Adapting Institutions: Governance, Complexity and Social-Ecological Resilience

Adapting Institutions Governance, Complexity and Social–Ecological Resilience What can we learn about the governance of uncertainty and change? How can we adapt and even transform existing institutions towards social–ecological resilience? â•… While theories about governance continue to evolve, the context of global environmental change poses unique challenges to the management of networked ecosystems, cities, organisations and institutions. Written by an international team of experts, this book provides cutting-edge insights into adapting institutions for building resilience and adaptive governance of complex social–ecological systems. Through a set of case studies, it focuses on the social science dimension of ecosystem management in the context of global change in a move to bridge existing gaps between resilience, sustainability and social science. â•… Using empirical examples ranging from local to global levels, it integrates a variety of disciplines including political science, anthropology, resilience science and adaptation, and will provide an important resource for scholars, policy-makers and students. E m i l y B o y d is a Reader in environmental change and human communities in the department of Geography and Environmental Science and Director of the Human Environments research group at the University of Reading. She is also a Research Associate at the Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University. Her current research and teaching focuses on climate change and development, environmental governance, resilience and human communites. C a r l F o l k e is Director of the Beijer Institute, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and Science Director of the Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, and is among the founders of the Resilience Alliance. His research emphasises the role that living systems at different scales play in social and economic development, and how to govern and manage for resilience in interdependent social–ecological systems.

Adapting Institutions Governance, Complexity and Social–Ecological Resilience Edited by

emily boyd Department of Geography and Environmental Science, University of Reading, UK and Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Sweden carl folke Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Sweden, The Beijer Institute of Ecological Economics, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Stockholm, Sweden

 cambridge university press

Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo, Delhi, Tokyo, Mexico City Cambridge University Press The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 8RU, UK Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521897501 © Cambridge University Press 2012 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published 2012 Printed in the United Kingdom at the University Press, Cambridge A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication data Adapting institutions : governance, complexity, and social–ecological resilience / [edited by] Emily Boyd, Carl Folke. p.â•… cm. Includes bibliographical references and index ISBN 978-0-521-89750-1 1.╇ Environmental management–Social aspects.â•… 2.╇ Ecosystem management–Social aspects.â•… 3.╇ Sustainable development–Environmental aspects.â•… 4.╇ Environmental policy.â•… 5.╇ Globalization–Environmental aspects.â•… 6.╇ Global governance.â•… I.╇ Boyd, Emily.â•… II.╇ Folke, Carl. GE300.A33 2011â•…â•…â•… 333.7--dc23 2011026295 ISBN 978-0-521-89750-1 Hardback Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.

To our children

Contents

List of illustrations List of contributors Foreword by Elinor Ostrom Acknowledgements List of acronyms and abbreviations

1

Adapting institutions, adaptive governance and complexity: an introduction

page ix xii xvii xix xx

1

emily boyd and carl folke

Part I Adapting local institutions, networks, leadership and learning 2

Knowledge, social networks and leadership: setting the stage for the development of adaptive institutions?

9

11

beatrice crona and örjan bodin

3

Adaptive capacity of local indigenous institutions: the case of the taboo forests of southern Madagascar

37

maria tengö and jacob von heland

4

Adapting to change: tracing farmers’ responses to disturbances in irrigation systems in Nepal

75

ingela ternström

5

Creating incentives for increased public engagement in ecosystem management through urban commons

101

johan colding

vii

viii

Contents

╇ 6

Part II Adapting and governing public institutions for uncertainty and complexity

125

Adaptive capacity and the ecostate

127

andreas duit

╇ 7

Food systems and adaptive governance: food crisis in Niger

148

sirkku juhola

╇ 8

9

Public–private partnerships in the provision of environmental governance: a case of disaster management emma l. tompkins and lisa-ann hurlston

171

Part III Adapting multi-level institutions to environmental crisis

191

Double complexity: information technology and reconfigurations in adaptive governance

193

victor galaz

10

Adaptive governance and natural hazards: the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami and the governance of coastal ecosystems in Sri Lanka

216

alison ashlin

11

Adapting to global climate change: evaluating resilience in two networked public institutions

240

emily boyd

12

Conclusions: adapting institutions and resilience

264

emily boyd and carl folke

Index

281

Illustrations

figures

╇ 2.1 Map of the coastal seascape in focus page╇ 13 ╇ 2.2 Multidimensional scaling plot showing the social network structure of relations among groups based on predefined occupational categories  20 ╇ 2.3 Relative difference in local ecological knowledge among different occupational groups operating in the target 23 community  ╇ 2.4 Degree centrality for the combined networks of knowledge exchange and sharing of fishing gear  28 ╇ 3.1 Androy, southern Madagascar. Taboo forest patches clearly visible on LandSat image  43 ╇ 3.2 Classification of forest cover change between 1986 and 2000  45 ╇ 4.1 Floods and landslides flowchart  81 ╇ 4.2 New users flowchart  84 ╇ 4.3 Offer of external support flowchart  88 ╇ 4.4 Implementation of external support flowchart  91 ╇ 5.1 The proportion of people living in one- and two-dwelling buildings decreases successively with population density  105 ╇ 6.1 The emerging ecostate  136 ╇ 6.2 Policy diversity in 24 countries  140 ╇ 7.1 Ranking of Niger in the UNDP Human Development Index  155 ╇ 8.1 Formal government hurricane preparedness and response strategy  179 10.1 The decrease in mangrove forest area in Sri Lanka 223 between 1980 and 2008  ix

x

List of illustrations

10.2 The distribution of funds for coastal environmental initiatives  10.3 A flowchart mapping the different pathways used to fund, facilitate and implement coastal ecosystem initiatives in Sri Lanka before the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami  10.4 A flowchart mapping the different pathways used to fund, facilitate and implement coastal ecosystem initiatives in Sri Lanka after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami  10.5 A comparison of the mechanisms employed for implementing coastal ecosystem initiatives in pre-tsunami and post-tsunami Sri Lanka 

225

226

227

228

tables

╇ 2.1 Sociomatrix based on occupational groups  ╇ 2.2 Summary of local ecological knowledge (LEK) of different occupational groups  ╇ 3.1 Summary of sources of adaptive capacity in the taboo forest governance system  ╇ 4.1 Disturbances and actions  ╇ 4.2 Sources and effects of disturbances  ╇ 5.1 Bundles of property rights associated with positions  ╇ 5.2 Ecosystem services provided by community gardens and allotment areas  ╇ 7.1 Projections of food and hunger indicators by region  ╇ 7.2 Adaptive governance principles in relation to the Niger crisis of 2004–05  ╇ 9.1 Adaptive reconfigurations in high-reliability organisations (HROs)  ╇ 9.2 Simplified adaptive reconfigurations in emerging infective disease (EID) governance  10.1 Environmental legislation and regulation from 1885 to 2003, as applicable to coastal ecosystems in Sri Lanka  11.1 Features of ecological, social–ecological and institutional resilience  11.2 Syntheses of potential resilience criteria and indicators for evaluating adapting institutions 

