation–and recovery–first hand. In the past, he said, lobsters were hard to find. But today, there are many more, thanks to Pulmo’s MPA. This man made it very clear that he saw things very differently, thanks to this meeting.

I remember walking out of the meeting thinking “Well, that worked pretty well.” And it apparently did. The whole money/economic opportunities angle did seem to be compelling for the local fishermen. It made people stand up and pay attention. It seemed to change some minds, to get people to rethink the importance of Cabo Pulmo and its protected reef. But the whole idea of the $400 fish stuck with me. I understand the rationale behind telling people that one fish swimming out there on the reef is worth all of that money. It’s meant to express the value of something in clear, powerful terms. The point is to motivate people, using one of the dominant registers of our time. Money talks–I get it.

But isn’t there something wrong with putting a price on nature? The moral indignation of this question was expressed perfectly by the late comedian Bill Hicks, who once shouted: “Quit putting a dollar sign on every fucking thing on this planet!” Yet, beyond all of the arguments and righteous indignation about the commodification of every possible aspect of our daily lives, what is actually the problem with standing in front of a room full of people and telling them that there’s a fish out there that’s worth two months of work? Do we really need to stay up late at night worrying about this?

Possibly. As Richard Conniff wrote on Yale Environment 360 (linked above), critics suggest that viewing nature in purely economic terms makes “a fundamental change not just in the world around us, but in ourselves.” Ok, so it changes the world around us, and it also changes us in a fundamental sense. Along similar lines, Marx once wrote,

Money is the universal self-established value of all things. It has therefore robbed the whole world—both the world of men and nature—of  its specific value. Money is the estranged essence of man’s work and man’s existence, and this alien essence dominates him, and he worships it.

Money robs the world of its specific value, says Marx.  For David Harvey, money is a corrupting, corrosive force. In Justice, Nature, and the Geography of Difference, he also argues that the intrinsic value of nature exists beyond the imposed realm of money values (1996:157-158). Money, as powerful as it is, falls short–it doesn’t quite cover over our world. But we often don’t take the time to look, to see the holes in the facade. There is something about nature (land, trees–and fish) that cannot quite be captured or expressed by money–much in the same way that language can never completely express human reality and experience. Money is a social convention, Harvey reminds us, not an immutable fact or law. It exists within particular social arrangements (or, to use other terms, specific modes of production).

In Capital, Marx warned against naturalizing value as it is created and understood in capitalism. Because if we internalize particular ways of valuing the world around us, we may lose the ability to think outside of such conceptions and imagine alternatives (see Harvey 2010:45-46). This brings us back to that $400 fish. This way of thinking about fish–and nature–commits exactly the kind of naturalization of one form of value that Marx warns about. It takes something that exists within a complex, dynamic ecological system and reduces it to a very specific value within one particular human-constructed system. Such a discourse frames nature in terms of money, markets, and capitalism. Period. This presupposes a certain kind of world, in which the primary meaning (i.e. value) of nature is tied to its economic productivity (even if the money values that are often assigned to nature are often incredibly vague). And thus, nature is robbed of all other potential meanings and values. This reminds me of an Aldo Leopold quote (in this case about land, but equally applicable to “nature” in general):

It is inconceivable to me that an ethical relation to land can exist without love, respect and admiration for the land, and a high regard for its value. By value, I of course mean something far broader than mere economic value; I mean value in the philosophical sense so that a thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it trends otherwise” (1968:223-224).

So where does this leave us? Is the $400 fish a signal of immanent corruption and doom, as Marx seems to suggest? In speaking about nature in terms of money, are we opening up a Pandora’s Box that ultimately leads us down a destructive, end-of-the-world path that could only be painted by Hieronymus Bosch? Maybe, and maybe not. As Keith Hart writes, “Anthropologists might sign up for the sentiment that money is the root of all evil. But, in demonising money, they come close to endowing the institution with an evil power all of its own.” Clearly, both Harvey and Marx can be put into the “money is the root of all evil” camp. But are they right?

On the one hand, speaking about fish in terms of dollars sets up the kind of situation that often plagues many Payment for Ecosystem Services schemes. In essence, when you start atomizing nature and putting price tags on all of its various components, it becomes possible to start substituting money for those components. Especially when things go wrong. In the case of fish, imagine if a local developer wanted to put in a massive hotel that required an equally behemoth desalination plant. Let’s say this desal plant produces sludge that affects the reef, and ends up killing 30% of the local reef’s fish biomass. Well, if you know the specific money value of each fish, you can just pay for the damage and move on with your business. Pay the 30% in cash, and done. No problem…except for the degraded reef and all the dead fish.

But then there’s the other hand. One of the issues here is that it sometimes seems as if the rhetoric of commodification automatically transforms and reshapes the world in which we live. As if the mere mention of money completely washes over, corrupts, and distorts nature. Sure, discourse has its effects and all, but the act of speaking of fish in terms of (US-based) money values doesn’t instantly make it so. And although this comparison may have grabbed the attention of La Ribera’s fishermen, it doesn’t mean, from that moment on, that they completely forgot about all of the other meanings and values of the fish, fisheries, and local marine systems. Other values persist, despite the ubiquitous dominance of money, markets, and western economies. There are times, I think, when our critiques about commodification do indeed endow money–and capitalism–with a bit too much evil, almost magic, transformational power.

Despite the seemingly unending dominance of global capitalism, it’s vital to imagine alternatives, to see other possibilities. In the case of La Ribera, maybe the strategic framing of fish in terms of money accomplished just that for La Ribera’s fishermen. It was a rhetorical tactic, framed in one powerful register of value, that helped people think differently about the importance of local conservation. Maybe, in the final tally, the fish in Pulmo reef aren’t doomed to be swimming dollar signs after all–thanks to one imaginary four hundred dollar fish.