The 13th Conference of the Parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna (CITES) is currently underway. Many African countries in particular have moved to property-rights based conservation for protecting endangered species and, where they have, wildlife populations have prospered. For the African elephant, however, this means that CITES continuing prohibition on the ivory trade may be its greatest hurdle to conservation.

As I write over at A Better Earth today, the ban suffers from the same flaws as "modern drug laws where illegal activity is driven underground. In the case of ivory, however, it is driven onto eBay." The September 24th Washington Post noted that approximately 1,000 eBay auctions of ivory take place daily. If those African communities that now steward their elephants could participate in those markets legally, new worlds of opportunity would arise for conservation of the elephant. "Only unowned resources are exploited to extinction."

The staying power of property-rights based conservation may be most evident in Zimbabwe where Robert Mugabe has decimated institutional property rights, and yet locals continue to fight for control of their wildlife.