- Email: [email protected]
Local resource management in Africa
Book reuiews
edition that he is working on a model of rural policy and planning to be used as a guide for future contributions. This seems like an excellent idea for addressing the unwieldy scope of the series and to promote carefully focused and concise overviews for each nation. I would also hope for more comparisons between countries! by various criteria, which is not attempted in the 1995 volume, except in the section on Europe. In summary, PIRPAP is a valuable series in rural policy and planning. The objectives of the series are valid and worthy! and the material presented has important implications for the study of rural lands and rural people. Unfortunately, the quality and scope of the chapters are uneven. These traits are not unusual in an edited Volume, especially in the context of a yearbook. I remain enthusiastic about reading future books in this series. DONNA L. ERICKSON School of Natural Resources and Environment The University of Michigan Ann Arbor, MI USA
Resource
management
Local Resource Management in Africa. J.P.M. van den Breemer, C.A. Drijver and L.B. Venema (Editors), Wiley, New York, 1995, 245 pp. The study group “Environment and Development” of the Netherlands African Studies Association, in cooperation with the Netherlands Sociological and Anthropological Union (NSAV) and the Centre for Environmental Science at Leiden organized the conference Local Resource Management in Africa in February, 1993. The underlying assumption of the conference was that all African people have to come to terms with their environment and to develop sustainable forms of land use in order to prevent an enormous social-ecological disaster threatening most African countries. Therefore, effective local environmental management is needed. The conference was organized to gain insight into the complex of factors responsible for success or failure,
85
the social and ecological requirements for local environmental management, and the implications for research. The book under review is the proceedings of the conference and was published in 1995. The book is composed of nine case studies, four theoretical contributions, and an introduction and evaluation of the theme of African local resource management. The nine case studies describe a variety of local land-use systems found in Chad, Cameroon (three cases>, Mali (two cases>, Senegal (two cases>, Benin, and Zimbabwe. The cases detail the management of resources such as trees and pastures, conservation of land and water, the protection of fish stock and, the management of wildlife. The theoretical contributions address areas such as the defense of (Groat et al.> and the accountability for (Laban) commons. The interface between central government and the local eommunity, e.g. the forestry extension worker, is also addressed (Wiersum and Lekamre dit Deprez). In the introductory chapter the concept of local resource management is defined as conscious and organized local efforts to durably maintain or to increase the regenerative capacity of local natural resources (Van Breemer and Venema). However, local resource management does not function in isolation, so-called “supralocal” powers influence the system, either in a direct way (such as tree-felling licenses granted by the state) or indirectly (such as general (world) economic conditions). These “supralocal” factors manifest themselves in four modalities. The first modality is that the state is not involved with the local groups. The initiative is taken by the community and its elaboration proceeds autonomously. In four cases, this proved at least temporarily successful. The second modality is that the state is indifferent and does not seek to link up with the local groups. Revertheless influences are there, such as in the case of the fishing community of Zina (Drijver et al.) in which the implementation of a large dam upstream negatively influenced the water levels and, thus, the fish stock. The third modality is that the state is in principle interested and seeks to work with local groups. The successes seem limited as the state apparatus, its institutional culture, and the community dynamics work in different directions. This situation is experienced in social forestry projects in Senegal (Van den Breemer at al.) and the
86
Book reviews
wildlife management programme in Zimbabwe (Olthof). Wiersum and Lekanne dit Deprez elaborate this often conflicting but crucial interface between state and community. The fourth modality is a complete link between government and local groups. In two cases in Benin (De Haan) such a linkage turned out to be effective. Another example, however, shows that the dynamics among the community were insufficiently understood, which resulted in a complete failure of the project (Van Dijk and De Bruin). To allow for successful local resource management in Africa, the following general conditions are enumerated by the authors: 1. Desirable changes in environmental behaviour and investments in natural resources must bring economic benefits to the actors; 2. Legal security for the actors with regard to their access to natural resources as well as to the results of their efforts; 3. Full involvement of the local community in decision making, problem identification, and selection of possible solutions; 4. Linking up with a wider organization or lnstitution to provide protection and power in dealing