19 21 64 93 98 105 117 151 165 201 210

222 245 247

List of illustrations boxes

5.1 7.1 8.1

Ecological values of allotment areas  Relevant institutions and early warning systems in the Sahel  Section 4 of the Emergency Powers Law (1997) 

118 157 180

xi

Contributors

Alison Ashlin has a doctorate from the Oxford University Centre for the Environment, Oxford, UK. To date her research has concentrated on the opportunities for socio-ecological change after a natural disaster. Her doctoral thesis specifically focused on the impact of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami on the management of coastal ecosystems in Sri Lanka. Before studying for her doctorate Alison worked in the communications sector, and as a result she is also interested in discourse and the media representation of science. Örjan Bodin is an Associate Professor at the Stockholm Resilience Centre and at the Department of Systems Ecology at Stockholm University, Sweden. His current research focuses on aspects of information and knowledge sharing in collaborative governance of ecosystems, and in studying ecological consequences of habitat fragmentation. He is particularly interested in using network analysis to study various aspects of ecosystems governance. Emily Boyd is a Reader in environmental change and human communities in the department of Geography and Environmental Science and Director of the Human Environments research group at the University of Reading. She is also a research associate at the Stockholm Resilience Centre. Previous positions have included deputy director of the Leeds University Centre for Global Development in the School of Politics and International Studies, research leader at the Stockholm Resilience Centre and Leverhulme/James Martin 21st Century Research Fellow at the University of Oxford. Her current research and teaching focuses on climate change and international development, environmental governance, resilience and human communities.

xii

List of contributors

Johan Colding is Assistant Professor at the Beijer Institute of Ecological Economics, Stockholm, and theme leader for urban research at the Stockholm Resilience Centre. His research covers both basic and applied ecological problems, with an emphasis on building resilience in urban social–ecological systems. His areas of expertise include governance of social–ecological systems, institutions and property rights, resilience science, ecological economics, biodiversity conservation, land-use planning and landscape design, land and water resources, and landscape analysis. Beatrice Crona is an Assistant Professor at the Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, and an affiliated research fellow at the School of Development Studies, University of East Anglia, UK. Her work is structured around three themes: learning and knowledge systems in natural resources governance, social networks in natural resource governance, and social–ecological feedbacks and traps, with a particular focus on small-scale fisheries. Much of her work has been in East Africa, but current research is expanding in the Baltic region and in the semiarid southwest of the United States. Her publication record ranges from ecological studies to work on science-policy interactions and social networks of communication, linked to natural resource management. Andreas Duit works in the field of comparative environmental Â�politics, with special focus on governance and complexity, institutional theory and the role of the state in addressing environmental problems. He is an associate professor at the Department of Political Science and a research fellow at the Stockholm Resilience Center, both at Stockholm University. Carl Folke is Director of the Beijer Institute, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and Science Director of the Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University and is among the founders of the Resilience Alliance. His research emphasises the role that living systems at different scales play in social and economic development, and how to govern and manage for resilience in interdependent social–ecological systems and has written extensively on those issues. He is editor-in-chief of Ecology and Society and an elected member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and serves as advisor to research institutes, policy processes and the Swedish government. He received the 1995 Pew Scholar Award in Conservation and the Environment, and in 2004 he was awarded the Sustainability Science Award of the Ecological Society of America.

xiii

xiv

List of contributors

Victor Galaz is a researcher and research theme leader at the Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University. His current research and teaching focuses on adaptive governance and global governance of complex environmental risks such as pandemics and planetary boundaries. He has published extensively on institutional dimensions of resilience. Lisa-Ann Hurlston is the Manager of the Sustainable Development Unit at the Cayman Islands Government Department of Environment. As co-chair of the National Climate Change Committee, she was instrumental in formulating an adaptation policy for the Cayman Islands. She advises on adaptation and mitigation issues relevant to UK Overseas Territories in international climate negotiations. Her continuing efforts include integrating climate-change impacts into local environmental assessment processes and advising public and private sectors in practical applications of adaptation and mitigation measures. She has published papers on adaptation to climate change in the Cayman Islands and an adaptation guidebook for small islands. Sirkku Juhola is a researcher at the Centre for Urban and Regional Studies, Aalto University, Finland. Her current research focuses on governance of climate change in both developed and developing countries, with particular emphasis on cross-scale interaction. Sirkku is also the Deputy Chief Scientist of the Nordic Centre of Excellence for Strategic Adaptation Research (NORD-STAR), which is funded by the Norden Top-level Research Initiative sub-programme ‘Effect Studies and Adaptation to Climate Change’. Maria Tengö is a researcher at the Stockholm Resilience Centre. Her work concerns how people organise themselves and interact with ecosystems at different scales to navigate change in the social–ecological system. She is interested in human-dominated systems, with a focus on agriculture, and her research is based on field work in Tanzania, Madagascar, Sweden and Canada. Ingela Ternström is an independent consultant working on aid, environment and development issues. She has a doctorate in economics and was previously a researcher at the Beijer Institute. Her research focuses on natural resource management, especially common-pool resource management, and how resource users react and adapt to various disturbances such as natural disasters, migration, economic development and HIV/AIDS.

List of contributors

Emma L. Tompkins is a Reader in environment and development at the University of Southampton. She is a lead author for the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report and a subject editor for Ecology and Society, and she sits on the Advisory Board of the UK Climate Impacts Programme. She has recently been on secondment to the UK Department for International Development, providing advice on climate-change adaptation in developing countries. Her research and teaching focuses on risk, decision-making, resilience, climate-change adaptation, small islands and coastal areas. Jacob von Heland is with the Natural Resource Management Group, Department of Systems Ecology, and the Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University. He works with livelihood issues in southern Madagascar, exploring the relations between ecological anthropology and social–ecological systems. He has also followed the discourse formation and formalisation in the drafting of the Madrid Action Plan aimed to guide UNESCO’s Man and the Biosphere programme.

