Methods of Recreation on Private Land:

Research on Approaches to Countryside Access for Irish Hill-Walkers

Abstract

The countryside access issue is a conflict over countryside land between their legal owners (mainly farmers) and the people using them for recreational purposes. This issue often creates a situation in which a dialogue and system for recreational access may or may not work properly depending on the access point. Indisputable justice cannot be established for the conflict. However, existing studies on natural resource management by multiple stakeholders have not examined such a situation. This article explores the activities of hill-walkers at the multiple access points in the Republic of Ireland, where the countryside access issue has intensified recently, and analyzes how they consider access to the countryside in the aforementioned situation.

Ireland has two national organizations for hill-walkers. One approaches the countryside access issue from the justice perspective and the other from the dialogue perspective. Their approaches are not consistent with each other. An inquiry into the practices of a local mountaineering club based in an area where there have been serious access problems revealed that the club members approach the access to the countryside with their ideal of hill-walking, using the logic of building “good relationships with farmers.” Unlike the approaches of the two national organizations, this club's approach has been effective as their methods help avoid conflicts with farmers and help them maintain their recreational activities. The result shows the potential of the logics of recreational activities. The logics create the methods to co-exist with other stakeholders in natural resource management. The result also reveals the importance of inquiry into people's everyday practices in researching natural resource management by multiple stakeholders.