This article summarizes 10 years of ethnographic research in the Okavango Delta
and describes how local communities are collaborating with government, tour operators,
and conservationists to manage wildlife through the Community-Based Natural
Resource Management (CBNRM) program. CBNRM channels social and economic
benefits to communities in exchange for their participation in wildlife conservation.
Benefits include secured access to land, institutional support, employment,
and share of profits from wildlife tourism. By some accounts, CBNRM has effectively
achieved co-management and wildlife conservation; by others, the program
has achieved only rhetorical success. We highlight collaboration between social
actors at various levels—community, government, tourism industry, international
nongovernmental organizations (NGOs)—as one indicator of success. We then
consider the steps that need to be followed to ensure that collaboration leads to
long-term conservation. Experiences from this case may provide insights for
co-management and conservation in other places where the fate of biodiversity
and local livelihoods are entwined.