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Abstracts - Towards a rights-based agenda in international
forestry? Berkeley,
USA, 30-31 May 2009 Shaunna Barnhart A Right to Resources, A Right to
Dignity: Community Forestry and the Promotion of Human Rights
Stefan Dorondel Who Benefits from the Forest? National Park, Land Reform and the Clash of Property Rights in Postsocialism The academia as well as
international donors have spent much energy advocating a property rights
approach with regards to forest. Advocating property rights meant often an
implicit disdain of the state rights and motivations. The state was seen as a rapacious
administrator of forest in contrast to local communities whose forest
administration and exploitation was considered more sustainable. The paper
analyzes the re-creation of a National Park in postsocialist Romania. The
re-creation of the park took place in the early 1990s at the same time as
forest restitution to the historical owners. The two events triggered a
competition of claims over forest. The claims were based on two types of
arguments. Villagers referred mainly to historical rights over forest while
the National Park based its claims on actual rights over forest. The Park claimed property rights over
forest for non-utilitarian purposes: for scientific research, recreation and
biodiversity conservation. Villagers argued that forest is essential for
their livelihoods. The state claimed that forest is a protection against air
pollution. Villagers’ argument was local; the National Park’s arguments were
national. The paper seeks to understand how different actors have built claims
on forest. It analyzes the competing notions of rights over forest and
different legitimacies. The paper analyzes the competition between the
individual claims over forest property rights (villagers’) and state’s actual
property rights over the same forest (the Park). The conflicts for competing
rights largely opened the door for maneuvers by powerful local actors. The mayor of the village, for instance,
has imposed his own agenda, which is uncontrolled forest exploitation through
his own logging firm, by manipulating the tensions between the villagers and
the Park. Without claiming property rights over forest he succeeded to get
rich from both state and private forest (over)exploitation. The paper demonstrates that an ethnographic approach and in-depth fieldwork bring insights into main actors’ actions, motivations and agendas. It also suggests that careful attention should be paid to who actually benefits from forest since often those who gain mostly have no property rights over it. Victoria
Edwards
Multiple Uses and Associated Rights: key issues from a thousand years of institutional evolution in the New Forest, UK Governments around the world
have begun to give local people greater rights and responsibilities in
relation to forests. It is hoped that by so doing bureaucracy will be
reduced, decision making decentralised, benefits distributed more equitably,
and forest utilisation regulated more effectively. However, simply assigning
rights to local users without ascertaining the range of uses of the forest,
diversity of interests among users and the capacity and characteristics of
existing local institutions to take on additional responsibility, may well
exacerbate rather than solve the problems associated with the appropriation
of forest resources. This paper explores such
critical issues emerging in the rights based agenda and searches for possible
solutions from a specific forest with a 1000 year documented history of
institutional evolution. So named in 1079, England’s ‘New
Forest' is one of the most complex, multiple-use and multiple-rights forests
in existence. It comprises state and
privately owned forest and farmland with an extensive system of overlapping
property rights to 'commoners'. It
has national park status and is host to a plethora of international
conservation designations. Situated
in one of the most developed parts of the south of England, a particularly
well educated resident population lives alongside practicing 'commoners'; and
all compete to protect their private, communal and de facto property rights.
