A new book covers elephants and poverty, democracy, and the limits of good intentions in a complex world.

Conservation involves humility and trade-offs and is about enriching all our lives, human and non-human.

Win-wins for humans and nonhumans require investment.

Elephants are sentient beings well-known for their incredible memory, intelligence, and rich emotional lives. In modern times, they come into conflict with neighboring humans, sometimes leading to fatalities. However, peaceful coexistence is a viable alternative, and for this and other reasons I found conservationist Dr. Nitin Sekar's highly acclaimed book, The Elephant Jungle: A Story of Conservation and Coexistence, to be a wonderful read about the lives of the people who are the guardians of India’s remaining wildlife.

In his easy-to-read book, Sekar offers grounded insights about how to achieve coexistence in a "crowded and complex world." He presents an important case study about compassionate conservation in which the well-being of all stakeholders matter, with global implications about the complexity of human-animal relationships.

Marc Bekoff: Why did you write The Elephant Jungle?

Nitin Sekar: The Elephant Jungle centers on the life story of Netra Sharma, a villager I worked with closely during my research in Buxa Tiger Reserve, India. The book uses our stories to show the difficulties faced by both low-income farmers and megafauna when they're expected to share a landscape.

My real reason for writing the book is that Netra's story—of protecting wildlife in a place where people still faced desperate poverty, even when many valued animal life—was extremely interesting. I couldn't let it go until I wrote the book.

More cerebrally: I started my PhD in ecology thinking that understanding how animals affected their........

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