Governance Change and Institutional Adaptation: A Case Study from Harenna Forest, Ethiopia

Many common pool resources have traditionally been managed through intricate local governance arrangements. Over time, such arrangements are confronted with manifold political, social, economic and ecological changes. However, the ways in which local governance arrangements react to such changes are poorly understood. Using the theoretical concept of institutional adaptation, we analyse the history of Harenna forest, Ethiopia, to examine processes of institutional change over the last 150 years. We find that the traditional institutions that governed Harenna’s resources persisted, in essence, over time. However, these institutions were modified repeatedly to address changes caused by varying formal, supra-regional governance regimes, the development of markets for forest products, increasing population pressure and changes in formal property rights. A key mechanism for adaptation was combining elements from both informal and formal institutions, which allowed traditional rules to persist in the guise of more formal arrangements. Our findings also highlight several constraints of institutional adaptation. For example, by abolishing fora for collective decision-making, regime changes limited adaptive capacity. To conclude, we argue that such insights into traditional resource governance and its adaptability and dynamics over time are essential to develop sustainable approaches to participatory forest management for the future, both in Harenna and more generally.     

Realization of participation and spatiality in participatory forest management – a policy–practice analysis from Zanzibar,Tanzania

The efforts in sustainable natural resource management have given rise to decentralization of forest governance in the developing world with hopes for better solutions and effective implementation. In this paper, we examine how spatially sensitive participation is realized from policy to practice in the process of establishing participatory forest management in Zanzibar, Tanzania. Our policy–practice analysis shows that the policies in Zanzibar strongly support decentralization and local level participation has in practice been realized. However, the policy does not emphasize participatory process design nor address the possibilities of using spatial information and technologies to ensure wider participation. Thus, the practices fall short in innovativeness of using site-sensitive information with available technologies. Reflecting the Zanzibari Community Forest Management Agreements (CoFMA) context with examples of participatory use of spatial information and technologies in other parts of the world, we discuss ways to improve the Zanzibari CoFMA process towards increased participation, communication, local sense of ownership and more sustainable land management decisions, and argue for the future implementation of CoFMA as a spatially sensitive participatory process.     

Sustaining local values through river basin governance: community-based initiatives in Australia's Murray–Darling basin

Australia's Murray–Darling basin (MDB) water plan is an ambitious attempt to balance ecological, social and economic benefits, where a key aspect of the reform process has been recovery of water for environmental use. This paper focuses on a set of initiatives established by a local non-governmental organisation and an Indigenous community designed to engage with local values and priorities and incorporate them into this complex river basin governance system. Contrary to expectations that local and basin-scale interests and outcomes will diverge, the case studies reveal the ability for local groups to collaboratively manage both land and water resources to achieve locally important outcomes, and contribute to basin-scale outcomes. The analysis also highlights a progressive style of community-based environmental management for water management that utilises multiple institutional arrangements and planning pathways to protect the values that are important to local communities, and to nest those values within the broader effort to sustainably manage the basin's water resources.     

Indigenous Knowledge and Long-term Ecological Change: Detection, Interpretation, and Responses to Changing Ecological Conditions in Pacific Island Communities

When local resource users detect, understand, and respond to environmental change they can more effectively manage environmental resources. This article assesses these abilities among artisanal fishers in Roviana Lagoon, Solomon Islands. In a comparison of two villages, it documents local resource users’ abilities to monitor long-term ecological change occurring to seagrass meadows near their communities, their understandings of the drivers of change, and their conceptualizations of seagrass ecology. Local observations of ecological change are compared with historical aerial photography and IKONOS satellite images that show 56 years of actual changes in seagrass meadows from 1947 to 2003. Results suggest that villagers detect long-term changes in the spatial cover of rapidly expanding seagrass meadows. However, for seagrass meadows that showed no long-term expansion or contraction in spatial cover over one-third of respondents incorrectly assumed changes had occurred. Examples from a community-based management initiative designed around indigenous ecological knowledge and customary sea tenure governance show how local observations of ecological change shape marine resource use and practices which, in turn, can increase the management adaptability of indigenous or hybrid governance systems.     