The New Forest cannot present
definitive solutions to a global rights based approach to forestry, but can
contribute to the identification and analysis of potential problems and
provide an interesting exploration of possible solutions. Moira Moeliono and Godwin Limberg Putting a Park in the Right Place: A rights based approach to
conservation in developing countries Supported by international
advocacy groups, the issue of rights and tenure has also emerged on
Indonesia’s agenda. However, as a
case of the Kutai National Park demonstrates, the understanding of forest
rights is very murky. In this 200,000
hectare national park, Bugis migrants claim about 23000 hectares. Local government wants to excise this
portion claiming autonomy and the right to develop its people, and several
mining companies are waiting for the opportunity to start mining the coal
underneath the park. More recently Dayak indigenous people used their
‘indigenous rights’ to protect the park but in fact clearing and occupying
about 1,000 hectares. All parties claim rights but
what kind of rights? Do indigenous people have rights over the area because
they are indigenous? Do migrants have rights because they cleared primary
forest? Does the state have the rights to claim the area for protection of a
public good with or without free prior informed consent? How will the local
government carry out its duty to serve its people in the park without rights
over the protected areas? And with all these rights who are the duty bearers
and what kind of duty do the bear? This paper will take on the
question of rights and adherent duties within the context of
decentralization, mobility of people and the consequent mixing of adat, the
different international, national and local agendas and the pressure of
privatization all over Indonesia. We
will discuss the different understanding of rights over land, the need for
security of rights and the rights to have these protected by the state. At the end we will try to conceptualize a
more rights based approach to conservation applicable in developing countries
such as Indonesia. Blake Ratner Rights, conflict and forest governance in Cambodia In Cambodia, where domestic
legal mechanisms for resource allocation and dispute resolution have failed
to resolve intense conflict over forest tenure and management, community
claims are often framed in terms of more fundamental human rights. Based on a comparative analysis of efforts
by domestic NGOs working to defend forest-dependent communities, this paper
explores the practical efficacy of a range of rights-based approaches in
securing equitable resource access and reducing conflict. Specifically, it compares approaches
emphasizing resolution of competing tenure rights claims by appeal to the
courts and local authorities, assertion of rights to decentralized management
and local participation in decision-making, and advocacy of broader economic
and social rights, including the rights of ethnic minorities to self
determination. Because the legal and
judicial system is so flawed, the ability to align the actions of multiple
stakeholders domestically and internationally is a key factor influencing the
efficacy of these approaches. The
paper discusses the implications of the Cambodia experience in international
perspective, and concludes with recommendations for enhancing the value of
human rights levers in improving forest governance and livelihood outcomes
for forest-dependent communities. Jesse Ribot Rights and Stratification: Access Control and Maintenance in a
Sahelian Forest Rights are claims enforceable
with the support of law, custom or convention. Those who have rights, then,
should be able to successfully make claims—e.g. to enforce or impose their
will so as to get what they want. But successful claims are made through more
than just ‘rights’. People also enforce claims through all kinds of
shenanigans—theft, trickery, stealth, violence, capabilities, differential
resources, or rights negation. This talk will build on Ribot and Peluso
(2003) to put the role of laws, custom and convention in place among other
factors by which people establish their ‘rights’. Property is the right to
the flow of benefits from a thing. Access is the ability to benefit from
things—where ability is broader than right and is evidenced by the fact or
act of benefiting. The talk will focus on the differences between rights to a
flow of benefits and abilities to capture the flow of benefits from forests
in the Tambacounda region of Senegal. In explaining this difference between
rights and abilities, the talk will explore how social differentiation is
shaped by or reflected in struggles over benefits—such as in the formation of
relations among actors who ‘control access’ and who must ‘maintain access’ through
those who control access. In this sense, the talk examines how relations of
access replace relations of production and exchange in a manner that shows
that class-based differentiation is inadequate to explain multi-stranded
material- and identity-based differentiation. Neera Singh Democratic
Spaces across Scales: Towards more inclusive community forestry
In the quest to democratize
forest governance, practitioner and academics tend to focus more on altering
power relations between the State and local communities or forest users; with
relative neglect of challenges of altering power relations within
communities. Often the most dependent
forest users, for e.g. women, tend to be the most excluded from forest decision-making
even within community forestry.
Drawing on multi-scalar ethnographic research from Orissa, India, this
paper shows that constraints to and possibilities for democratic
participation for women are different across spatial scales. Further, spaces
for participation and democratic action across scales are intermeshed and in
dynamic interaction. In the Orissa
case, marginalized women gained voice and visibility by organizing at a
regional scale, and used democratic spaces at higher spatial scales to
overcome constraints to their participation at the community level. The case demonstrates how closer attention
to issues of scale and fostering cross-scale linkages can help in deepening
democracy and addressing issues of social justice in and inclusion within
community forestry. Studies indicate
limited success of top-down approaches to solve complex social and political
processes. While top-down approaches have limited success, bottom-up
processes that challenge unequal power relations are unlikely to emerge from
locales and spaces where these power relations are most strongly entrenched.
