Uneven Environmental Management: A Canadian Perspective

Advocates of community-based approaches to environmental management argue that by respecting local circumstances, skills, and concerns we may improve the prospects of achieving environmental sustainability; yet, within nation states such as Canada, environmental conditions, management and enforcement costs and capabilities, and power differentials within and among civic and public sectors may result in a highly differentiated capacity for environmental management across different localities and regions. This article draws on insights of political ecology to 1) create a conceptual framework that identifies key elements shaping regional environmental management regimes and to 2) undertake a comparative analysis to assess how elements interact to generate uneven management outcomes. I compare experiences of two Canadian biosphere reserves designated in 2000: Clayoquot Sound, BC; and Redberry Lake, SK. Analysis reveals that differences in governance and institutional capacities in the biosphere reserves are key to explaining uneven local outcomes. Where the public and civic sectors are strong, a robust and publicly vetted form of management will emerge. Where these sectors are weak and land is held as private property, environmental nongovernmental organizations can set the type and level of management, to the exclusion of effective civic and state involvement. This result may improve environmental sustainability but hinder social sustainability of a management regime and raises questions about the efficacy of community-based management.     

Tracking collaboration: forest planning and local participation on the San Juan National Forest,Colorado

The proliferation of community-based collaborative approaches to public land management and planning has spawned many questions regarding issues of community representation and the effects of participation for local residents. This paper presents a longitudinal assessment of local resident participation in collaborative forest planning on local community–forest relations in southwestern Colorado. Using survey data of participants involved in the San Juan National Forest's forest plan revision community study groups from 1998 to 2003, we assess participation in terms of community representation and the effects of community-based collaboration upon individuals' forest uses, forest values, and the level and form of involvement in forest management and planning activities. Results show that community representation remains slanted towards existing active stakeholders, and that while forest values, uses, and frequencies of involvement change little, participants cite positive effects in terms of the development of new knowledge, personal relationships, and greater confidence to engage in forest management affairs.     

Adaptation in Collaborative Governance Regimes

Adaptation and the adaptive capacity of human and environmental systems have been of central concern to natural and social science scholars, many of whom characterize and promote the need for collaborative cross-boundary systems that are seen as flexible and adaptive by definition. Researchers who study collaborative governance systems in the public administration, planning and policy literature have paid less attention to adaptive capacity specifically and institutional adaptation in general. This paper bridges the two literatures and finds four common dimensions of capacity, including structural arrangements, leadership, knowledge and learning, and resources. In this paper, we focus on institutional adaptation in the context of collaborative governance regimes and try to clarify and distinguish collaborative capacity from adaptive capacity and their contributions to adaptive action. We posit further that collaborative capacities generate associated adaptive capacities thereby enabling institutional adaptation within collaborative governance regimes. We develop these distinctions and linkages between collaborative and adaptive capacities with the help of an illustrative case study in watershed management within the National Estuary Program.     

Managing Public Forests: Understanding the Role of Collaborative Planning

/ As federal land management agencies such as the USDA Forest Service increasingly choose to implement collaborative methods of public participation, research is needed to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the technique, to identify barriers to effective implementation of collaborative processes, and to provide recommendations for increasing its effectiveness. This paper reports on the findings of two studies focused on the experiences of Forest Service employees and their external partners as they work to implement collaborative planning processes in national forest management. The studies show both similarities and differences between agency employees and their partners in terms of how they evaluate their collaborative experiences. The studies reveal that both Forest Service employees and external partners are supportive of collaborative planning and expect it to continue in the future, both see the trust and relationships built during the process as being its greatest benefit, and both see the Forest Service's organizational culture as the biggest barrier to effective collaborative efforts. The groups differed in terms of evaluating each other's motivation for participating in the process and in whether the process was a good use of time and resources, with external partners seeing it as too drawn out and expensive. The paper concludes with a discussion of the policy implications and changes necessary to increase the effectiveness of collaborative efforts within the Forest Service and other federal land management agencies.KEY WORDS: Public land management; Collaborative planning; National forests; Public participation     

Constructing and justifying risk and accountability after extreme events: public administration and stakeholders’ responses to a wildfire disaster

ABSTRACT

The impacts of extreme weather events, causing severe storms and wildfires, cascade across administrative borders within a country, challenging the steering capacity of governance networks at different political scales. This paper examines how accountability and risk were constructed and negotiated in the aftermath of Sweden’s largest wildfire. It draws on results from an interview study with executives of organizations and landowners involved, and an analysis of government reports about the wildfire’s cause and consequences. Although the fire was human-caused, public administrative bodies paid considerable attention to the local emergency services and their poor handling of the wildfire, caused by lack of knowledge of forest fire behavior. The study confirms many of the challenges associated with governance networks. It finds that issues about who to hold accountable, in what forum and for what issue are not fully addressed, being overwhelmed by demands for better knowledge of forest fire prevention and improved coordination and collaboration. To conclude, the paper calls for a better-informed public administration, forest sector and interrelated networks that take responsibility for their actions or lack thereof.     

