I first came across Stuart Marks’ work through his classic book, The Imperial Lion. Human dimensions of wildlife management in Central Africa (1984). At the time I was still young(er) and his work served as a guide for my own research on wildlife management in Zimbabwe and how it was inevitably intertwined with, and relating to, socio-cultural, socio-political and socio-economic processes. It taught me how important intra-, inter- and socio-organisational processes are for understanding something that sounds as ‘biological’ as ‘wildlife management’ does. Little could I envisage then that years later I would have the honour and privilege to write the foreword for what I can only label as Stuart Marks’ stunning synthesis of his oeuvre.

Times are changing. Speed and acceleration are the order of the day; the world seems enmeshed in ‘the fast lane’, both within and outside academia. However, a catchy oneliner I often use with my students states that ‘there is no short-cut to intellectualism’. In other words, time, understood as duration and endurance, is a sine qua non to come to deeper understandings of social processes and configurations and their embeddedness in a plethora of contexts. Not only a chronological or linear sense of time, but also its multiple combinations and paradoxes of repetitiveness and rhythms, like ‘standing still’ in times of dullness, seasonality, or waiting, and ‘thundering by’ in times of excitement. All these essential elements come together in Stuart Marks’ stunning story, an interpretation and analysis of his four decades of work, consultancy, research and reflection on how the residents of the Munyamadzi Game Management Area (GMA) in Zambia perceive their interactions with the Zambian Wildlife Authorities. This has resulted in an ethnographic case study that is a beautiful illustration of a growing and ripening intellectual perspective over time.

In line with Stuart Marks's work over the years, the book does not conclude with final answers or convictions that are set in stone or have turned into rock bottom beliefs. It dares to remain critical of itself, of earlier work and of any finality, without idealising its own perspective or hammering it home in any way. I would like to recommend you to sit back, pick up the book and let yourself be translocated to Zambia by its sheer descriptive power, convinced by its breadth of scope and contexts, and inspired by its wisdom built over years.