xv

Foreword elinor ostrom

Emily Boyd and Carl Folke have brought together an important set of studies of adaptive institutions, covering diverse scales from local to global. While many of the cases analysed are local and give the reader rich theoretical and empirical overviews of the multiple challenges faced by small- to medium-sized populations in Madagascar, Nepal and urban areas around the world, the book also reaches up to include studies of the Indian Ocean tsunami and global climate change. A potential reader might wonder about the substantial range of empirical studies in the book and ask, why should I read about all these different problems when I specialise in problem X in region Y? The answer is that Boyd and Folke introduce a core puzzle facing all of us in today’s world: How can we analyse our current institutions that have developed over time to cope with a particular set of problems and address how likely they are to cope effectively with changes in the complex social and ecological worlds around us? This is one of the fundamental questions of our times! We must stop being complacent about humanly designed systems that have worked relatively well for solving X, Y and Z problems in settings A, B and C. We must recognise that all social–ecological systems face new challenges over time, and understand how and why some are adaptive and survive substantial threats of diverse origins, and others do not continue to generate positive outcomes and collapse. Static analysis is useful when one wants to know how a particular social–ecological system operates. And it may take substantial effort just to understand how a complex system operates in an unchanging world. Static analysis of particular types of systems is the first requirement, and a tough one, when dealing with complex systems. But without serious efforts to identify changes that can occur within the system itself (a part wears out in a mechanical system, or a political leader or party xvii

xviii

Foreword

exhausts the relevance of an agenda to solve maturing problems), and in the environment in which the system operates, static analysis is the first step but is not sufficient for gaining effective systems knowledge in an ever-changing world. In one volume, Boyd and Folke have brought together resilience thinking (which initially related to ecological systems operating over time), the analysis of changing social–ecological systems, the problems of fit and the need to understand adaptive governance of resilient systems. As they state, ‘Resilience is the ability to reorganise following crisis, continuing to learn, evolving with the same identity and function, and also innovating and sowing the seeds for transformation’ (Chapter 12). Their cases are all written by knowledgeable scholars and focus on how diverse systems coped with gradual or abrupt changes and how institutions did or did not adapt to these changes over time. Each chapter is worth serious reading and reflection. This is not a book to be read rapidly in a few evenings for casual recreational enjoyment. I did enjoy reading the chapters of this book, but each requires one to think hard about what one can learn about change in complex systems before one moves on to a different problem and region of the world. Thinking about the chapters is more important than just reading them! One of the most important lessons to be learned from this book is that contemporary scholars should not reject the analysis of complex systems on the incorrect notion that good science is a method for simplifying systems, and thus efforts to represent complexity analytically are not scientific. I will assert that the widespread presumption among many social scientists, that one cannot do good scientific work unless one reduces all systems to the simple interplay of a few variables, is a dangerous approach. Oversimplification reduces our resilience in coping with changes in our complex world. One should not make the analysis of any system more complex than needed for understanding how and why it works (or does not work). Assertions that ‘my case is unique’, however, are not scientific and reduce our capabilities for discovering ways of analysing and adapting systems to improve them over time. Boyd and Folke do derive a number of important lessons from the empirical studies in the last chapter of this book. For doubters, I recommend reading the last chapter first and then several times again alongside the excellent empirical chapters. This strategy will enable the reader to gain maximum understanding while thinking about a fascinating array of individual studies.

Acknowledgements

This book would not have been possible without the inspiration and help of a handful of people, in particular colleagues at the Stockholm Resilience Centre and at the Environmental Change Institute, Oxford University, who have shared their ideas and insights throughout the writing of this book. We are thankful to Formas, the Kjell and Märta Beijer Foundation, the Leverhulme Trust and the James Martin 21st Century School at Oxford University, who provided support for the work. The research has also been supported by the Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research, Mistra, through a core grant to the Stockholm Resilience Centre. Special thanks are extended to Â�chapter reviewers, especially Stephan Barthel, Henrik Ernston, Thomas Hahn, Bo Kjellén, Annette Löf, Nicholas Moss, Henny Osbahr, Andy Stirling, Maria Tengö, Frank Thomalla and Richard Walters. For their patience we thank the Cambridge University Press editorial and production team, in particular Lynette Talbot. Thanks are extended to Jerker Lokrantz for the illustrations and figures, Fredrik Moberg for the cover and Ann Grand for her improvements on the manuscript. The real thanks, however, go to the chapter authors, for contributing their time and effort to advance our understanding of adapting institutions and the human dimensions of global environmental change.

xix

Acronyms and abbreviations

AGRHYMET ALNAP BBC CBO CCD CDC CDM CID CIFS CILSS CIRC CPR CRED CZMP DEFRA DERT DFID DNPGCA EAC ECDC ECLAC EGR xx

Agricultural, Hydrological and Meteorological programme Active Learning Network for Accountability and Performance in Humanitarian Action British Broadcasting Corporation Community-based organisation Coast Conservation Department (Sri Lanka) Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (USA) Clean Development Mechanism (Kyoto Protocol) Common-interest development Cayman Islands Fire Services The Permanent Interstate Committee for Drought Control (Sahel) Cayman Islands Red Cross Common-pool resource Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters Coastal Zone Management Plan (Sri Lanka) Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (UK) District Emergency Response Team Department for International Development (UK) Food Crisis Prevention and Mitigation Mechanism (Niger) Environmental Audit Committee European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean Environmental governance regime

List of acronyms and abbreviations

EID EOC ERS EU EWS FAO FCO FCPNS FEWSNET GEC GECAFS GIEWS GIS GOARN GPHIN HDI HRO ICT IDS IFPRI IGO IMO INGO IPCC IUCN LEK LoGB MA MAP MDGs MFF MGO MLA MSF NAREP NEAP NGO

Emerging infectious disease Emergency operations centre Essential relief services European Union Early warning system Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations Foreign and Commonwealth Office (UK) Food Crisis Prevention Network of the Sahel Famine Early Warning System Network funded by USAID Global environmental change Global Environmental Change and Food Systems Global Information and Early Warning System Geographical information systems Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network Global Public Health Intelligence Network Human Development Index High-reliability organisation Information and communications technology Institute for Development Studies (University of Sussex, UK) International Food Policy Research Institute Intergovernmental organisation International membership organisation International non-governmental organisation Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change International Union for the Conservation of Nature Local ecological knowledge Leader of government business Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Mangrove Action Project Millennium Development Goals Mangroves For the Future (Sri Lanka) Metropolitan gardening organisation Member of the Legislative Assembly (Cayman Islands) Médecins Sans Frontières Natural Resources and Environment Policy (Sri Lanka) National Environmental Action Plan Non-governmental organisation

xxi

xxii

List of acronyms and abbreviations

NHC OCHA OECD OFDA OIE PPP RCIP SAM SARS SES SIEC SWAC TAFREN UNDP UNEP UNFCCC UNICEF USAID WFP WHO WWF

National Hurricane Committee (Cayman Islands) United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance World Organisation for Animal Health Public–private partnership Royal Cayman Islands Police Special Area Management (Sri Lanka) Severe acute respiratory syndrome Social–ecological system Sister Islands Emergency Committee (Cayman Islands) Sahel and West Africa Club Task Force for Rebuilding the Nation (Sri Lanka) United Nations Development Programme United Nations Environment Programme United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change United Nations Children’s Fund United States Agency for International Development United Nations World Food Programme World Health Organization World Wide Fund for Nature