This paper suggests ways to address this problem by focusing on meso-scales
and locales where power relations are less strongly entrenched. My
research encourages thinking beyond the dichotomy of bottom-up or top-down
processes and consider meso-scales, locales and influences that draw from the
spontaneity of bottom-up emergence, yet brings to it the intentionality of
social change driven by ideas of social justice, equality, and rights that
might be missing from the locales at which change needs to be effected. Oliver Springate-Baginski, Madhu Sarin, Soumitra Ghosh,
Purnamita Dasgupta, Indranil Bose, Ajit Banerjee, Kailas Sarap, Pradeep
Misra, Sricharan Behera, M. Gopinath Reddy, and P. Trinadh Rao Forest Rights Reform and the State: The political ecology of
democratising forest governance in India - As late as 1995, and despite the much hyped and heavily
donor-funded participatory ‘Joint Forest Management’ programmes, Gadgil and
Guha could justifiably lament that in India ‘[t]he structure of the
administration of public (including forest) lands remains essentially
colonial in nature’. A wide range of
forest rights deprivation scenarios, caused by the composition and management
of the national forest estate, continued to marginalise and oppress an
estimated 200 million or more forest dependent people across the
country. - After years of intensive civil society mobilisation the
so-called Forest Rights Act 2006 has dramatically broken this impasse, providing
a strong legal basis for recognition of forest-dependent peoples’ rights,
both to privately cultivated land in forest landscapes, and to collective
control, management, access and use of village forests. - Yet although the legal provisions of the Act are
radical, their implementation, since the Act came into force in January 2008,
has so far been highly problematic. - The paper assesses the implementation processes to date
and their impacts, based on field evidence from 18 local sites reflecting the
range of forest rights deprivation scenarios in three eastern states in India
(West Bengal, Orissa and Andhra Pradesh), gathered during 2008 - There are two main areas of analytical focus. The
prospects for poverty alleviation from tenure reform and progress to date are
assessed. Secondly, the ways in which
the implementation of the legal reform are in practice being diverted in
order to perpetuate ‘business as usual’ for the forest bureaucracies are
considered. - The wider implications for international debates are
drawn out, in particular the challenges of asserting democratic legislative
oversight of forest bureaucracies accustomed to a high degree of autonomy. -Three documentary films on these issues, produced within
the research project in conjunction with leading regional activist directors,
(and currently being completed) will also be available for broadcast. William Sunderlin The Evolution of Rights in the Forest: Three Critical Turning Points This paper examines three
historical turning points that have shaped the contemporary status of rights
in the forested landscape. The first
is imposition of state control over forest lands and resources centuries ago,
involving the creation of statutory laws and regulations over and against a
system of customary rights and management.
The second is a trend, begun in many countries several decades ago, in
which heavy-handed control of forest lands and resources has given way to
forest sector decentralization and devolution, recognition of customary rights
and management, increased statutory rights to access and ownership for
indigenous peoples and other forest dwellers, and proliferation of
community-based forest management.
The third turning point is an incipient trend toward forest land and
resource grabbing, carried out by the state and large-scale enterprises,
propelled in part by an imminent energy revolution (related to peak oil and
climate change) and by land shortages for various forms of industrial
extraction and production. The three
junctures are experienced unevenly among and within countries, and while
largely sequential, can be experienced simultaneously. The paper examines the underlying causes
for these turning points, and reflects on challenges and opportunities for
strengthening local forest rights. Peter Leigh Taylor Market-based
Forest Governance and Community Resource Rights
The emerging rights-based agenda
in international forestry seeks to consolidate and deepen new resource rights
produced by the dramatic global shift in tenure and governance from states to
communities and indigenous groups. This paper brings together economic
sociology perspectives on “embeddedness” with new agrarian movement research
and draws on cases of community-based forest associations in Mexico and Guatemala
to explore the relationship between market-based governance and broader
resource rights claims, such as those based on identity or place.
