Paper Discussion: Identity, Conflict, and Engagement in Wolf Reintroduction

Graduate comparative discussion guide

1 Assigned papers

Paper A — Engagement expectations

Gonzalez, M. N., Quartuch, M., & Niemiec, R. (2025). “Stakeholder engagement for Colorado wolf reintroduction: stakeholder-derived metrics of success.” Human Dimensions of Wildlife. https://doi.org/10.1080/10871209.2025.2520848

Paper B — Identity and intergroup conflict

Gonzalez, M. N., Heid, T. N., & Niemiec, R. (2024). “Characterizing social conflict over wolf reintroduction in Colorado: A theoretical model of intergroup conflict.” People and Nature, 6, 2001–2013. https://doi.org/10.1002/pan3.10694

Read both full articles. Bring one passage, result, or methodological choice from each that the group should examine closely. Paper A studies expectations of a planning process; Paper B analyzes identity-linked narratives of conflict before the 2020 vote. Neither evaluates ecological impacts of the reintroduction.

Optional extension — Experimental evidence on political identity

Metcalf, A. L., & Angle, J. W. (2026). “Effects of political identity activation and inaccurate metaperceptions on attitudes toward wolves.” Conservation Biology, 40, e70212. https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.70212

This open-access study reports two randomized experiments with residents of U.S. states with wolves. Read it if you want to compare qualitative accounts of a specific Colorado policy conflict with experimental evidence about when political identity shapes wolf attitudes. It is about wolves broadly, not the Colorado reintroduction process.

2 Central question

How should natural-resource agencies respond to identity-linked conflict while designing engagement processes whose influence and limits are explicit?

3 What the studies examine

Paper A studies expectations for the Colorado wolf-restoration planning process among highly engaged stakeholders who were not members of the Stakeholder Advisory Group (SAG). It compares their expectations with a research-based engagement-evaluation framework and identifies context-specific criteria and outcomes.

Paper B applies a theoretical model of intergroup conflict to 20 interviews with stakeholders recruited purposively and through snowball sampling before the 2020 vote. It analyzes perceptions of in-group, out-group, intergroup relations, and the nature of the conflict. Its qualitative design characterizes narratives; it does not estimate population prevalence or establish causal effects of identity on voting.

Paper A reports early expectations in a multi-year process. It does not evaluate final engagement outcomes, establish causal effects of engagement, or assess the ecological effects of wolf restoration.

4 Discussion sequence — 90 minutes

4.1 1. Opening claim — 8 minutes

Invite each student to offer an initial answer or question. As a class, identify the assumptions behind different answers and note where perspectives diverge.

4.2 2. Set up the case and papers — 12 minutes

Build a compact comparison map together as a whole class; the instructor can record it on the board:

• Research questions: What did each study seek to learn?
• Population and recruitment: Who was eligible, how were people identified, and who participated?
• Data and analysis: How did interviews and each paper’s analytic framework shape the findings?
• Inference: What is the strongest claim each design supports?

Use the articles to support each part of the map. Mark details the class cannot resolve from the papers as open questions.

4.3 3. Methods and inference — 18 minutes

Discuss these questions as a whole class:

1. Paper A invited 345 people to the survey and received 92 responses; 24 people completed interviews. How does recruiting highly engaged external stakeholders shape what it can tell us?
2. Paper B interviewed 20 stakeholders recruited purposively and by snowball sampling. What kinds of narratives become visible through this strategy, and which are likely missing?
3. Both use deductive and inductive thematic analysis. How does theory help make identity-linked conflict analyzable? What might the framework obscure?
4. Paper B sorts stakeholders by position on reintroduction. Does that illuminate meaningful differences, risk flattening within-group variation, or both?
5. What do the coding procedures establish about analytic dependability? What remains unresolved about validity, transferability, or prevalence?
6. Which findings are expectations, reported perceptions, or observed outcomes? Where could readers overstate the evidence?
7. What follow-up or comparative design would help explain how identity, engagement, and management decisions interact over time?

4.4 4. Findings under pressure — 17 minutes

Paper A identifies expectations around representativeness, influence, transparency, independence, learning, conflict resolution, and stakeholder values. It also identifies two stakeholder-derived process criteria—intentional two-way communication and active inclusivity—and two stakeholder-derived outcomes—trust in the agency and support for the final management plan. Paper B finds that strong supporters and opponents often described in-group virtue and out-group failings, while middle-ground interviewees more often described perspective-taking and intergroup relations.

