By Kelsey Wakiyama (Spring 2026)
Introduction
In 1872, The United States created the first national park, Yellowstone National Park (YNP), and along with it, the concept of the protected area (PA) (Adams & Hutton 2007). The National Park Service (NPS) is the governing body for these landscapes, presenting national parks as raw nature, separate from human realms. The politics that take place to curate parks and the life within them, like land access and protection priorities, are often obscured. YNP is an example of how multispecies politics have shaped the fate of the American bison. Having bounced back from near-extinction, the bison population is now managed by humans, determining how and where bison can exist. Management decisions extend beyond bison themselves, impacting Tribal Nations, wildlife, livestock, and human stakeholders. This essay argues that bison management is a multispecies political project, producing uneven consequences for bison, livestock, Tribal Nations, and conservation institutions while determining systems of belonging and exclusion.
The Multispecies Politics of Conservation
The concept of PAs as a means of conservation is rooted in Western thought and was established in the United States upon the founding of YNP (Adams & Hutton 2007). While the main goal of PAs is to protect biodiversity, the process of creating and maintaining PAs strips people of access to their land. PAs are an example of “fortress conservation” (Dawson 2024), a concept based on the separation of humans and nature. PAs are a continued reminder that the lands separated for conservation purposes were once home to Indigenous people who were the first stewards of the land, like the Nez Perce, Shoshone, and Blackfeet Tribes native to YNP land (NPS 2023).
The NPS is a federal agency within the U.S Department of Interior. Decisions about the national parks are granted to the federal government, giving it the power to manage wildlife, land use, and human access at each park. This authority makes conservation inherently a political process, and in YNP, decision making yields multispecies consequences.
The Multispecies Relationship
In her article “Human-Bison Relations as Sites of Settler Colonial Violence and Decolonial Resurgence”, Danielle Taschereau Mamers analyzes the history of human-bison relations (Taschereau Mamers 2019). Prior to the 19th century, bison roamed North America in numbers from 30 to 60 million. They were a keystone species, creating habitat for insects, shaping vegetation landscapes, and serving as prey for predators, humans included. Indigenous people relied on bison for food, clothing, and tools; however, their relationship spanned more than just subsistence. Indigenous scholars speak of the bison relationship as intimate and spiritual. Nêhiyaw scholar and filmmaker Tasha Hubbard argues that the role of the bison includes “‘guide, teacher, and relative’” in Indigenous culture (Taschereau Mamers 2019). Some Indigenous communities were even modeled on bison herd social structures, signifying the role that bison had in politics and relations. Indigenous thought challenges the notion of PAs that people and wildlife must be separate.
As settler westward expansion intensified and technology improved to increase killing efficiency, the bison population was decimated in the 19th century. Popular for their hides and bones, the bison were hunted to the brink of extinction, with just 1,000 remaining by the turn of the century. Colonial politicians had no qualms with the loss of the bison, as it was seen as necessary for embracing domestic cattle and “‘the advancement of civilization’” (Taschereau Mamers 2019). Additionally, the loss of the bison meant the weakening of Indigenous people and the opportunity for the colonial government to push them off their land. Taschereau Mamers argues that colonization is multispecies. The imposition of land and resources impacts wildlife and humans concurrently. As Indigenous people were forced onto reservations, bison were forced into confinement at zoos and parks, marking a new era in which their existence became conditional. Hubbard characterizes the bison-Indigenous people relationship as one of “‘mutual hardship’” (Taschereau Mamers 2019).
Bison Management Today
Today, the bison population is at stable levels within YNP. The mammal is a tourist attraction, drawing in millions in revenue for the state, but a larger herd means management is deemed necessary. In 2000, the Interagency Bison Management Plan (IBMP) was signed to coordinate bison management between stakeholder groups. The plan’s main goals are to maintain a wild bison population (about 3,500), manage bison that leave YNP boundaries, and reduce the risk of brucellosis infection from bison to livestock (IBMP 2023). Brucellosis is a disease that affects cattle and bison alike, causing infertility, abortion, or weak offspring (IBMP 2023). Bison are a migrating species, often leaving park boundaries and causing human-bison conflict, so the plan also defines what happens to bison when they exit YNP. In 2009, three Tribal entities– the Confederated Salish & Kootenai Tribes, the InterTribal Buffalo Council, and the Nez Perce Tribe– joined the founding IBMP state and federal agency partners (IBMP 2023).
In 2024, NPS updated its bison management plan in accordance with the original IBMP, reflecting new science and knowledge. The plan targets a bison population of 3,500-6,000, a range accounting for migration and conditions from season to season (NPS 2024). NPS justifies this increased target with studies that found larger numbers of bison benefit the ecosystem. It also claims that a larger population enhances the visitor experience and can be effectively managed. Finally, with the knowledge that there have been no recorded bison-to-cattle brucellosis cases, NPS feels that the larger population is justified (Eggert 2025). The 2024 plan states that it will continue to work toward the goals of the IBMP through three strategies that involve transferring bison to Tribes for herds and food, increasing Tribal hunting outside the park, and state culling. All three strategies involve culling bison that leave park boundaries and increasing Tribal involvement. By regulating what happens when bison cross park boundaries, the management plan makes migration a political act rather than an ecological process.