People, power and timber: The politics of community-based forest management

The potential of devolved conservation to empower people, reduce poverty and protect forest resources has yet to be realized in much of the developing world. This is particularly evident in the Philippines where the central state paradoxically recentralizes political power through devolution at the policy, program and project level in forest management. We investigate how centralized state power emanates through devolved networks to affect the success of local timber utilization involving community-based forest management (CBFM) on Mindanao Island, the southern Philippines. By examining broader shifts from centralized to devolved forest management, results suggest that centralized political power continues to control and adversely affect local uses of timber through CBFM. We discuss how in the process of state authorities recentralizing devolved rights and responsibility over timber management, community-based logging operations were threatened but sustained by members relying on community-based structures and their own capabilities. The conclusion asserts that broader state processes of devolving power over timber management remains constrained by political motives and interests and so largely fails to fulfill the objectives of community-based forest management.     

Transaction costs and community-based natural resource management in Nepal

Transaction costs in community-based resource management are incurred by households attempting to enforce property right rules over common resources similar to those inherent in private property rights. Despite their importance, transaction costs of community-based management of common pool resources (CPRs) are often not incorporated into the economic analysis of participatory resource management. This paper examines the transaction costs incurred by forest users in community forestry (CF) based on a survey of 309 households belonging to eight different forest user groups (FUGs) in the mid hills of Nepal. The analysis reveals that the average 'poor' household incurred Nepalese rupees (NRS) 1265 in transaction costs annually, while wealthier 'rich' households incurred an average of NRS 2312 per year. Although richer households bear higher proportions of such costs, transaction costs for CF management as a percentage of resource appropriation costs are higher for poorer households (26%) than those of middle-wealth (24%) or rich households (14%). There are also village differences in the level of transaction costs. The results show that transaction costs are a major component of resource management costs and vary according to socio-economic status of resource users and characteristics of the community.     

Dynamics of local governance in natural resource conservation in the Okavango Delta,Botswana

There has been a shift in natural resource management worldwide. This paper describes how modern institutions and policies influence management and shape access to and utilization of resources by rural communities in the Okavango Delta, Botswana. It is rooted in the framework of adaptive co‐governance within social‐ecological systems, and employs a critical literature review to analyse access to and use of natural resources in rural Botswana. Prior to the establishment of community‐based natural resource management (CBNRM) in Botswana in 1989, resource governance was dominated by strong traditional institutions that were responsible for natural resource management and decision‐making. Contemporary natural resource governance is characterized by a bureaucratic system that invariably undermines the role of traditional institutions in natural resource governance. Findings indicate that policies and regulatory instruments deny rural communities adequate access to and utilization of resources available within their immediate environment. In spite of an orientation towards an anthropocentric approach to natural resource management (as in the case of CBNRM), the current governance system continues to undermine the inclusion of local resource users as legitimate stakeholders in the decision‐making process.     

INSTITUTIONAL OPTIONS FOR THE COLORADO RIVER1

ABSTRACT: In many interstate river basins, the institutional arrangements for the governance and management of the shared water resource are not adequately designed to effectively address the many political, legal, social, and economic issues that arise when the demands on the resource exceed the available supplies. Even under normal hydrologic conditions, this problem is frequently seen in the Colorado River Basin. During severe sustained drought, it is likely that the deficiencies of the existing arrangements would present a formidable barrier to an effective drought response, interfering with efforts to quickly and efficiently conserve and reallocate available supplies to support a variety of critical needs. In the United States, several types of regional arrangements are seen for the administration of interstate water resources. These arrangements include compact commissions, interstate councils, basin interagency committees, interagency-interstate commissions, federal-interstate compact commissions, federal regional agencies, and the single federal administrator. Of these options, the federal-interstate compact commission is the most appropriate arrangement for correcting the current deficiencies of the Colorado River institution, under all hydrologic conditions.     