with outsiders; 5. Self-reliance and self-confidence; 6. Sufficient means and knowledge to sustainably use the environment 7. An enabling environment to be created through legislation, price, and subsidy policies and the development of appropriate technology and participatory training. The authors, in particular, Drijver state that knowledge of the ecological processes over time and on various scale levels, is necessary in order to know how to maintain the regenerative capacity of natural resources. Of course, immediately after the listing of requirements, the question arises, how to facilitate for them. Van den Breemer and Venema stipulate that further research is needed at least in the areas of legislation, incorporation of participatory approaches by the state, on how to select local leaders, and on attitude and behaviour of people with regard to environmental management beyond the economic paradigm and including tradition and culture. The nine case studies give detailed descriptions of local resource management, their successes and their
failures. All together the cases provide a very good overview of what can be expected in participatory local management of natural resources. The more obvious and easy to study issues such as ownership of the environment, the need for security, the role of the state as a facilitator for local initiative, have all been addressed. But also the less obvious factors have been acknowledged. For example, in the Gouzda case described by Drijver and Zorge, factors such as charismatic leadership and ethnic emancipation as the common motivator for the community which made local resource management a success are discussed. This case also showed the need for formal environmental education and informal training on the job of the participating community to achieve an equal partnership between the community, the leaders, and the state. Local resource and environmental planning and management is a fantastic concept which as illustrated in this book has been realized with varying results. One of the many difficulties in the apphcation of the concept is that all systems that create the environment have to be taken into account. The ecology of the area and the society modifying nature to suit its objectives form the basic foundation for the understanding of local resource management. All subsystems; the living and non-living environment and the natural laws steering ‘this subsystem; the economic, socio-cultural, and political subsystems organizing the society, as well as the driving forces behind human actions have to be taken into account and have to be integrated in a workable framework. Furthermore, it has to be understood that in the African context, the state is often still based on a colonial exploitive organization with very different objectives than the organizing principles among the indigenous societies. So, there are two forms of societal organization who as the cases show rarely move in the same direction. Notwithstanding, these difficulties, on the long term local resource management can only be sustainable if both systems, the state as well as the indigenous, are taken into account. The state has to play an enabling and supportive role to facilitate the process of local resource management. The book Local Resource Management in Africa provides a myriad of important and worthwhile experiences. An integrated framework
Book reviews
that would make the concept of local resource management applicable has yet to be formulated. INGRID DUCHHART Agricultural University Wageningen Netherlands
Urbanisti
italiani
Urbanisti Italiani. Piccinato, Marconi, Samona, Quaroni, DeCarlo, Astengo, Campos Venuti. P. Bi Biagi and P. Gabellini (Editors), Editori Laterza, Roma-Bari, Italy, 1992, 593 pp. In Italy the use of the “biographic genre,” as a historiographic tool to analyze thoroughly the field of city and regional planning, has not had a great tradition. Preferences of scholars were to describe city planning as the outcome of the combination of historical circumstances and of political and ideological tensions. Authors of plans were often seen as a part of a group, a school or a current of thought. Individual personalities were overlooked. Sometimes, they were hidden behind the general responsibility of the whole society. In most of city and regional planning history, the role of the individual emerged with difficulty from the complicated plot that made the plan possible. The building of cities and regions was seen as an anonymous and collective effort. The urban (or regional) plan was not merely interpreted as the result of the planner’s mind. It was seen mainly as the translation of ideas included within the institutions and into other planning instruments, present into acts and laws, and expressed by collective subjects. In other words, the plan was seen as the interpretation of all the different views precipitated inside the lobal “culture” of the space to which the plan referred. It is not so easy to understand reasons why the narration of city and regional planning referred more to global issues than personal facts and experiences. However, to a great extent, there are three reasons -in no particular order of importance- which can help to explain this tendency. One is the “death of the author”, described by the French semiologist Roland Barthes, that took place between the 17th and 18th centuries: an important gap in the history of ideas.