Exploring management strategies for community-based forests using multi-agent systems: A case study in Palawan, Philippines

This paper describes the experiences and lessons learned in applying a multi-agent systems (MAS) model to study the dynamics and complex interactions among stakeholders in the management of community-based forests. The MAS model is developed using the companion modelling (ComMod) approach, which allows for a collaborative development of the model between the stakeholders and researchers. This approach involves the development and application of role-playing games (RPGs) and computer simulation as learning tools and to validate the model. Inferences are drawn from the learning and negotiation processes that the stakeholders and researchers underwent in the collaborative development of the MAS model. These processes ultimately led to the development of a collaborative resource management plan. The approach and the MAS model were applied to a case study involving a community-based forest managed by three villages in the island of Palawan, Philippines.     

On-site rainwater harvesting to achieve household water security among rural and peri-urban communities in Jordan

This paper presents the experience of Mercy Corps’ “Community Based Initiatives for Water Demand Management” project, a five year project (2006–2011), in terms of community-based initiatives for water management. This project was designed to build the capacity of local community-based organizations (CBOs) to raise the awareness level around water demand management (WDM) and engage community members in water management measures. It showed how local solutions decrease the reliance on public water systems and ultimately help in facing the water shortage on a national level. This paper also showed that on-site rainwater harvesting Cisterns funded through this project have been able to harvest 88,335 m³ annually. The paper found that rainwater harvesting at household level was able to save an average of 24% in potable water per year.     

INTEGRATING DEMOGRAPHIC AND LANDSAT (TM) DATA AT A WATERSHED SCALE1

ABSTRACT: Recurrent calls for integrated resource management urge that an understanding of human activities and populations be incorporated into natural resource research, management, and protection efforts. In this paper, we hypothesize that watersheds can be a valuable geography for organizing an inquiry into the relationship between humans and the environment, and we present a framework for conducting such efforts. The framework is grounded in the emerging field of landscape ecology and incorporates demographic theory and data. Demography has been advanced by technological capabilities associated with the 1990 Census. Employing Geographic Information System (GIS) tools, we couple Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) land cover data with census‐derived housing density data to demonstrate the operation of our framework and its utility for better understanding human‐landscape interactions. In our investigation of the Kickapoo Watershed and two sub‐ watersheds, located in southwestern Wisconsin, we identify relationships between landscape composition and the distribution and social structure of human populations. Our findings offer insight into the interplay between people and biophysical systems.     

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.     

An exploratory assessment of the attitudes of Chinese wood products manufacturers towards forest certification

Interviews with Chinese forest products manufacturers were conducted to explore their attitudes towards forest certification and related issues. Participants comprised owners, CEOs, and managers in 20 Chinese wood products companies, including producers of furniture, doors, flooring, and various engineered wood products. The interviews were used to analyze the extent to which participants were considering adopting forest certification and what might motivate such a decision. This was done by assessing their awareness and knowledge of certification. The results indicated that participants' understanding of forest certification was extremely low, despite major efforts in China to raise awareness of the issue. Potential economic benefits were the most frequently cited reason to adopt certification, including gaining or maintaining competitive advantage over their industry counterparts, improved access to both domestic and export markets, better customer recognition, and enhanced corporate responsibility practices. Some interviewees (3 out of 20) considered that certification would become a mandatory requirement or industry standard, and that this would be the only viable motivation for certification given that the financial benefits were potentially limited. According to the participants, the main differences between certified and uncertified wood products operations related to improved market access and public image. Interviewees felt that cooperation between and support from governments and the forest industry would enable the enhanced awareness of certification amongst manufacturers and the general public. This, in turn, could serve to stimulate demand for certified products.     

A Framework to Evaluate Ecological and Social Outcomes of Collaborative Management: Lessons from Implementation with a Northern Arizona Collaborative Group

As collaborative groups gain popularity as an alternative means for addressing conflict over management of public lands, the need for methods to evaluate their effectiveness in achieving ecological and social goals increases. However, frameworks that examine both effectiveness of the collaborative process and its outcomes are poorly developed or altogether lacking. This paper presents and evaluates the utility of the holistic ecosystem health indicator (HEHI), a framework that integrates multiple ecological and socioeconomic criteria to evaluate management effectiveness of collaborative processes. Through the development and application of the HEHI to a collaborative in northern Arizona, the Diablo Trust, we present the opportunities and challenges in using this framework to evaluate the ecological and social outcomes of collaborative adaptive management. Baseline results from the first application of the HEHI are presented as an illustration of its potential as a co-adaptive management tool. We discuss lessons learned from the process of selecting indicators and potential issues to their long-term implementation. Finally, we provide recommendations for applying this framework to monitoring and adaptive management in the context of collaborative management.     