1 Adapting institutions, adaptive governance and complexity: an introduction emily boyd and carl folke

People shape the planet and at the same time depend on its functioning. Global environmental change is currently occurring at a rate faster than humans have ever experienced and may result in potentially devastating consequences at the planetary scale (Rockström et€al. 2009). The well-being of people on the planet faces two dominant global environmental crises: climate change and the loss of the world’s ecosystem services. Following the collapse of the financial markets in 2008 the global community also faces turbulent times in terms of economic development. These crises are complex and all are interlinked (Young et€al. 2006, Walker et€al. 2009a). Human actions are having serious consequences on the earth’s climate system and on the capacity of landscapes and seascapes to generate important ecosystem services upon which societal development rests (Daily 1997). We take guidance from those who argue that economic systems are not separate from ecological systems (e.g. Jansson et€ al. 1994). We draw on the understanding that all of the materiality of societies is inherently based on the availability of renewable resources and the capacity of the biosphere to generate and sustain those. The environment is not just an externality, but our societies are part of the biosphere, ultimately dependent on its functioning and at the same time shaping it. Such interdependence of social and ecological Â�systems has been illustrated in many ways, from community-based and multi-level resource management (e.g. Berkes et€al. 2003) to political shocks triggering shifts towards ecosystem stewardship (e.g. Adapting Institutions: Governance, Complexity and Social–Ecological Resilience, ed. Emily Boyd and Carl Folke. Published by Cambridge University Press. © Cambridge University Press 2012.

1

2

Emily Boyd and Carl Folke

Gelcich et€al. 2010). We acknowledge that markets cannot be decoupled from social–ecological systems, and in fact these are deeply nested concepts (Harvey 2006). New approaches across the social and natural sciences are needed to further our understanding of how to govern the rapid and unpredictable change that characterises these crises, from local to global. Insights are required that are based on empirical observations of the features of the institutional responses to sudden and slow-onset shock at local, national, regional and global levels. In particular, there is a need for better understanding of the specific and general resilience of systems to cope with sudden change and the ways that people’s leadership and expectations are negotiated around uncertainty, abrupt change and shifts from one state or trajectory to another. Some societies show resilience in the face of shock and surprise: they adjust, reorganise and develop without significant impairment of their function. Others suffer and have difficulties in coping with change, and may shift into or deepen a pathway of unsustainable development. Resilience can be seen in the ways that communities respond to a crisis and progress their pathways of development (Chapin et€ al. 2010, Folke et€al. 2010). Societies can increase their resilience by developing mechanisms and institutions that enable them to remember past events, put early warning systems in place, create buffers against the impacts of change and learn how to better prepare for future events. Having resilience allows for novelty and innovation, often triggered by a shock or a sudden change. These events may open up new options for taking on new directions, for learning and adapting, and for transitions and transformations towards new paths of development. Resilient social– ecological systems have the ability to turn crisis into opportunity for a prosperous future, but they may not mobilise it (Gunderson and Holling 2002, Folke 2006). Planetary resilience is paramount to the world’s ability to cope with the multiple changes that are taking place at both global and local levels. Planetary Stewardship and Global Sustainability are emerging concepts in this context (e.g. Power and Chapin 2009, Reid et€al. 2010). As yet, we have little idea of how people will cope with environmental change in the long term, but we can look back and consider what changes have happened in response to loss of ecosystem services and what adjustments have been made as a result of the small (0.75â•›°C) global temperature rise. As the planet faces increasing pressures, evidence suggests that there are adaptations occurring in practice

Adapting institutions, adaptive governance and complexity

(Osbahr et€ al. 2008, Tompkins et€ al. 2010). Furthermore, institutions in developed and developing countries€– public, private and community/voluntary organisations€– are building adaptive capacity (Adger et€al. 2009, Armitage and Plummer 2010, Boyd and Osbahr 2010, Boyd et€al. 2011, Pelling 2011). There are also important insights emerging about lock-in, shifts and transformations in Â�social–ecological systems (Olsson et€al. 2006, Biggs et€al. 2009, Walker et€al. 2009b, Gelcich et€al. 2010). It is in this context that we approach adapting institutions, adaptive governance and complexity. We view the world from a complexity angle, where people and nature are truly intertwined and interdependent (hence social–ecological systems); where linear relations and stable conditions do exist but are partial in time and space and do not properly capture the dynamics of complex systems; where periods of gradual change and abrupt change dynamically interact across levels and scales and influence resilience, adaptability and transformability of social–ecological systems. Institutions are about the ‘rules of the game’ that arise from formal and informal norms and rules, and organisational structures, and adaptation is about actors and agency, networks and governance. Adapting institutions, as we define it for the purpose of this book, concerns the capacity of people, from local groups and private actors, to the state, to international organisations, to deal with complexity, uncertainty and the interplay between gradual and rapid change. Some of the responses may be about coping with complexity and change in the short term; others may be about adaptability in a general sense or even maladaptive responses from a longer-term sustainability perspective (e.g. Cinner et€al. 2010). We are interested in exploring and understanding social–ecological features involved in adaptations that may help societies move towards global sustainability. In particular, this book is about the challenge of how to match the social with the ecological to improve stewardship of natural resources and ecosystem services for human well-being and sustainability€– referred to as the problem of fit (Folke et€al. 1998, Young 2002, Galaz et€ al. 2008). Still, most research looks either at the ecological, treating people as external to the ecosystem, or at the social, largely disconnected from ecosystem feedbacks. The social dimensions that provide bridges or create barriers to ecosystem stewardship need to be further explored (Gunderson et€ al. 1995), including the interplay between institutions at multiple levels and scales affecting the dynamics of cross-scale and cross-level interactions (Cash et€al. 2006). In a situation of converging trends of global interconnectedness and increasing

3

4

Emily Boyd and Carl Folke

pressure on social–ecological systems, a resilience approach to governance issues enables a more refined understanding of the dynamics of rapid, interlinked and multi-scale change (Duit et€al. 2010) The analytical framework of adaptive governance of social–Â� ecological systems is an extension of the challenges posed by the problem of fit, recognising the need for flexibility in the governance structure to allow for ecosystem-based management and stewardship of dynamic landscapes and seascapes (Dietz et€ al. 2003, Folke et€ al. 2005, Ostrom 2009). Adaptive governance is a useful concept to understand how agents and institutions respond to crisis in new ways or are constrained by resistance to change, and how these responses and constraints interact across levels and scales (e.g. Boyd 2008, Termeer et€al. 2010). This book aims to examine the complexity of adapting institutions and governance and how it relates to the problem of fit in a globalised world. Institutions in this context relate to the flexibility of adapting norms and rules in the short term, and to long-term challenges of deep legacies and belief systems as barriers and bridges for adaptation. We look in particular at adapting institutions and sources of social–ecological resilience such as the networks, partnership and leadership that are taking shape as a result of changes in temperature and in ecosystem services. We ask, what can we learn about adapting institutions and governance in relation to rapid change and uncertainty, and what are the enabling conditions for adapting or transforming? The book looks at the features of change, such as shocks and surprises, to assess what adaptations have emerged at local, state and global levels. What is unique about this book is the focus on adapting institutions and governance across multiple levels in relation to ‘adaptiveness’ of social–ecological systems, and the move in ideas towards the need for transformations, or new pathways of development, to make a prosperous future for humanity possible. In particular, this book focuses on the social science dimension of social–ecological resilience in an effort to bridge gaps between resilience thinking and the practice of resilience in terms of management and governance. This book brings together resilience thinking and research on governance, complexity and adaptation. Through carefully selected case studies we examine different contexts of challenges for social– ecological systems in transition, actor and network functions, and how politics is shaping complex interrelationships between adapting institutions, adaptive capacity and governance of social–ecological systems. Through the book, we provide examples where there is evidence

