Why We Finally Did Save the Whales

40 years ago in the movie Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, Admiral Kirk and his crew travel back in time to San Francisco in 1986 to try and save humpback whales that are extinct in the future because they hold the key to answering an alien message and saving 24th century Earth from destruction. The movie shined a spotlight on the conservation efforts in progress to save the whales and for a time that became a rallying cry of environmental groups. The movie was credited with fueling a resurgence in humpback whales back from the brink of extinction.

The global shift continued this past week, when Iceland quietly joined hundreds of other nations to ban whale hunting, leaving only Norway and Japan as the last two countries on Earth that allow the practice to continue. The reasons for their change of policy, though, did not come down to the moral argument. Rather, increasing tourism dollars from whale watchers was the real driver, combined with a dwindling demand for Icelandic whale meat. The biggest remaining challenge, as the story illustrates, is the connection between whale hunting and the independent identity of some Icelanders. For students of behavior change, this story has everything. Financial incentives, national identity, geopolitical pressure and an environmental win forty years in the making.