I examined ecosystem management (EM) using questionnaires from 46 state and territorial wildlife agencies and interviews in 11 states. Political culture, agency traditions, and other bureaucratic factors were examined to seek differences in wildlife conservation practices within organizations and to determine which influenced EM adoption. Twenty-two of 46 states claimed to be using EM; most adopted it in the early to middle 1990s. Socioeconomic and political factors (14 potentially affecting agency operations and 18 presumed to influence EM adoption) could not be linked to EM adoption. There was no correlation between state political culture or state ideology and EM. Although the importance of state natural heritage programs and the [...]