Adapting institutions, adaptive governance and complexity

of some form of change and adaptive responses, slow or rapid, occurring across governance scales. The book is divided into three parts. The first part, Adapting local institutions, networks, leadership and learning, consists of four place-based chapters. The first, by Beatrice Crona and Örjan Bodin, analyses adaptive institutions in a coastal fishing community in southern Kenya, focusing on the role and interaction of knowledge, social networks and leadership in dealing with a fluctuating local environment. The next chapter, by Maria Tengö and Jacob von Heland, takes us into deep norms, values and culture on the island of Madagascar, capturing the essential role of belief systems and religion in adapting institutions. In particular, the authors focus on how a forest taboo institution that sustains ecosystem services is adapting in the face of human migration due to erratic rainfall and the spread of Christianity. In the next chapter Ingela Ternström, focusing on irrigation systems in Nepal, captures diverse social responses, essential in institutional persistence, and the role of leadership among farmers in the face of diverse and sometimes unexpected disturbances. The last chapter in this part, by Johan Colding, draws on examples from urban systems and green areas worldwide to suggest how to build new adapting institutions for social–ecological resilience through public engagement in urban commons. The second part, Adapting and governing public institutions for uncertainty and complexity, starts with a chapter by Andreas Duit on adaptive capacity and the ecostate. The chapter uses cross-national data to consider how the adaptive capacity of states can be conceptualised and measured, and introduces the notion of the ecostate and the environmental governance regime. The next chapter, by Sirkku Juhola, considers the complexity of food systems, reviewing the current state of the world’s food insecurity and what responses to counter such insecurity have been developed, internationally and nationally. The 2004–05 food crisis in Niger serves as an illustrative example of the need for adapting institutions internationally. The last chapter of this part, by Emma L. Tompkins and Lisa-Ann Hurlston, shows how adaptive governance through public–private partnerships can work in practice. Using the emergence and transformation of the Cayman Islands’ National Hurricane Committee as an example, they analyse the role of public and private responsibility in the provision of disaster mitigation, early warning systems, disaster response and post-impact reorganisation.

5

6

Emily Boyd and Carl Folke

The final part, Adapting multi-level institutions to environmental crisis, sets out with an explorative chapter by Victor Galaz, asking whether state and non-state actors really can govern complex social–ecological systems, with complex governance systems, in times of rapid unexpected global environmental change. He refers to this challenge as ‘double complexity’, and discusses the features and modes of governance able to deal with both slow and rapid change at multiple scales. Adaptive governance in the face of natural hazards is the focus of the next chapter by Alison Ashlin, with the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami hitting Sri Lanka as a telling example. She asks if the governance of coastal ecosystems in Sri Lanka was adaptive in its approach, and what changes occurred in governance institutions following this social–ecological shock. The next chapter, by Emily Boyd, takes us into adapting institutions in relation to global climate change, focusing on whether two networked policy institutions are adapting beyond business-as-usual and how resilient their responses are to climate change. The institutions in question are two UK government departments that play a central role in delivering development aid and security to public and civil society actors and communities in the global South. We end the book with a concluding chapter in which the editors discuss adapting institutions, the problem of fit and adaptive governance challenges in a resilience and complexity context, drawing out lessons from the ten preceding contributions to this volume. Much of the literature on environmental governance fails to capture the adaptive nature of social–ecological systems. This book strives to take on this challenge, exploring the capacity of people, from local groups and private actors to the state and international institutions, to deal with complexity, uncertainty and the interplay between gradual and rapid change. We hope the reader will enjoy the book, and at the same time find within its pages many enriching insights and inspiration on adapting institutions, adaptive governance, complexity and social–ecological resilience.

references

Adger, W. N., Lorenzoni, I., and O’Brien, K. L., eds. 2009. Adapting to Climate Change: Thresholds, Values, Governance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Armitage, D., and Plummer, R., eds. 2010. Adaptive Capacity and Environmental Governance. Berlin: Springer-Verlag.

Adapting institutions, adaptive governance and complexity Berkes, F., Colding, J., and Folke, C., eds. 2003. Navigating Social–Ecological Systems: Building Resilience for Complexity and Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Biggs, R., Carpenter, S. R., and Brock, W. A. 2009. Turning back from the brink: detecting an impending regime shift in time to avert it. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA, 106, 826–831. Boyd, E. 2008. Navigating Amazonia under uncertainty: learning from past and present forms of environmental governance. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, 363, 1911–1916. Boyd, E., and Osbahr, H. 2010. Resilient responses to climate change: exploring organisational learning in networked development organisations. Environmental Education Research, 16, 397–411. Boyd, E., Street, R., Lonsdale, K., et€al. 2011. Leading the UK adaptation agenda: a landscape of stakeholders and networked organisations for adaptation to climate change. In Ford, J., and Berrang-Ford, L., eds., Climate Change Adaptation in Developed Countries: From Theory to Practice. Series: Advances in Global Change Research, Vol. 42. New York, NY: Springer. Cash, D. W., Adger, W., Berkes, F., et€al. 2006. Scale and cross-scale dynamics: governance and information in a multilevel world. Ecology and Society, 11(2), 8. www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol11/iss2/art8. Chapin, F. S. III, Carpenter, S. R., Kofinas, G. P., et€al. 2010. Ecosystem stewardship: sustainability strategies for a rapidly changing planet. Trends in Ecology and Evolution, 25, 241–249. Cinner, J. E., Folke, C., Daw, T., and Hicks, C. 2010. Responding to change: using scenarios to understand how socioeconomic factors may influence amplifying or dampening exploitation feedbacks among Tanzanian fishers. Global Environmental Change, 21, 7–12. doi:10.1016/ j.gloenvcha.2010.09.001. Daily, G., ed. 1997. Nature’s Services: Societal Dependence on Natural Ecosystems. Washington, DC: Island Press. Dietz, T., Ostrom, E., and Stern, P. C. 2003. The struggle to govern the commons. Science, 302, 1902–1912. Duit, A., Galaz, V., Eckerberg, K., and Ebbesson, J. 2010. Governance, complexity, and resilience. Global Environmental Change, 20, 363–368. Folke, C. 2006. Resilience: the emergence of a perspective for social–ecological systems analyses. Global Environmental Change, 16, 253–267. Folke, C., Pritchard, L., Berkes, F., Colding, J., and Svedin, U. 1998. The problem of fit between ecosystems and institutions. International Human Dimensions Programme (IHDP). IHDP Working Paper No. 2. www.unibonn.de/IHDP/public.htm. Folke, C., Hahn, T., Olsson, P., and Norberg, J. 2005. Adaptive governance of social–ecological systems. Annual Review of Environment and Resources, 30, 441–473. Folke, C., Carpenter, S. R., Walker, B. H., et€al. 2010. Resilience thinking: integrating resilience, adaptability and transformability. Ecology and Society, 15(4), 20. www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol15/iss4/art20. Galaz, V., Olsson, P., Hahn, T., Folke, C., and Svedin, U. 2008. The problem of fit among biophysical systems, environmental regimes and broader governance systems: insights and emerging challenges. In Young, O., Schroeder, H., and King, L. A., eds., Institutions and Environmental Change: Principal Findings, Applications, and Research Frontiers. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, pp. 147–186. Gelcich, S., Hughes, T. P., Olsson, P., et€al. 2010. Navigating transformations in governance of Chilean marine coastal resources. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA, 107, 16794–16799.

