The peoples' forest balancing local and global values

Resumen

This thesis examines a number of approaches to understanding and influencing landscape transformations. They are all based upon the concept of treating the landscape as a social - ecological system. The underlying hypothesis is that these different approaches can be deployed in a coordinated manner to enable all actors to work towards a shared vision of how the "landscape" might be improved and sustained. This approach should enable people to explore options for improving their own livelihoods in ways that are consistent with this overarching goal of sustaining environmental values - thus reconciling the needs for development with the necessity of conserving the natural resource base upon which this development depends. The underlying approach is one of "Action Learning" in which management is treated as experimental and both external stakeholders and local people share in the learning experience. This learning is then expected to lead to changed behaviour amongst stakeholders. A number of scientific hypotheses are implicit in the general approach to "conservation landscapes". The following papers report upon studies that have explored these hypotheses. The overall aim is to suggest a suite of scientifically tested approaches that can be used in unison to improve the management of conservation landscapes. Chapter 2 provides an overview of scientific approaches to the understanding of natural resource systems.. Understanding is thus sought on the interactions between people and natural resources and amongst different human "actors" and not just on the biophysical characteristics and interactions of the natural resource base. Chapter 3 addresses the fundamental issue of measurement of the performance of a complex natural resource system. If a system's approach is to be taken to the management of a social - ecological system then it is clearly essential to measure the performance of the "system" as an integrated whole. Chapter 4 addresses the issues of restoring