Herding Monkeys to Paradise: How Macaque Troops Are Managed for Tourism in Japan by John Knight (review)

John Knight has written the definitive study on wild monkey parks (yaen kōen) in Herding Monkeys to Paradise: How Macaque Troops Are Managed for Tourism in Japan. In a comprehensive analysis, this volume reviews the histories, personalities, and issues surrounding the monkey parks of Japan. Knight is an anthropologist who has already published numerous studies on human-nature relations in Japan, most notably his 2003 volume on wildlife and rural communities titled Waiting for Wolves in Japan.¹ In this new volume, Knight brings to bear his considerable energy in interviewing protagonists and digging up literature on monkey parks.

Some potential readers may wonder how such a massive volume can hold the interest of a reader for such a narrow subject. The Japanese monkey (Macaca fuscata) is only one of many wildlife species in Japan, and human-animal relations is a much broader topic than the interactions occurring within the confines of a monkey park. Furthermore, for any reader involved with wildlife research in Japan, virtually every topic taken up in the book is already a familiar one, and I was skeptical at first about whether the author could teach anything to the legions of veteran primatologists in Japan.

The potential reader has no need to worry. I was astounded by the depth, breadth, and detail of every topic taken up in the book. Yes, every topic was familiar, but I was taught far more about everything I thought I was familiar with, or reminded of so much I had long forgotten, than I had expected before opening this book.

The monkey parks were established in many parts of Japan within the range of monkeys, from Kyushu to the northern tip of Honshu. The parks are operated by local governments or run as small businesses by private owners, and they generally charge admission. Many were established in the 1950s and remain in business today. The most famous parks include those at Takasakiyama in Ōita, Arashiyama Monkey Park on the outskirts of Kyoto, and Jigokudani in Nagano Prefecture, world renowned as the site of monkeys bathing in hot springs. Herding myriad facts into coherent stories, Knight explains the histories of these and other parks in great detail to introduce the people who started the parks, the philosophies they invoked to explain the parks to themselves and others, and the various problems they have had to deal with over the years.

The monkey park serves as the backbone, but this volume ranges over many topics that interface with monkey parks. The definition of the zoo—where visitors view animals across a barrier—is crucial because monkey parks define themselves in contrast to zoos and may call themselves “natural zoos.” The free-ranging animals are considered to be “wild” even as their human managers attempt to control their daily activities with food. The history of hunting is important because monkeys had been hunted right up to the postwar period when humans began to approach wild monkeys for reasons other than hunting. Crop damage by wild monkeys and other forms of monkey damage against human communities is covered extensively in the book since the overpopulation caused by feeding leads to an increased number of well-habituated monkeys that range far more widely. The monkey parks have survived into the recent age of ecotourism, shifting the arena for monkey watching to more naturalistic settings which can be near or include monkey parks.

Personalities, both human and monkey, are given prominent presentation. Many monkey parks originated through the efforts of a person who made the huge initial effort to find the monkeys and persuade them to accept human foods, a tremendously difficult task at a time when the hunting of monkeys had ceased only recently and monkeys ran away at the first sight of a human. The pioneer provisioners were motivated by many goals. Scientists wanted to observe monkeys closely to study...