87
According to Barthes’ argument, from that moment, scientific discourses were guaranteed by the coherence with the systematic totality of the theories and not by the author who made them. Another reason is the reference for historians, not only for the field of planning and not only in Italy, to the idealistic and Marxist historiographies. Such historiographies tended to reduce the role of the individual, and therefore the biography, as a way to study a complex phenomenon. The last reason is specifically connected with planning instruments. In these documents it is difficult to individuate contributions of the single planner from those of other subjects involved. In Urbanisti Ztaliani, Paola Di Biagi and Patrizia Gabellini, explore telling a part of the history of the Italian city and regional planning starting from a reverse historioraphical point of view. With this book, the two editors test the fertility of the biographical approach in the field of the development of cities and landscapes, which is an in-depth and experienced method in other cultural ambits. (I am thinking, for example, about the importance of the role of individuals given by Donald A. Kreuckeberg (1983) or Dana F. White (19891, and to single biographies such as the one of Frederick Law Olmsted, Sr. by Laura Roper (19731, or to those several planners’ portraits in the Journal of the American Planning Association.) Di Biai and Gabellini do not totally reject planning history written up until now. They start from the assumption that a wide and global historical interpretation, risks to flaten the variances between individual ways to consider the role of planning (and planners) in the social contest. There are different kinds of planning approaches and a linear lecture of planning evolution forces toward hypotheses that are too much aggregate and general. Biographic research -when dealing with several individuals- aims, on the contrary, to describe both the contrasts and the points of convergence. This Italian planning history, concentrated after World War II, is narrated here, by different authors, throuh the life of seven planners: Luigi Piccinato (1899- 1931, Plinio Marconi (1893- 19741, Giuseppe Samona (1898-1983), Ludovico Quaroni (19111987) Giancarlo De Carlo (born 19191, Giovanni Asteno (1915-19901, and Giuseppe Campos Venuti
edition that he is working on a model of rural policy and planning to be used as a guide for future contributions. This seems like an excellent idea for addressing the unwieldy scope of the series and to promote carefully focused and concise overviews for each nation. I would also hope for more comparisons between countries! by various criteria, which is not attempted in the 1995 volume, except in the section on Europe. In summary, PIRPAP is a valuable series in rural policy and planning. The objectives of the series are valid and worthy! and the material presented has important implications for the study of rural lands and rural people. Unfortunately, the quality and scope of the chapters are uneven. These traits are not unusual in an edited Volume, especially in the context of a yearbook. I remain enthusiastic about reading future books in this series. DONNA L. ERICKSON School of Natural Resources and Environment The University of Michigan Ann Arbor, MI USA
Resource
management
Local Resource Management in Africa. J.P.M. van den Breemer, C.A. Drijver and L.B. Venema (Editors), Wiley, New York, 1995, 245 pp. The study group “Environment and Development” of the Netherlands African Studies Association, in cooperation with the Netherlands Sociological and Anthropological Union (NSAV) and the Centre for Environmental Science at Leiden organized the conference Local Resource Management in Africa in February, 1993. The underlying assumption of the conference was that all African people have to come to terms with their environment and to develop sustainable forms of land use in order to prevent an enormous social-ecological disaster threatening most African countries. Therefore, effective local environmental management is needed. The conference was organized to gain insight into the complex of factors responsible for success or failure,
85
the social and ecological requirements for local environmental management, and the implications for research. The book under review is the proceedings of the conference and was published in 1995. The book is composed of nine case studies, four theoretical contributions, and an introduction and evaluation of the theme of African local resource management. The nine case studies describe a variety of local land-use systems found in Chad, Cameroon (three cases>, Mali (two cases>, Senegal (two cases>, Benin, and Zimbabwe. The cases detail the management of resources such as trees and pastures, conservation of land and water, the protection of fish stock and, the management of wildlife. The theoretical contributions address areas such as the defense of (Groat et al.