7

8

Emily Boyd and Carl Folke Gunderson, L., and Holling, C. S., eds. 2002. Panarchy: Understanding Transformations in Human and Natural Systems. Washington, DC : Island Press. Gunderson, L., Holling, C. S., and Light, S., eds. 1995. Barriers and Bridges to the Renewal of Ecosystems and Institutions. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. Harvey, D. 2006. Spaces of Global Capitalism: A Theory of Uneven Geographical Development. London: Verso. Jansson, A. M., Hammer, M., Folke, C., and Costanza, R., eds. 1994. Investing in Natural Capital: The Ecological Economics Approach to Sustainability. Washington, DC: Island Press. Olsson, P., Gunderson, L. H., Carpenter, S. R., et€al. 2006. Shooting the rapids: navigating transitions to adaptive governance of social–ecological systems. Ecology and Society, 11(1), 18. www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol11/iss1/art18. Osbahr, H., Twyman, C., Adger, N. W., and Thomas, D. S. G. 2008. Effective livelihood adaptation to climate change disturbance: scale dimensions of practice in Mozambique. Geoforum, 39, 1951–1964. Ostrom, E. 2009. A general framework for analyzing sustainability of social– ecological systems. Science, 325, 419–422. Pelling, M. 2011. Adaptation to Climate Change: From Resilience to Transformation. London: Routledge. Power, M. E., and Chapin, F. S. III. 2009. Planetary stewardship. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, 7, 399. Reid, W. V., Chen, D., Goldfarb, L., et€al. 2010. Earth system science for global sustainability: grand challenges. Science, 330, 916–917. Rockström, J., Steffen, W., Noone, K., et€ al. 2009. A safe operating space for humanity. Nature, 461, 472–475. Termeer, C. J. A. M., Dewulf, A., and van Lieshout, M. 2010. Disentangling scale approaches in governance research: comparing monocentric, multilevel, and adaptive governance. Ecology and Society, 15(4), 29. www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol15/iss4/art29. Tompkins, E. L., Adger, W. N., Boyd, E., et€al. 2010. Observed adaptation to climate change: UK evidence of transition to a well-adapting society. Global Environmental Change, 20, 627–635. Walker, B. H., Barrett, S., Polasky, S, et€al. 2009a. Looming global-scale failures and missing institutions. Science, 325, 1345–1346. Walker, B. H., Abel, N., Anderies, J. M., and Ryan, P. 2009b. Resilience, adaptability, and transformability in the Goulburn-Broken Catchment, Australia. Ecology and Society, 14(1), 12. www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol14/iss1/art12. Young, O. R. 2002. The Institutional Dimensions of Environmental Change: Fit, Interplay and Scale. Boston, MA: MIT Press. Young, O. R., Berkhout, F., Gallopin, G. C., et€al. 2006. The globalization of socioecological systems: an agenda for scientific research. Global Environmental Change, 16, 304–316.

Part Iâ•…Adapting local institutions, networks, leadership and learning

2 Knowledge, social networks and leadership: setting the stage for the development of adaptive institutions? beatrice crona and örjan bodin

2. 1╇

introduction

Institutions, be they formal or informal (North 1990, Ostrom 1990), guide the behaviour and interactions of people. This is a fact of particular importance when studying local-level collaborative management of common-pool resources (that is, co-management: e.g. Carlsson and Berkes 2005). However, given the inherent unpredictability of natural systems (Levin 1998), institutions need to be flexible enough to deal with ecological changes and surprises. In effect, the institutions need to be adaptive€– an insight permeating the chapters of this book. Social networks are increasingly cited as instrumental in enabling communities to adaptively respond to environmental change and to initiate and sustain successful co-management of natural resources (e.g. Olsson 2004a, Folke et€al. 2005). Social networks are, for example, one factor determining the flow of information within communities and, as such, are important in determining possibilities for continuing learning and making sense of environmental feedbacks. They also offer a valuable tool for identifying social groups, influential actors and patterns of communications. This chapter will explore different features of social networks and how they affect the local institutional context for governance of natural resources. We will discuss how social networks for communication of local ecological knowledge (LEK) among actors affect knowledge distributions and perceptions of change in the ecosystem. Furthermore, we will analyse networks to map social groups in the Adapting Institutions: Governance, Complexity and Social–Ecological Resilience, ed. Emily Boyd and Carl Folke. Published by Cambridge University Press. © Cambridge University Press 2012.

11

12

Beatrice Crona and Örjan Bodin

community and the level of communications within and between these groups. Based on analyses of social positions in the networks, social networks also provide the ability to identify informal opinion leaders who could be instrumental in initiating collective action (see Kopller 1984 for a review of the concept). By analysing the personal characteristics of these individuals, in combination with analyses of contextual issues of importance, such as incentive structures, one can develop hypotheses regarding the abilities of these individuals to engage in initiating, coordinating and facilitating collaborative management efforts. The discussion centres on a case study of a coastal fishing community in southern Kenya. The chapter starts with a look at the case-specific cultural and institutional context, followed by a brief description of methodology and the Social Network Analysis approach. We then proceed to discuss the role of social position and network structure in governance of ecosystems and how this may affect incentives for changed behaviour among resource users. 2. 2╇

the case

The social–ecological system which forms the basis for the analysis in this chapter is a rural fishing village on the south coast of Kenya. It has approximately 200 households and an estimated 1000 inhabitants. The ecological system is characterised by mangroves, covering 615 ha, with mudflats and seagrass meadows in the shallow part of the lagoon, in turn sheltered from wave impact by shallow reefs at the mouth of the bay (Figure 2.1). The use of resources in the village is centred on fishing and, to some degree, the use of mangroves for poles and firewood. Other non-forest products are taken from the mangroves, but government restrictions, in the form of a cutting ban, have periodically impeded extraction of wood products by locals (Dahdouh-Guebas et€ al. 2000). The majority of households depend primarily on fishing for their livelihood. The local artisanal fishery is based on gear such as seine nets, different types of gill nets, spearguns and handlines, methods which have been found to be spatially separated (Obura et€al. 2002) (Figure 2.1). The local fishery focuses on finfish but also includes various crustaceans and molluscs, such as juvenile penaeid shrimps, fished only by women and sold at local markets. The East African climate has alternating wet and dry seasons, with two pronounced rainy times; a period of heavy rains from

Knowledge, social networks and leadership

Figure 2.1â•… Map of the coastal seascape in focus. The respective distribution of mangroves, seagrass beds and reefs is indicated. The area of primary fishing effort for each fishing-related occupational category is marked with dotted lines. Adapted with permission from Crona (2006).

