PAPER SERIES:
Democracy and Environment
What is the relationship between democratic
governance and environment/nature? What are the immediate and long-term
implications of democratic governance on the environment and natural resources?
As pressures for redistributive policies, environmental justice, and
participatory decision-making have intensified across the world following
increasing democratization and social mobilization through the 1990s,
environmentalists have responded in diverse ways. Conservationists have
responded to specific proposals at times with concern, speculating about adverse
environmental consequences. There is also a growing realization that poverty,
especially associated with extreme inequality, increases the social and human
costs of conservation and environmental action. The latter reflects the
increasing convergence in global discourses on environment, democracy, and
development. A shift in the locus of governance interventions over the last two
decades, often through decentralization and recourse to private sector actors,
has also been accompanied by a relative withdrawal of the central state as the
prime interlocutor in social and environmental struggles. Although these shifts
are a welcome correction to the institutional dysfunction and distortion of the
past, they also create an urgent need to pay greater attention to the
relationship of democratic processes to environmental and resource governance
outcomes.
Papers in this session explore the dynamics of democratization as they play out
on the landscape through contesting claims from different social actors.
Organizers (all sessions):
Ashwini Chhatre
Arun Agrawal
Governing the environment I: Production of democratic landscapes
WEDS, APRIL 16TH FROM 8:00-9:40 AM
Chairs:
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Pamela D. McElwee |
Participants:
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Presenter: |
Brent McCusker, Local Democracy, Contested Authority and Differential Development in Limpopo, South Africa |
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Presenter: |
Kundan Kumar, Democratic Assertions: Exclusions, Historical Injustices and the Making of India's Forest Rights Act |
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Presenter: |
Gabriela Valdivia, Resource Governance and the Question of 'Best Use': Land Reform in Santa Cruz, Bolivia |
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Presenter: |
Joseph H. Bryan, Walking the Line: Property and Indigenous Rights in La Mosquitia, Honduras |
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Discussant: |
Diane Rocheleau |
Sponsorships: Cultural and Political Ecology Specialty Group, Political Geography Specialty Group, Developing Areas Specialty Group
◄ the blogGoverning the environment II: Constructing democratic authority
WEDS, APRIL 16TH FROM 10:10-11:50
Chairs:
|
David Wilkie |
Participants:
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Presenter: |
Leila Harris, Emerging Environmentalisms, Shifting States, and New Democracies in Turkey? |
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Presenter: |
Jesse Ribot, Pluralism without Representation: Recognizing Democracy in Natural Resource Decentralization |
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Presenter: |
Bonnie Kaserman, Imagined Geographies of Climate Change Science and Democracy |
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Presenter: |
Yen-Chu Weng, Diverging Interests, Diverging Knowledges: Democratize Ecological Restoration? |
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Discussant: |
Brent McCusker |
Sponsorships: Cultural and Political Ecology Specialty Group, Political Geography Specialty Group, Developing Areas Specialty Group
Governing the environment III: Civil society and democratic governance
WEDS, APRIL 16th from 1:00-2:40
Chairs:
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Saudiel Ramirez-Sanchez |
Participants:
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Presenter: |
David Wilkie, Building demand for democracy: the unheralded role of NGOs in community-based natural resources management |
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Presenter: |
Neera Singh, Democracy, Institutional Pluralism, and Women's Inclusion in Forest Governance |
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Presenter: |
Betsy A. Beymer, International Conservation, State Interests, and Local Democracy |
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Presenter: |
Alexander Aylett, Conflict, Compromise and Climate Change: Participatory Democracy and Urban Environmental Struggles in Durban, South Africa. |
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Presenter: |
Charles Chester, Civil Society, Transnational Conservation, and Democratic Governance in North America |
Sponsorships: Cultural and Political Ecology Specialty Group, Political Geography Specialty Group, Developing Areas Specialty Group
Governing the environment IV: Democracy beyond representation
WEDS, APRIL 16th from 3:10-4:50
Chairs:
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Derick Fay |
Participants:
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Presenter: |
Saudiel Ramirez-Sanchez, The challenge of democracy for the creation and management of MPAs in Mexico |
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Presenter: |
Jennifer Brewer, Lobstering in the Public Sphere: Governance, Civic Discourse, and Resource Access |
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Presenter: |
Verna DeLauer, Deliberative Requirements of an Ecosystem-Based Approach to Coastal Ocean Management |
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Presenter: |
Louise Crabtree, New Ecology and Resilience Thinking in Urban Housing: Implications for Housing Governance and Tenure Systems |
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Discussant: |
Jeremy M. Campbell |
Sponsorships: Cultural and Political Ecology Specialty Group, Political Geography Specialty Group, Developing Areas Specialty Group
◄ the blogGoverning the environment V: Democratic inclusions and exclusions
THURS, APRIL 17TH FROM 8:00-9:40AM
Chairs:
|
Brent McCusker |
Participants:
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Presenter: |
Derick Fay, Property Rights and Political Representation in Struggles over Protected Area Proposals in the USA and South Africa |
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Presenter: |
SOLANGE BANDIAKY, Gender Equity, Electoral Politics, and Natural Resource Decentralization: Women trapped by multiparty politics in Senegal |
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Presenter: |
Tapoja Chaudhuri, Professionalizing 'Empowerment': Delineating Communities in a 'model' Tiger Reserve |
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Presenter: |
Jeremy M. Campbell, Projecting Sustainability: Negotiating the Sustainable Br-163 Highway Plan in Brazil |
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Discussant: |
Pamela D. McElwee |
Sponsorships: Cultural and Political Ecology Specialty Group, Political Geography Specialty Group, Developing Areas Specialty Group
◄ the blogGoverning the environment VI: State, markets, and community agency
THURS, APRIL 17th from 10:10-11:50
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Chair: Bhaskar Vira |
Participants:
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Presenter: |
Ashwini Chhatre, Democracy and Forest Cover Change: Exploring environmental citizenship in the Western Himalayas |
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Co-Presenter: |
Arun Agrawal |
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Presenter: |
Pamela D. McElwee, Is Authoritarianism Good for Biodiversity? Participation, Politics and the Myth of State Conservation Hegemony |
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Presenter: |
Melissa Poe, Rhizomatic Natures: Gender, Mushrooms, and the Public Sphere |
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Presenter: |
Jeremy Brooks, Decentralization, Resource Management, and the Coming Democracy in Bhutan |
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Discussant: |
David Wilkie |
Sponsorships: Cultural and Political Ecology Specialty Group, Political Geography Specialty Group, Developing Areas Specialty Group
◄ the blogGoverning the environment VII: The role of democracy in nature-society interactions
THURS, APRIL 17th from 1:00-2:40pm
Chairs:
|
Ashwini Chhatre |
Participants:
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Panelist: |
Sarah Whatmore |
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Panelist: |
Diane Rocheleau |
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Panelist: |
Bhaskar Vira |
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Panelist: |
Leila Harris |
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Panelist: |
Jesse Ribot |
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Panelist: |
Arun Agrawal |
Sponsorships: Cultural and Political Ecology Specialty Group, Political Geography Specialty Group, Developing Areas Specialty Group