Reforms from the Ground Up: A Review of Community-Based Forest Management in Tropical Developing Countries

After an initial burst of enthusiasm in the 1990s, community-based forest management (CBFM) is increasingly being viewed with a critical eye. Evidence suggests that many programs have failed to promote their stated objectives of sustainability, efficiency, equity, democratic participation and poverty reduction. A large volume of academic literature now exists on CBFM, examining both the success and failure of such initiatives in a wide variety of countries. Through analysis of key themes, concepts and issues in CBFM, this article provides a review of CBFM initiatives in tropical developing countries for policymakers, practitioners and planners wishing to gain an understanding of this wide-ranging, interdisciplinary academic literature. The article identifies key institutions and incentives that appear to significantly affect the success or failure of CBFM initiatives. In particular, it reports that consideration of institutional and socioeconomic factors along with personal characteristics of key stakeholders such as beliefs, attitudes, financial resources and skills are important determinants of CBFM outcomes. However, local incentive structures also appear to be important. There is increasing recognition in the literature of the need to consider the conditions under which local politicians entrusted with carrying out CBFM initiatives will deem it worthwhile to invest their scarce time and resources on environmental governance.     

Success Factors for Community-Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM): Lessons from Kenya and Australia

Recent concerns over a crisis of identity and legitimacy in community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) have emerged following several decades of documented failure. A substantial literature has developed on the reasons for failure in CBNRM. In this paper, we complement this literature by considering these factors in relation to two successful CBNRM case studies. These cases have distinct differences, one focusing on the conservation of hirola in Kenya on community-held trust land and the other focusing on remnant vegetation conservation from grazing pressure on privately held farm land in Australia. What these cases have in common is that both CBNRM projects were initiated by local communities with strong attachments to their local environments. The projects both represent genuine community initiatives, closely aligned to the original aims of CBNRM. The intrinsically high level of “ownership” held by local residents has proven effective in surviving many challenges which have affected other CBNRM projects: from impacts on local livelihoods to complex governance arrangements involving non-government organizations and research organizations. The cases provide some signs of hope among broader signs of crisis in CBNRM practice.     

Landscape Characterization Integrating Expert and Local Spatial Knowledge of Land and Forest Resources

In many developing countries, political documentation acknowledges the crucial elements of participation and spatiality for effective land use planning. However, operative approaches to spatial data inclusion and representation in participatory land management are often lacking. In this paper, we apply and develop an integrated landscape characterization approach to enhance spatial knowledge generation about the complex human–nature interactions in landscapes in the context of Zanzibar, Tanzania. We apply an integrated landscape conceptualization as a theoretical framework where the expert and local knowledge can meet in spatial context. The characterization is based on combining multiple data sources in GIS, and involves local communities and their local spatial knowledge since the beginning into the process. Focusing on the expected information needs for community forest management, our characterization integrates physical landscape features and retrospective landscape change data with place-specific community knowledge collected through participatory GIS techniques. The characterization is established in a map form consisting of four themes and their synthesis. The characterization maps are designed to support intuitive interpretation, express the inherently uncertain nature of the data, and accompanied by photographs to enhance communication. Visual interpretation of the characterization mediates information about the character of areas and places in the studied local landscape, depicting the role of forest resources as part of the landscape entity. We conclude that landscape characterization applied in GIS is a highly potential tool for participatory land and resource management, where spatial argumentation, stakeholder communication, and empowerment are critical issues.     

Environmental Subsidiarity as a Guiding Principle for Forestry Governance: Application to Payment for Ecosystem Services and REDD+ Architecture

This article describes and proposes the “environmental subsidiarity principle” as a guiding ethical value in forestry governance. Different trends in environmental management such as local participation, decentralization or global governance have emerged in the last two decades at the global, national and local level. This article suggests that the conscious or unconscious application of subsidiarity has been the ruling principle that has allocated the level at which tasks have been assigned to different agents. Based on this hypothesis this paper describes the principle of subsidiarity and its application to environmental policies within forest governance and proposes the “environmental subsidiarity” principle as a critical conceptual tool for sustainable resource management. The paper explains as an example how “environmental subsidiarity” is the key principle that can link payment for ecosystem services (PES) with environmental public policies and applies this principle with all its political consequences to reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, and enhancing forest carbon stocks in developing countries (REDD+) architecture. It concludes by showing how the adoption of “environmental subsidiarity” as a ethical principle could help to maximize benefits to all stakeholders involved in PES schemes such as REDD+.     

