Conclusion of the third part

1As seen throughout this Part, elephants and their mahouts intervene in each step of timber operations. Although the elephants’ physical strength is an important component of their labour contribution, we have seen that their cognitive and sensory capabilities for making decisions and understanding their comfort level in working environments is also crucial. Furthermore, elephants not only demonstrate these adaptive abilities according to the situation, but also in relation to the men with whom they are working. The individuality of each animal and their varying motivational disposition influences the performance of logging labour tasks. In each operation, elephants know what they are doing, and the work is completed only through their involvement. Whenever an elephant fears something or if he detects the awaited return of his owner, the working activity is likely to falter.

2According to the definition of labour and working activity as provided in the introduction of the volume drawing from Dejours, the situation presented and analysed shows that among the Khamti, elephants are working (Dejours 2013). The elephants’ labour is valuable not only because they mobilise their strength and their sensory abilities, but also because the observation of their conduct reveals signs of their voluntary volition, and in some cases of their disengagement. They clearly know the rules of labour and they are able to respect or ignore them. It can also be assumed that elephants are working because they are subjects of affects while performing the requested tasks.

3Nevertheless, given that elephants are working, and that evidence for the intelligence of elephants is a relevant consideration, the question remains as to whether the human-elephant interaction constitutes collaborative labour or merely a sequence of coordinated and adjusted actions. This question is posed since coordination might imply a simple mechanistic view of the elephant, controlled according to human will, without any claim as to the subjective agency of elephants as thinking and feeling sentient beings. By constraints and/or using coercive means (such as the use of chains for example), it appears quite feasible to force an animal to coordinate his actions for a certain time, but not to cooperate.

4I argue for collaborative labour by noting the adaptive ability of elephants to autonomously negotiate problems, and by noting the relational context between humans and elephants involving qualities of mutual trust as well as empathic and communicative understanding. Describing the loading operations, I have shown that interspecies communication was based on the trusting confidence between the mahout, Chao Nakalang Mein and the elephant, Aipang. The description revealed that instructions alone are insufficient to account for the elephant’s activity and that they exercise their own initiatives in completing logging tasks. Crucially, this suggests the elephant’s autonomy and intentionality as a fellow worker collaborating with humans. From the mahout’s point of view, this implies a familiarirty with, and confidence in their elephants’ abilities to think and act.

5The above elements allow me to assert that among the Khamti, humans and village elephants constitute labour collectives based on confidence, mutual knowledge and a willingness to complete a job well done.