A contextual framework for understanding good practice in integrated catchment management

Principles of good practice for collaborative resource management were derived from the literature and their use studied in a range of integrated catchment management processes. Desk-based reviews and interviews with participants allowed the principles to be refined and described within a framework that illustrates the interrelationships between core principles, enabling principles, precursors to a project and the influence of external factors on such collaborative processes. The findings illustrate the importance of these relationships in understanding how success is defined and under what conditions successful outcomes can be achieved. Understanding how these procedural aspects influence outcomes contributes to the wider literature on collaborative resource management that often treats processes separately from their context.     

Sustainable Forest Management Preferences of Interest Groups in Three Regions with Different Levels of Industrial Forestry: An Exploratory Attribute-Based Choice Experiment

The challenge of sustainable forest management is to integrate diverse and sometimes conflicting management objectives. In order to achieve this goal, we need a better understanding of the aspects influencing the preferences of diverse groups and how these groups make trade-offs between different attributes of SFM. We compare the SFM preferences of interest groups in regions with different forest use histories based on the reasoning that the condition of the forest reflects the forest use history of the area. The condition of the forest also shapes an individual’s forest values and attitudes. These held values and attitudes are thought to influence SFM preferences. We tested whether the SFM preferences vary amongst the different interest groups within and across regions. We collected data from 252 persons using a choice experiment approach, where participants chose multiple times among different options described by a combination of attributes that are assigned different levels. The novelty of our approach was the use of choice experiments in the assessment of regional preference differences. Given the complexity of inter-regional comparison and the small sample size, this was an exploratory study based on a purposive rather than random sample. Nevertheless, our results suggest that the aggregation of preferences of all individuals within a region does not reveal all information necessary for forest management planning since opposing viewpoints could cancel each other out and lead to an interpretation that does not reflect possibly polarised views. Although based on a small sample size, the preferences of interest groups within a region are generally statistically significantly different from each other; however preferences of interest groups across regions are also significantly different. This illustrates the potential importance of assessing heterogeneity by region and by group.     

The Best Laid Plans: Community-Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM) Group Capacity and Planning Success

As community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) increases in popularity, the question of the capacity of such groups to successfully manage natural resources becomes increasingly relevant. However, few studies have quantifiably analyzed how the amount or type of capacity in a CBNRM organization directly affects the outputs or the environmental outcomes produced. This paucity of research exists in part due to the diversity of indicators for CBNRM group capacity, as well as the ensuing debate over how to best define and measure success in CBNRM initiatives. Although concrete outputs vary widely, many efforts center on creating natural resource management plans (RMPs). The primary objective of our research was to explore the link between capacity and RMP implementation success, as perceived by practitioners among CBNRM groups across Illinois. A short online survey was constructed, utilizing findings from focus groups in combination with an extensive literature review, to measure CBNRM participants’ (n = 190) perceptions of 10 key capacity indicators and RMP implementation success. Results show that capacity perceptions varied significantly among respondents in low, moderate, and high RMP implementation success groups, and that group capacity was predictive of the degree of perceived RMP implementation success. Further, our findings suggest that bonding social capital and outreach are crucial in predicting low versus moderate RMP success, while leadership, motivation, and vision best distinguish the moderately successful and highly successful groups.     

A Framework of Lessons Learned from Community-Based Marine Reserves and Its Effectiveness in Guiding a New Coastal Management Initiative in the Philippines

Community-based coastal resource management has been widely applied within the Philippines. However, small-scale community-based reserves are often inefficient owing to management inadequacies arising because of a lack of local support or enforcement or poor design. Because there are many potential pitfalls during the establishment of even small community-based reserves, it is important for coastal managers, communities, and facilitating institutions to have access to a summary of the key factors for success. Reviewing relevant literature, we present a framework of lessons learned during the establishment of protected areas, mainly in the Philippines. The framework contains summary guidance on the importance of (1) an island location, (2) small community population size, (3) minimal effect of land-based development, (4) application of a bottom-up approach, (5) an external facilitating institution, (6) acquisition of title, (7) use of a scientific information database, (8) stakeholder involvement, (9) the establishment of legislation, (10) community empowerment, (11) alternative livelihood schemes, (12) surveillance, (13) tangible management results, (14) continued involvement of external groups after reserve establishment, and (15) small-scale project expansion.These framework components guided the establishment of a community-based protected area at Danjugan Island, Negros Occidental, Philippines. This case study showed that the framework was a useful guide that led to establishing and implementing a community-based marine reserve. Evaluation of the reserve using standard criteria developed for the Philippines shows that the Danjugan Island protected area can be considered successful and sustainable. At Danjugan Island, all of the lessons synthesized in the framework were important and should be considered elsewhere, even for relatively small projects. As shown in previous projects in the Philippines, local involvement and stewardship of the protected area appeared particularly important for its successful implementation. The involvement of external organizations also seemed to have a key role in the success of the Danjugan Island project by guiding local decision-makers in the sociobiological principles of establishing protected areas. However, the relative importance of each component of the framework will vary between coastal management initiatives both within the Philippines and across the wider Asian region.Published on line     