> and the accountability for (Laban) commons. The interface between central government and the local eommunity, e.g. the forestry extension worker, is also addressed (Wiersum and Lekamre dit Deprez). In the introductory chapter the concept of local resource management is defined as conscious and organized local efforts to durably maintain or to increase the regenerative capacity of local natural resources (Van Breemer and Venema). However, local resource management does not function in isolation, so-called “supralocal” powers influence the system, either in a direct way (such as tree-felling licenses granted by the state) or indirectly (such as general (world) economic conditions). These “supralocal” factors manifest themselves in four modalities. The first modality is that the state is not involved with the local groups. The initiative is taken by the community and its elaboration proceeds autonomously. In four cases, this proved at least temporarily successful. The second modality is that the state is indifferent and does not seek to link up with the local groups. Revertheless influences are there, such as in the case of the fishing community of Zina (Drijver et al.) in which the implementation of a large dam upstream negatively influenced the water levels and, thus, the fish stock. The third modality is that the state is in principle interested and seeks to work with local groups. The successes seem limited as the state apparatus, its institutional culture, and the community dynamics work in different directions. This situation is experienced in social forestry projects in Senegal (Van den Breemer at al.) and the
86
Book reviews
wildlife management programme in Zimbabwe (Olthof). Wiersum and Lekanne dit Deprez elaborate this often conflicting but crucial interface between state and community. The fourth modality is a complete link between government and local groups. In two cases in Benin (De Haan) such a linkage turned out to be effective. Another example, however, shows that the dynamics among the community were insufficiently understood, which resulted in a complete failure of the project (Van Dijk and De Bruin). To allow for successful local resource management in Africa, the following general conditions are enumerated by the authors: 1. Desirable changes in environmental behaviour and investments in natural resources must bring economic benefits to the actors; 2. Legal security for the actors with regard to their access to natural resources as well as to the results of their efforts; 3. Full involvement of the local community in decision making, problem identification, and selection of possible solutions; 4. Linking up with a wider organization or lnstitution to provide protection and power in dealing with outsiders; 5. Self-reliance and self-confidence; 6. Sufficient means and knowledge to sustainably use the environment 7. An enabling environment to be created through legislation, price, and subsidy policies and the development of appropriate technology and participatory training. The authors, in particular, Drijver state that knowledge of the ecological processes over time and on various scale levels, is necessary in order to know how to maintain the regenerative capacity of natural resources. Of course, immediately after the listing of requirements, the question arises, how to facilitate for them. Van den Breemer and Venema stipulate that further research is needed at least in the areas of legislation, incorporation of participatory approaches by the state, on how to select local leaders, and on attitude and behaviour of people with regard to environmental management beyond the economic paradigm and including tradition and culture. The nine case studies give detailed descriptions of local resource management, their successes and their
failures. All together the cases provide a very good overview of what can be expected in participatory local management of natural resources. The more obvious and easy to study issues such as ownership of the environment, the need for security, the role of the state as a facilitator for local initiative, have all been addressed. But also the less obvious factors have been acknowledged. For example, in the Gouzda case described by Drijver and Zorge, factors such as charismatic leadership and ethnic emancipation as the common motivator for the community which made local resource management a success are discussed. This case also showed the need for formal environmental education and informal training on the job of the participating community to achieve an equal partnership between the community, the leaders, and the state. Local resource and environmental planning and management is a fantastic concept which as illustrated in this book has been realized with varying results. One of the many difficulties in the apphcation of the concept is that all systems that create the environment have to be taken into account. The ecology of the area and the society modifying nature to suit its objectives form the basic foundation for the understanding of local resource management. All subsystems; the living and non-living environment and the natural laws steering ‘this subsystem; the economic, socio-cultural, and political subsystems organizing the society, as well as the driving forces behind human actions have to be taken into account and have to be