The Paradox of Success in Conservation Performance Payments: Rising Costs and Declining Trust in Sweden's Carnivore Policy

Human–wildlife coexistence is central to global biodiversity agendas, yet can impose substantial costs on affected communities. Conservation Performance Payments (CPPs), which reward participants for wildlife presence, aim to redistribute these costs and reduce conflicts. Sweden's state-funded CPP for Indigenous Sámi reindeer herders to share space with wolverines, lynx, and wolves is the oldest scheme of its kind and widely hailed as best practice for coexistence. Drawing on interviews, ecological data, and policy records spanning nearly three decades, we assess its operation in Norrbotten County, a hotspot for wolverines and herding communities. We show that scheme effectiveness has not been sustained: Payments do not match rising coexistence costs, monitoring methods have become unreliable under changing climate conditions, and participants’ trust in the system has eroded. The resulting loss of legitimacy coincides with a reversal of the regional wolverine recovery previously enabled by the scheme. Our findings illuminate a dilemma for results-based payments: success increases costs, demanding sustained institutional accountability and adaptive management. Without this, pressure mounts on local communities, undermining social justice and conservation goals. We conclude that CPPs can be a valuable complementary tool for coexistence, if designed to adapt to socio-ecological change, rising costs, and participants’ needs over time.