Effectiveness of participatory planning for community management of fisheries in Bangladesh

This study provides statistical evidence that support for community-based management of resources was more effective when initiated through a process known as participatory action plan development (PAPD). Thirty-six sites were studied where community management of fisheries was facilitated by NGOs. All involved community participation and establishing local fisheries management institutions. However, communities were able to take up more conservation-related interventions and faced fewer conflicts in the 18 sites where a PAPD was the basis for collective action and institution development. This indicates the value and effectiveness of adopting good practice in participatory planning, such as PAPD, which helps diverse stakeholders find common problems and solutions for natural resource management.     

Measuring good governance: piloting an instrument for evaluating good governance principles

ABSTRACT

As federal, state, and local governments and agencies respond to calls to make decisions and implement programs according to tenets of ‘good governance’, a need exists to develop methods for systematically evaluating performance. ‘Good governance’ has been characterized as including a wide array of principles, which vary across literatures. Comparatively little scholarship has sought to systematically quantify program achievement in accordance with these principles. We develop and present a scale for measuring program achievement in accordance with eight main principles of good governance: inclusivity, fairness, transparency, accountability, legitimacy, direction, performance, and capability. We present the results of a pilot implementation of the scale within the context of two community-based deer management programs. Our results suggest that these principles of good governance may not sort into distinct dimensions in a real-world context.     

Prospects for the co‐management of mangrove ecosystems on the North Brazilian coast: Whose rights,whose duties and whose priorities?

This article describes the co‐management approach in situations of open access to and of increasing pressure on resources, using a mangrove coastal zone in North Brazil as an example. Co‐management clearly has the potential to turn nonviable, de facto open access to mangroves into effective common property management. Alliances of different political and ideological groups have been formed under the RESEX (reservas extrativistas — natural resource user reserve) model of coastal co‐management. Local economic interests have been mobilized as client constituencies. The RESEX system of co‐management assigns additional duties to both co‐managing parties, i.e., the state administration and the local users, in exchange for new rights. The authors argue that local support for the RESEX model has been gained on partially distorted premises. As the public authority passes on responsibility for management to local users under the RESEX model, this entails a number of duties for the local users. Thus local users assume the duty to implement and monitor resource management; they also appear to gain the right to take local decisions, such as excluding outsiders from resource access, and designing local resource management rules. However, as this article shows with two examples, some important new rights for local users under the RESEX co‐management concept are contrary to environmental legislation in force. This conflict is at present unresolved. It is argued that increased transparency about their precise rights for local resource co‐managers will considerably improve the prospects of coastal co‐management in Brazil.     

Diffusion of Policy Discourse into Rural Spheres Through Co-Management of State Forestlands: Two Cases from West Java,Indonesia

In the context of state forestland management in tropical regions, the implementation of a co-management approach has been widely advocated in order to include the voices of local people and accommodate their interests in management decision-making. Most co-management literatures, however, underestimate the significance of statutory authority held by state to control forestlands and resources. By clarifying the implications of state ownership of forestland, this article aims to critically examine co-management processes with reference to Foucault's notion of power and subject. Case studies were conducted at two co-management pilot sites in Gunung Halimun-Salak National Park, West Java, Indonesia. Findings demonstrate that co-management processes actually materialize shared decision-making arrangements between state forest bureaucracy and rural people through the application of equity approaches, such as deliberation, negotiation, and experimentation. At the same time, these processes can also function to diffuse state policy discourse in rural spheres, which makes rural subjects who accept and practice the policy discourse. The research also reveals that the diffusion process is complex and does not necessarily make a durable subject unless they are pertinently organized. The results of this research indicate that co-management of state forestlands is a double-edged process for local people who risk becoming a proxy of state bureaucracy in the implementation of state policy. Proponents of co-management should, therefore, critically examine whether new institutional arrangements, which are developed through co-management, truly reflect values and needs of local people and assist them to develop a pertinent subject to deal with it.     