Market-based governance has been widely assumed to afford the best foundation
for expanded and secure community rights to forest resources. Communities’
external and internal legitimacy as resource managers has often rested on
their effective participation in commercial timber, non-timber forest product
and services markets, and in related market-oriented schemes such as
environmental certification. Market-based governance clearly responds to
local livelihoods’ dependence on forest resources and has generated
significant support for sustainable management within and without
communities. Yet similar to Taylor and Buttel’s 1992 observation regarding
social justice advocates’ turn to environmental science for support of their
agendas, market-based governance can also undermine community resource rights
agendas. Market-based governance often essentializes communities as
“community enterprises” while simultaneously individualizing participants and
introducing new hierarchies and conflicts. It often overlooks how forest
resource activities pursue social, symbolic, political and technical
objectives in addition to economic imperatives of efficiency and
competitiveness. An uncritical market orientation exposes communities and
their organizations to logics and practices of a global economic system which
may undermine the ability to embed resource practices within local historical
contexts. “Inefficient” and uncompetitive market performance may also
undermine legitimacy with diverse stakeholders. This paper aims to develop a
preliminary framework that can contribute to critical analysis of the complex
issues posed by market-based governance for broader rights claims at a key
moment within the community forestry movement. Phuc To Xuan How Does Forest Devolution Contribute to Agrarian Differentiation in the Vietnamese Uplands? The Vietnamese government
implemented forest devolution in the mid-1990s. By doing so it transferred
the management power over the large area of forestland from its hand to
individual households. Local households now enjoy a bundle of rights to land
including rights to exchange, transfer, lease, mortgage, and pass the land on
to third parties. This paper examines how these rights are exercised on the
ground and assesses the impacts of it on the local population. The findings
show that the exercise of these rights is often conditioned by larger economic
processes, particular by the commodity markets of softwood tree, cassava, and
tea and the availability of
household’s resources such as labor and capital. In the study village,
devolution provided the households that have knowledge and capital with ample
opportunity to accumulate land and become landlords. By contrast, poorer
households having limited labor force and capital were dispossessed and
became landless. The process of agrarian differentiation experienced in the
village is strongly driven by expansion of the commodity markets in the
country. The paper highlights that individual rights granted to the
landholders under the devolution legislation do not necessarily guarantee the
landholder a material benefit. For some landholders, these rights are strongly
associated with risks. This makes outcome of devolution unanticipated. Paul
Vantomme
Implementing rights-based forestry legislation in Central Africa: lessons from country experiences In the Congo basin, subsistence
use of the many non-timber forest products and wildlife resources have
existed for centuries without causing major deforestation or threats for
extinction of forest species. Informal rules and ancient old customary
practices were sufficient to steward the overall ‘management’ of the forests
among the many and diversified user groups. However, this century old
traditional law and framework of regulating customary practices is no longer
adequate to deal with the complexities of a fast increasing commercial
use of these resources in the Central African region. A region that is at the
same time facing a booming population growth and is becoming increasingly
accessible to inter-, national and regional trade thanks to an ever further
reaching network of roads and logging tracks. Several studies by major
organizations such as FAO, IUCN, CIFOR and many others draw global attention
to the fast increasing and by far un-sustainable exploitation rates of major
commercial forest-based timber- and non-timber species. The FAO implemented
recently a regional project in the Congo Basin to elaborate in a fully
participatory process with major forest stakeholders, and representatives of
governments, private sector and local people associations an innovative model
of a rights-based legislation governing the subsistence and commercial use of
NTFPs, called “the Regional NTFP Directives”. This model legislation was officially endorsed by the COMIFAC
member countries (October 2008) for integration into their national-level
forestry legislations and rules. This model legislation supplements relevant
traditional customary rights with modern law and rules that aim to improve
conservation of the forests while at the same time govern their commercial
exploitation to the benefit of those people, whose livelihood depends on the
forest. The paper describes the process of how this rights-based legislation
model was elaborated and reports on lessons learned with their implementation
and field testing by the countries in the region. |