April to June (southeast monsoon) and a period of lighter rains from October to November (northeast monsoon). The fishery is thus characterised by annual seasonal fluctuations caused by monsoon winds, with calm waters and intense activity during the southeast monsoon and lower fishing pressure and catches during the northeast monsoon, a pattern also documented in other areas (de la Torre-Castro and Rönnbäck 2004). The reason for this lowered activity lies primarily in the nature of the fishing vessels available, which cannot withstand rough seas and strong winds. During the southeast monsoon, the higher catches are largely attributable to the calm weather, which allows fishing using low-technology gear in the entire reef areas as well as in the lagoon. Twenty-four per cent of households in the village are recent immigrants. The majority originate from Tanzania, to which they regularly return. Many Tanzanian fishermen reside in the village semipermanently, returning to their homeland in seasons of low fishing activity. Migration is linked to both economic factors and kinship ties. In the high season, migrating fishermen return to the study area to fish and are often assisted with travel expenses and permits by local

13

14

Beatrice Crona and Örjan Bodin

middlemen (fishmongers) operating from the village. Kinship ties also play a significant role in recruiting crew for the season. 2.2.1╇ Fishing activities and management over time The coastal population of Kenya comprises two main ethnic groups: the Mijikenda, of Bantu origin, and the Swahili, of mixed Bantu, Asian and Arabic descent. The Mijikenda comprise nine tribes; in the study area, Digo is the predominant ethnicity. Historically, the Mijikenda were farmers; they started their relationship with the Swahilis as traders of agricultural products. In consequence of colonial land access policies and early-twentieth-century politics, the Digo were forced to abandon traditional shifting cultivation and convert to Islam, which led to a need to diversify their livelihood (Ng’weno 1995). This resulted in the gradual development of dependence on fishing. In the early to mid twentieth century, a combination of factors, including the Kenyan government’s striving to develop the marine fishing industry, the parallel rise of coastal tourism attracting large numbers of unskilled labour, and skilled, knowledgeable fishermen abandoning fishing for more lucrative ventures, contributed gradually to undermine local institutions for managing common fisheries (Glaesel 2000). The vast majority of newcomers (primarily young men) seeking employment were not absorbed by the tourist industry. This group turned to self-employment in speargun fishing (Glaesel 1997). Speargun fishing required low capital investment in gear and was free from the apprenticeship and kinship ties traditionally associated with other gear types. Another strain on the traditional management system was the dramatic influx of Tanzanian fishermen after the 1964 overthrow of the Zanzibar/Pemba government, resulting in large seine-net crews establishing more or less semi-permanent operations along the Kenyan coast (Glaesel 1997). Records show that, although currently classified as illegal, spearguns and seine-net fishing have increased in proportion to other fishing methods in the area (McClanahan et€al. 1997, Glaesel 2000). The gradual weakening of traditional governance structures, coupled with a national top-down view of legislation, with a heavy focus on regulatory measures but without sufficient capacity for enforcement (Government of Kenya 1991, 2001), has led to the inshore fishery along the southern Kenyan coast becoming almost open access (Alidina 2005). This has led to overfishing and depletion of inshore stocks (Ochiewo 2004). Mangroves have also suffered: intensive mangrove

Knowledge, social networks and leadership

timber extraction reached a maximum in the 1970s, leading the government to impose an irregularly enforced mangrove-cutting ban. The lifting of this ban is currently under review (Kwale District Forestry Officer, personal communication). Under the Forest Act (Government of Kenya 1994), community involvement in management of resources is suggested as a future goal.

2. 3 ╇t h e o r e t i c a l

perspective and methodological

approach

2.3.1╇ Theoretical perspective It is becoming increasingly clear that even rather small communities often display quite complex patterns of interactions between different user groups (Agrawal and Gibson 1999, Crona and Bodin 2006). In general, in a given community, there is rarely one single group of local stakeholders; rather, communities are defined by complicated patterns of subgroups with different perceptions, interests, resources and amounts of influence (e.g. Carlsson and Berkes 2005, Nygren 2005). This structural and relational perspective on social systems has, over a considerable time, developed into a broad trans-disciplinary scientific field (Social Network Analysis: see www.insna.org) and has proven a useful tool in studying and explaining social phenomena (e.g. Freeman 2004). Among other things, it has been used to study information diffusion (e.g. Abrahamson and Rosenkopf 1997) and group structures and their possible social consequences (e.g. Johnson et€al. 2003). Thus, the social network perspective is an interesting framework to apply in studying the social side of ecosystem governance. In recent years, the interest in social networks in resource management contexts has increased (e.g. Lansing 1991, Schneider et€ al. 2003, Baker 2005, Crona and Bodin 2006, Ernstson et€al. 2008, Bodin and Crona 2009, Ramirez-Sanchez and Pinkerton 2009). This is a positive development, but we still have a limited understanding of how outcomes of ecosystem governance are associated with particular structural features of the social networks among the various resource users, beneficiaries and governmental agencies in a community. A reasonable hypothesis is, however, that desirable outcomes are associated with how these complex pattern of interactions are structured (Carlsson and Berkes 2005, Bodin et€al. 2006, Carlsson and Sandström 2006). This argument is further strengthened by numerous studies showing that the existence of informal social networks among and

15

16

Beatrice Crona and Örjan Bodin

between various stakeholders and groups is very important in successful cases of bottom-up community-based natural resource management (e.g. Gunderson 1999, Folke et€al. 2003, Olsson 2003, Pretty 2003). What we intend to highlight, in this research context, is that not all social networks are created equal. Different structural characteristics of social networks give rise to different outcomes with respect to the governance of natural resources (Bodin et€al. 2006, Bodin and Crona 2009; Bodin and Prell 2011). By applying a network-oriented research approach to studying this issue, some of these patterns of dependencies and their consequences for governance can be revealed, quantified and analysed (as we intend to demonstrate in this chapter). 2.3.2╇ Methods In this subsection, we briefly explain some methodological issues of importance in applying a social network research approach. For more in-depth description of the methodological issues in general, see, for example, Marsden (1990) and Wasserman and Faust (1994). For details of the specific case study discussed here, see Crona and Bodin (2006) and Bodin and Crona (2008). In many cases, defining the boundaries of the population within which the social interactions of the actors are to be measured and analysed is not trivial. Since everyone in some sense can be considered as being connected to everyone else (although via others), one has carefully to define reasonable system boundaries, given the research question at hand. Fortunately, in the case discussed here, the population is, a priori, quite well defined; that is, it consists of all households in the fishing village. Given a reasonable definition of the population, the next step is to measure the different social networks of interests among the actors. Often, relational data are gathered using interviews and/or questionnaires. Collection of relational data can either be done using recall (that is, the respondent generates a list of his or her relations) or recognition (that is, the respondent picks individuals from a list of all individuals in the studied population). We used an ‘unaided’ or ‘free’ recall approach to elicit information (see, e.g., Marsden 1990, Wasserman and Faust 1994). Using a set of questions related to different kind of relations, for example ‘with whom do you discuss important matters?’, each head of household in the village was asked about his/her different social relationships (see further details in Crona and Bodin 2006). All interviews were conducted in the native language (Kiswahili), either in