Planning and development strategy for effective management of community forestry: lessons from the Thai experience

The forestry laws and regulations imposed by the Thai government to solve chronic deforestation have created conflicts between rural communities and government agencies over the use and control of forest resources. Therefore, the research carried out for this article focused on the study of community-based forest management practices in the northern region of Thailand to determine whether community-based forest management can lead to sustainable use and reverse the deteriorating situation and related problem of deforestation.
This study was conducted in a district of Phayao Province in northern Thailand, where a natural watershed has recently been managed jointly among ethnically diverse local communities living in upstream and downstream areas under the promulgation of the National Park Act. Research was based on both secondary and primary sources of data and information. An intensive field survey was also conducted through a standard questionnaire, supplemented by group discussions and informal interviews to understand the historical development of settlements in the study area.
The joint management of the community forest by the community, government and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) was recommended under the decentralised and participatory planning framework in the study area and also in other areas with similar environmental conditions. Equally important in promoting community forest management were the facilitating role of forest officials, the provision of support services, monitoring and enforcement of control mechanisms, and capacity building of local organisations.     

Forest Cover Change,Physiography, Local Economy,and Institutions in a Mountain Watershed in Nepal

This study assessed changes in forest cover in a mountain watershed in central Nepal between 1976 and 2000 by comparing classified satellite images coupled by GIS analyses, and examined the association of forest change with major physiographic, economic, and local forest governance parameters. The results showed an increase in forested area (forest plus shrublands) by 7.6% during 1976–2000. Forest dynamism (changes including improvement, deterioration, gain, and loss) was highest in low-elevation, south-facing and less-steep slopes that were closer to roads. Proportionately the highest net improvement and gain to forested area also took place in those locations. Forest degradation occurred at twice the rate of improvement in high elevation areas (> 2300 m). Forests located in urban and semiurban areas (i.e., a market-oriented economy) experienced a proportionately higher amount of net improvement and gain than forests in rural areas (i.e., a subsistence economy). Among the three governance arrangements, proportionately the highest net improvement and gain took place in semigovernment forests (forested area legally under the forest department but with de facto control and claim of ownership by local communities and/or municipality) followed by formalized community forests (including leasehold). Government forests, which were mostly found in the southern high mountains and had virtually open access, remained relatively stable during the study period. Over 50% of the watershed forests have not come under community-based management despite favorable policy and more than two decades of government intervention with continuous donor support. The findings indicate that the present one size fits all approach of community forest handover policy in Nepal needs rethinking to accommodate biophysical and socioeconomic variations across the country.     

Protected area governance in Sweden: new modes of governance or business as usual?

This paper explores whether ambitions to open up the traditional Swedish model of top-down conservation methods to local influences are indicative of an actual transition in governance of Swedish national park policy (NPP), and examines whether such a shift entails an increase in local influence over local interests and needs. Methodologically, we analyse a combination of governance types and incorporate theoretical definitions of power and accountability. The establishment of new governance arrangements – where power is shared, interactions promoted and accountability is directed downwards – indicates that Sweden's NPP is undergoing a change in its mode of governance. This change also seems to include ceding some influence to local interests, and the possibility of combining conservation with the utilisation of certain natural resources. The results of our research also provide valuable insights into when the establishment of shared-governance arrangements are likely to succeed; in short, this seems more likely when there are established sectors sited in a robust legal framework and where strong international commitments potentially play a role. In conclusion, we contend that when seeking diversified governance arrangements it is not enough simply to take local practices and customs into consideration – they have to be strengthened.     

Challenges for Community-Based Forest Management in the KoloAla Site Manompana

Following the IUCN 5th World Congress on Protected Areas in 2003, the then-President of Madagascar decided to increase the area of Madagascar’s protected areas from 1.7 to 6 million ha. To combine the aims of protection and timber production, a new concept was developed through the establishment of community-based forest management (CBFM) sites, called KoloAla. However, experience shows that similar management transfers to communities in Madagascar have only been successful in a very few cases. We aimed to explore the success to be expected of this new approach in the particular case of the Manompana corridor at Madagascar’s eastern coast. In a first step, the readiness of the corridor’s resource users for CBFM has been analysed according to the seven resource users’ attributes developed by Ostrom that predict an effective self-organized resource management. In a second step, we explored how KoloAla addresses known challenges of Madagascar’s CBFM. Analyses lead in a rather sober conclusion. Although KoloAla attempts to address the goals of poverty alleviation, biodiversity conservation and timber production under a single umbrella, it does so in a rather non-innovative way. Challenges with regard to the state’s environmental governance, agricultural inefficiency and thus deforestation remain unsolved.