integrated in a workable framework. Furthermore, it has to be understood that in the African context, the state is often still based on a colonial exploitive organization with very different objectives than the organizing principles among the indigenous societies. So, there are two forms of societal organization who as the cases show rarely move in the same direction. Notwithstanding, these difficulties, on the long term local resource management can only be sustainable if both systems, the state as well as the indigenous, are taken into account. The state has to play an enabling and supportive role to facilitate the process of local resource management. The book Local Resource Management in Africa provides a myriad of important and worthwhile experiences. An integrated framework
Book reviews
that would make the concept of local resource management applicable has yet to be formulated. INGRID DUCHHART Agricultural University Wageningen Netherlands
Urbanisti
italiani
Urbanisti Italiani. Piccinato, Marconi, Samona, Quaroni, DeCarlo, Astengo, Campos Venuti. P. Bi Biagi and P. Gabellini (Editors), Editori Laterza, Roma-Bari, Italy, 1992, 593 pp. In Italy the use of the “biographic genre,” as a historiographic tool to analyze thoroughly the field of city and regional planning, has not had a great tradition. Preferences of scholars were to describe city planning as the outcome of the combination of historical circumstances and of political and ideological tensions. Authors of plans were often seen as a part of a group, a school or a current of thought. Individual personalities were overlooked. Sometimes, they were hidden behind the general responsibility of the whole society. In most of city and regional planning history, the role of the individual emerged with difficulty from the complicated plot that made the plan possible. The building of cities and regions was seen as an anonymous and collective effort. The urban (or regional) plan was not merely interpreted as the result of the planner’s mind. It was seen mainly as the translation of ideas included within the institutions and into other planning instruments, present into acts and laws, and expressed by collective subjects. In other words, the plan was seen as the interpretation of all the different views precipitated inside the lobal “culture” of the space to which the plan referred. It is not so easy to understand reasons why the narration of city and regional planning referred more to global issues than personal facts and experiences. However, to a great extent, there are three reasons -in no particular order of importance- which can help to explain this tendency. One is the “death of the author”, described by the French semiologist Roland Barthes, that took place between the 17th and 18th centuries: an important gap in the history of ideas.
87
According to Barthes’ argument, from that moment, scientific discourses were guaranteed by the coherence with the systematic totality of the theories and not by the author who made them. Another reason is the reference for historians, not only for the field of planning and not only in Italy, to the idealistic and Marxist historiographies. Such historiographies tended to reduce the role of the individual, and therefore the biography, as a way to study a complex phenomenon. The last reason is specifically connected with planning instruments. In these documents it is difficult to individuate contributions of the single planner from those of other subjects involved. In Urbanisti Ztaliani, Paola Di Biagi and Patrizia Gabellini, explore telling a part of the history of the Italian city and regional planning starting from a reverse historioraphical point of view. With this book, the two editors test the fertility of the biographical approach in the field of the development of cities and landscapes, which is an in-depth and experienced method in other cultural ambits. (I am thinking, for example, about the importance of the role of individuals given by Donald A. Kreuckeberg (1983) or Dana F. White (19891, and to single biographies such as the one of Frederick Law Olmsted, Sr. by Laura Roper (19731, or to those several planners’ portraits in the Journal of the American Planning Association.) Di Biai and Gabellini do not totally reject planning history written up until now. They start from the assumption that a wide and global historical interpretation, risks to flaten the variances between individual ways to consider the role of planning (and planners) in the social contest. There are different kinds of planning approaches and a linear lecture of planning evolution forces toward hypotheses that are too much aggregate and general. Biographic research -when dealing with several individuals- aims, on the contrary, to describe both the contrasts and the points of convergence. This Italian planning history, concentrated after World War II, is narrated here, by different authors, throuh the life of seven planners: Luigi Piccinato (1899- 1931, Plinio Marconi (1893- 19741, Giuseppe Samona (1898-1983), Ludovico Quaroni (19111987) Giancarlo De Carlo (born 19191, Giovanni Asteno (1915-19901, and Giuseppe Campos Venuti