Knowledge, social networks and leadership

the respondent’s home or in a public place. Since many respondents were not comfortable reading or writing, the enumerator noted the information, with the help of an interpreter. A nearly complete (83%) network dataset was gathered, based on interviews with the heads of 171 households, resulting in a total of approximately 1500 reported relations. Social ties elicited by the recall method tend to be frequent in interaction, intense and recent. That is, they can be seen as the strongest and most influential at any particular time (see Marsden 1990 and references therein). Given that one of the aims of this chapter is to link LEK distribution in the community to network structure, a methodological note is warranted: we conceptualise local ecological knowledge as the body of knowledge which resource users draw on to understand the marine environment, upon which the majority depend, to various degrees. This body of knowledge can, for the sake of simplicity, be seen as comprising two subsets. The first relates to relatively simple information, such as knowledge of different species of fish or other organisms and how to differentiate them. The second is more complicated and relates to complex relationships and ecological processes. The simpler type of knowledge could, arguably, be shared through relatively weak ties, while the latter is more akin to tacit knowledge, which has been argued to require stronger relational ties (Cross et€al. 2001). Since our main interest lies in the knowledge of more complex ecological processes, our focus is accordingly on the stronger social ties. Network analyses were used to assess quantitatively the level of communication within and between subgroups existing within the realm of the village’s social networks. Our main objective with this subgroup-oriented analysis was to investigate if group structures, and patterns of communications among them, could help explain distributions of LEK, as well as give some insights into the community’s social structures. For the purpose of this study, we divided respondents into subgroups based on occupational categories (henceforth referred to as ‘occupational groups’). Nine different occupational groups were identified, based on respondents’ reports of primary income: farmers, businessmen (local entrepreneurs), middlemen (fishmongers) and six categories of fishermen, based on primary gear type and fishing technique. Once respondents had been classified into an occupational group, the relationships of individuals were used to analyse the aggregated pattern of relations among and within these occupational groups (see further details in Crona and Bodin 2006).

17

18

Beatrice Crona and Örjan Bodin

In addition, using the relational data, structural network measures based on network position were used to identify the most influential individuals of the community. This assessment is based on the assumption that the possibility for social influence and leadership is closely tied to a person’s structural position in a network (e.g. Wasserman and Faust 1994). A range of network centrality measures, with specific relation to influence and possibility for leadership, are available. We chose the following measures of influence: degree centrality (e.g. Wasserman and Faust 1994), betweenness centrality (Freeman 1979) and Eigenvector centrality (Bonacich 1972). For a detailed description of the applied analyses, see Bodin and Crona (2008). 2. 4╇s o c i a l

networks: the fabric of collaborative

management

Theories on common-pool resource management build on the idea that stakeholders can come together and devise rules for how to use a specific resource. For this to happen, groups of stakeholders need to have a shared understanding of how the natural system works, as well as some degree of consensus about the resource problem (Ostrom 1990, 2005). For example, is overfishing causing decline in catches, or is the decline an effect of eutrophication and untreated sewage flowing into the bay? In a social–ecological system in which no collective action for any kind of resource management has been instigated, despite apparently declining and degrading resources (McClanahan and Mangi 2001, Maina et€al. 2008), pertinent questions must be: What understanding of ecosystem dynamics exist in the community? Among which community members? How is such understanding created, maintained and shared? Has lack of understanding suppressed collective action or could there be other explanations? 2.4.1╇ Networks and knowledge distributions The network of communication of knowledge and information related to resource extraction among occupational groups in the village is shown in Figure 2.2, while Table 2.1 shows the relative frequency of relations among and between occupational groups. As seen in Figure 2.2, there are several links between these subgroups, but Table 2.1 reveals that respondents within most of these subgroups communicated more with each other than they did with members of other subgroups. In Figure 2.2, we also see that certain

Knowledge, social networks and leadership

Table 2.1╇ Sociomatrix based on occupational groups using data obtained from the social network of information/knowledge exchange. Numbers in cells represent the ratio of the measured versus the expected number of relational ties, assuming a random distribution of ties. A ratio above 1 means that communication within occupational groups is higher than if occupational membership had no effect on relational preferences. Reprinted with permission from Crona and Bodin (2006)

Seine Deep Gill net Businessman Farmer sea net Seine net 6.13 Businessman Farmer Deep sea Gill net Middleman

0 0.92

0 0.21 1.64

1.02 0 0.19 0 0.13 1.15 2.79 1.23 9.2

Number of group Middleman members 0.29 0 0.58 0.72 0.46 5.11

16 27 8 45 10 10

groups, such as the group of deep-sea fishermen, are more central compared to more peripheral groups like the seine netters, farmers and businessmen.1 When we studied LEK in the village, it became apparent that there were significant differences in terms of the level and content of ecological knowledge of farmers and businessmen compared to the majority of resource-extractor categories (Figure 2.3). Knowledge common to most groups included the acknowledgement of the central role played by mangroves in coastal protection, nursery habitat and water quality. Farmers and businessmen showed consistently poorer knowledge of all coastal habitats as well as a poor understanding of related ecological processes (Table 2.2). LEK held by fishermen using various gear types revealed a range of knowledge, from detailed accounts of the feeding of certain target species to acknowledgement of large-scale climatic changes affecting shrimp stocks and mangrove coverage. The seasonal rains and related freshwater pulse affecting shrimp and fish migrations were also recognised by all types of fishermen. Knowledge specific to certain occupational groups of fishermen included recognition that sea urchin aggregations could affect the dynamics of Detailed analysis and description of methods of the social network analysis can

1

be found in Crona and Bodin (2006).

19

20

Beatrice Crona and Örjan Bodin

Farmer

Gill net

Businessman

Middleman

Deep sea

Seine net

Figure 2.2â•… Multidimensional scaling plot showing the social network structure of relations among groups based on predefined occupational categories. The size of each node is proportional to the group size, and the thickness of the links is proportional to the strength of the inter-group relations, i.e. the ratio of the observed versus expected number of relations (thin line