Community Responses to Government Defunding of Watershed Projects: A Comparative Study in India and the USA

When central governments decentralize natural resource management (NRM), they often retain an interest in the local efforts and provide funding for them. Such outside investments can serve an important role in moving community-based efforts forward. At the same time, they can represent risks to the community if government resources are not stable over time. Our focus in this article is on the effects of withdrawal of government resources from community-based NRM. A critical question is how to build institutional capacity to carry on when the government funding runs out. This study compares institutional survival and coping strategies used by community-based project organizations in two different contexts, India and the United States. Despite higher links to livelihoods, community participation, and private benefits, efforts in the Indian cases exhibited lower survival rates than did those in the U.S. cases. Successful coping strategies in the U.S. context often involved tapping into existing institutions and resources. In the Indian context, successful coping strategies often involved building broad community support for the projects and creatively finding additional funding sources. On the other hand, the lack of local community interest, due to the top-down development approach and sometimes narrow benefit distribution, often challenged organizational survival and project maintenance.     

Creating Defensible Space in the Wildland–Urban Interface: The Influence of Values on Perceptions and Behavior

We examined the effect that value orientation to forests and wildland fire management has on an individual’s decision to create defensible space around his or her residence in the wildland–urban interface. Using data from a mail-back questionnaire, respondents in north central Minnesota were clustered by basic value–laden beliefs toward forest and wildland fire management and compared across a number of perceptions and behaviors related to creating defensible space around residences. Value orientation groups differed in attitudes, subjective norms, and perceived behavior control toward creating defensible space. In addition, relative effects of these perceptions on intention to create defensible space differed across groups. Implications lie in (a) understanding differences in motivations and reasons for support of strategies for managing fires near the wildland–urban interface, (b) developing information designed to address the perspectives of different groups related to creating defensible space, and (c) contributing to an improved integration of land management and public concerns and interests.     

The Rise and Fall of a Second-Generation CBNRM Project in Zambia: Insights from a Project Perspective

Since the advent of community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) in the mid-1980s, scholars and practitioners have sought to explain the uneven performance of CBNRM programs. Most CBNRM assessments examine the underlying principles of community-based conservation, the local social and ecological contexts, and connections with larger political and historical patterns. In this article, I argue that analysis of the potential and pitfalls of CBNRM also requires an understanding of the institutional history and internal dynamics of projects that implement CBNRM reforms. Drawing upon theory and methods from development ethnography and public policy, I examine the rise and fall of CONASA, a second-generation CBNRM project in Zambia that operated from 2001 to 2004. CONASA was constituted from a merger of organizations and discourses to provide continuity with previous projects. Its ambitious suite of activities included support for household livelihoods, community-based resource management, policy analysis, advocacy, and conservation enterprises at local, national, and transboundary levels. While individual activities were largely successful, CONASA’s hybrid origins and logframe-centric management created fissures between its holistic design and operational logics, and hindered its ability to develop a broader narrative and maintain key alliances. This case study illustrates the importance of understanding the interplay between project design and operational context to fully appreciate the possibilities and limitations of project-mode conservation.     

Forest planning across Europe: the spatial scale,tools, andinter-sectoral integration in land-use planning

New approaches to forest planning are needed to support the transition of European forests to sustainable management. The aim of this study is to review forest planning systems already in place throughout Europe by exploring a set of case-study countries reflecting the main silvicultural schools of Western Europe, including Belgium, Finland, France, Italy, Portugal, and Slovenia.

A literature review and case-study data were used to assess the scale factors (vertical logic) as well as the relationships between forest planning and other environmental/land-use planning sectors (horizontal logic). The influence of EU policy on the development of forest planning is also discussed. As assessed using the vertical logic, the multi-scale and multi-topic planning approaches adopted in the countries studied here are highly heterogeneous. The horizontal logic shows that despite the importance of an inter-sectoral and harmonic relational framework between forest planning and the planning efforts of other sectors such as landscape and urban planning, the various plans are barely consistent with each other across the European countries studied here. Although interest is growing in the multi-functionality of forests, their sustainable management calls for the development of better integrated planning approaches across Europe.