In 2024, the state of Montana sued the Biden administration, challenging the new bison management plan. The lawsuit’s main concern is the potential spread of brucellosis to livestock and calls for a smaller population target (State of Montana Newsroom 2024). In 2025, The Fort Peck Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes, along with conservation organizations, joined the lawsuit to defend YNP’s management plan ((National Parks Conservation Association 2025).
Why is this Multispecies Relationship Political?
Cal Lee Garrett claims in his article “Stewardship: The Political Ecologies of Parks, Rewilding, and Reform in the United States” that parks advance the political and economic interests of the elite (Lee Garrett 2025). Past and ongoing bison management policy are continually disputed by those in power for their economic and political gain, reflecting Garrett’s argument. Montana’s strict caution about brucellosis, despite no scientific findings of the bison-cattle transmission, shows disregard for ecological or Tribal outcomes. Instead, it emphasizes that the state’s concern lies in fear of economic losses from the livestock industry. While it seems that Tribal Nations, YNP, NPS, and conservation organizations are on the same side of the fight, these organizations have different fundamental goals. An article written by the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA) on the lawsuit mentions on multiple occasions the economic gain of a robust herd size from tourism (NPCA 2025). These organizations might value conservation, but they know their work cannot be done without monetary support.
In between the power struggle for a prevailing bison management plan, the remnants of multispecies colonialism and the legacy of Tribal Nations’ and the bison’s mutual hardship still stands. Tribal Nations have fought for their rights to land and bison, and they have made strides in intra-Tribal collaboration and with NPS. But the system still denies them sovereignty. While the new plan is to restore Tribal herds and “food sovereignty”, it still reflects a system that does not recognize Tribal Nations as decision makers (NPS 2024). The way that Tribal Nations are allowed to interact with and relate to bison is strictly managed by the government. The YNP border represents a stringent political line that defines conditional existence for both the bison and Tribal Nations. The bison, once free to roam, now is confined by an invisible border. Exit the border, and the bison is vulnerable to culling by the state, capture, or hunting. The same border line for the Tribal Nations is representative of the NPS authority superseding Tribal sovereignty, granting Tribes only conditional access to bison.
Conclusion
Looking at the core definition of politics– who gets what, when, and how– it is reflective of why bison management and the human-bison relationship is political (Lasswell 1936). Who gets protection, bison or livestock? When are bison tolerated within and outside of the park? How is Tribal access to bison managed? Each of these questions exposes bison management as governance, not an act of stewardship. The root of bison management lies in the determination of which life is allowed to belong, and how it is allowed to belong. The multispecies politics of bison management reveals that belonging is shaped through systems of power and regulation.
Works Cited
Adams, William M., and Jon Hutton. “People, Parks and Poverty: Political Ecology and Biodiversity Conservation.” Conservation and Society 5, no. 2 (2007): 147–83. http://www.jstor.org/stable/26392879.
Cal Lee Garrett. “Stewardship: The Political Ecologies of Parks, Rewilding, and Reform in the United States.” Social Problems, 2025;, spaf054. https://doi.org/10.1093/socpro/spaf054
Dawson, Ashley. 2024. Environmentalism from Below. Haymarket Books.
Eggert, Amanda. 2025. “Montana Sues Yellowstone National Park over Bison Management Plan.” Montana Free Press. 2025. https://montanafreepress.org/2024/12/31/montana-sues-yellowstone-national-park-over-bison-management-plan/.
IBMP. 2023. “About IBMP | IBMP.” IBMP. 2023. https://www.ibmpinfo.org/background.
Lasswell, Harold Dwight. 1936. Politics; Who Gets What, When, How. Whittlesey House.
National Parks Conservation Association. 2025. “Fort Peck Tribes, Conservation Groups Defend Yellowstone Bison Plan in Court.” National Parks Conservation Association. 2025. https://www.npca.org/articles/6977-fort-peck-tribes-conservation-groups-defend-yellowstone-bison-plan-in-court.
National Park Service. 2023. “Historic Tribes – Yellowstone National Park (U.S. National Park Service).” http://Www.nps.gov. October 11, 2023. https://www.nps.gov/yell/learn/historyculture/historic-tribes.htm.
National Park Service. 2024. “Bison Management – Yellowstone National Park (U.S. National Park Service).” Nps.gov. 2024. https://www.nps.gov/yell/learn/management/bison.htm.
State of Montana Newsroom. 2024. “Gov. Gianforte, State Agencies File Suit over Yellowstone National Park’s Bison Management Plan.” Mt.gov. 2024. https://news.mt.gov/Governors-Office/Gov_Gianforte_State_Agencies_File_Suit_Over_Yellowstone_National_Parks_Bison_Management_Plan.
Stoetzer, B. (2022). Ruderal city : Ecologies of Migration, Race, and Urban Nature in Berlin (1st edition). Duke University Press. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781478023203
Taschereau Mamers, Danielle. 2019. “Human-Bison Relations as Sites of Settler Colonial Violence and Decolonial Resurgence.” Humanimalia 10 (2): 10–41. https://doi.org/10.52537/humanimalia.9500.
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