Word: rabinowitz
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...state where they can be readily accessed and distributed throughout the Harvard community is one of the Center’s primary aims. “This is all about access; it is not about making things beautiful and hoarding them,” says Jan Merrill-Oldham, Malloy-Rabinowitz Preservation Librarian. “Its about finding ways to get this material to people. A very common scenario is for us to assess objects, to treat them, for cataloguers to improve bibliographic records so that those objects can be found by researches and then to digitize them...
...Rabinowitz makes clear just how painful the process was in his new book, Life in the Valley of Death. (Watch Alan Rabinowitz talk about the Hukawng Valley reserve, and the changing nature of wildlife conservation, on the new video Greencast.) First there was the forbidding Hukawng Valley itself, a remote chunk of mountainous jungle on the border with India, dubbed the "Valley of Death" by British refugees fleeing the Japanese advance into Burma during World War II. When Rabinowitz hiked deep into the Hukawng in 1999 - braving carnivorous leeches, among other trials - he was the first scientist to visit...
...also knew that by protecting the tiger, he could save far more wildlife than just the big cat. Following in Schaller's footsteps, Rabinowitz has focused on protecting cats partially for public relations reasons - it's easier to rally public support behind such beautiful, charismatic animals than, say, a new species of frog. Also, because big cats range far and wide in their habitats, if you can stake out enough land to protect them, you'll also be protecting all the smaller animals that occupy the lower rungs of the food chain. (It's called the "apex protection" strategy.) Tigers...
...wildlife reserves grow in size, however, they need to change. Pristine sanctuaries without human interference are simply impossible - endangered animals and people need to learn to live with one other. In the Hukawng Valley reserve, which would eventually grow to an area the size of Vermont, that meant Rabinowitz needed to enlist the help of local people. Over years of meetings, he managed to convince many of them to stop hunting tigers and the wild game that is the animals' main source of food. At the same time, Rabinowitz didn't stand in the way of some economic development...
None of this would have happened, Rabinowitz says, without the determined support of the generals he spent years courting. Because of his willingness to work with the junta, Rabinowitz has emerged as a prime target for the free Burma community, which believes that any engagement with the generals only legitimizes a cruel military regime. While the charge especially stings in the wake of last fall's brutal military crackdown of Burmese protesters, Rabinowitz is unapologetic about his work with the junta, knowing their cooperation was the only way to ensure the reserve would be protected. And he's right...