Select one finding for a whole-room close reading. Ground claims in the articles:

• Is it a process criterion, a social outcome, or potentially both?
• How could an agency operationalize it without reducing it to a weak proxy?
• Whose interpretation should count when participants define it differently?
• Could pursuing it create a trade-off with another valued criterion?
• What evidence would show that the process changed a decision, rather than merely collecting input?
• How might identity threat or inaccurate beliefs about the other group shape what an engagement process needs to do?

4.5 5. Whole-room engagement design discussion — 20 minutes

As a class, advise a state wildlife agency planning a contested species restoration. Use both papers to develop an engagement plan that addresses identity-linked conflict and makes decision authority explicit. The instructor records the emerging design, disagreement, and unresolved questions on the board:

1. Identify the relevant publics and stakeholders, including those not already organized or highly engaged.
2. Explain how you will address affectedness, representation, access, and Tribal sovereignty where relevant.
3. State what participants can influence and what remains the agency’s responsibility.
4. Select two process criteria and two social outcomes to evaluate.
5. Name one ecological outcome to monitor separately.
6. Describe how the agency will report what it heard, what changed, and what did not change.
7. Identify one foreseeable limitation or harm caused by the process itself.

Do not assume that broader participation guarantees agreement, trust, or support.

4.6 6. Compare and critique — 10 minutes

Review the class design. Invite each student to identify its highest-stakes choice or a remaining concern. Challenge the proposal with questions about evidence, legitimacy, feasibility, and unintended consequences.

4.7 7. Closing synthesis — 5 minutes

Complete individually:

“These papers change how I would evaluate engagement by . A remaining uncertainty is .”

5 Instructor facilitation notes

• Use facilitated whole-room discussion throughout; do not divide students into pairs or teams. With a small seminar, invite multiple rounds of contributions and let students build on or challenge previous comments.
• Keep discussion on study design, engagement process, and inference. Students may debate wolf restoration, but ask them to distinguish those normative views from what each study measured.
• Preserve the distinction between expectations and outcomes. The interviewees were anticipating how an engagement process should work; this article does not show whether those expectations were met.
• Invite disagreement about representation without flattening Tribal Nations into one stakeholder category. Treat sovereignty and governance authority explicitly.
• If discussion stalls, ask whether consensus is necessary for legitimacy, whether meaningful influence requires shared decision authority, and how an agency can make non-adoption of public input transparent.
• Graduate-level extension: ask students to propose a longitudinal or comparative design that links specific process features to social outcomes while accounting for selection into participation and changing ecological conditions.

6 Article limitations worth probing

These are prompts for students to assess, not a substitute for their own critique:

• The study focuses on highly engaged stakeholders who were not members of the SAG; it does not represent the Colorado public as a whole.
• Interview expectations were measured early in a two-year process and may differ from retrospective assessments.
• The sample supports contextual insight, while transfer to other species, regions, and governance settings requires argument.
• The article identifies valued criteria and outcomes but does not empirically test which process features produce which outcomes.
• Interview transcripts are not publicly available because of the confidentiality commitments made to participants.
• Paper B’s 20 interviews characterize stakeholder narratives; purposive and snowball sampling do not support estimates of how common these views are in the public.
• Paper B’s pre-vote data describe a specific political moment; they should not be treated as a direct account of current attitudes or post-reintroduction conflict.

7 Preparation check

Before class, be able to answer:

1. What is the unit of analysis in each paper?
2. How did the authors identify participants?
3. What is one inductively identified theme, and why is it useful?
4. What is one claim each paper cannot support?
5. What additional evidence would you want before advising an agency?

8 Optional extension prompt

Metcalf and Angle report that political identity activation can increase polarization in attitudes toward wolves, while correcting inaccurate in-group metaperceptions can increase positive attitudes across the political spectrum. Discuss:

1. What does random assignment let the authors infer that the Colorado interview studies cannot?
2. What remains uncertain when moving from experimental attitudes to voting, participation, management acceptance, or behavior?
3. How could an agency use this result without treating political identity as a fixed attribute or manipulating participants?