Everyday Politics of Community Forestry in Quintana Roo, Mexico
Mexico is a among the world's leaders in community-based management
of natural resources like forests and grazing lands. Unlike
many countries where natural resources are owned and managed either
privately or publicly (by the state), a significant percentage
of Mexico's natural resources are managed communally by agrarian
reform land grant communities called "ejidos." Communal
management of temperate and tropical forests across Mexico presents
numerous challenges and opportunities for relatively low income
agrarian communities. It also represents an important contribution
to biodiversity conservation where communities can maintain livelihoods
without converting forests to pasture or agricultural plantations.
My research on community forest management in Quintana Roo, Mexico
considers three areas of inquiry: (1) impacts of neoliberal reforms on local organization and everyday politics, (2) environmental and political histories of agrarian
reform, and (3) common pool resource management. The first area
seeks to understand if and how structural reforms at the national
level linked to neoliberal reforms (e.g. changes to agrarian law) impact
community forestry enterprises and associated social processes. The second area looks at
the emergence of agrarian reform land grant communities (ejidos)
in Quintana Roo since the 1940s and examines how state interventions
have shaped community politics and resource management over time. The
third area investigates how land grant communities collectively
manage their forests through the development of mutually agreeable
rules for use. In particular, I look at how rule systems
for common pool resource management are shaped by long-standing
cultural and political practices.
Publications in this area:
2009. Shades of Social Capital: Elite Persistence and the Everyday Politics of Community Forestry in Southeastern Mexico. Environment and Planning A 41(2):389-406 . [View article]
2009. Social Process as Everyday Practice: The Micro Politics of Conservation and Development in Southeastern Mexico. Policy Sciences 42(2):137-162. [View article]
2005. "Community
Adaptation or Collective Breakdown?: The Formation of 'Work
Groups' in Two Ejidos in Quintana Roo, Mexico." Pp. 151-179 in Bray, Merino-Pérez, and Barry (eds.). The Community-Managed Forests of Mexico: Managing for Sustainability . Austin: University
of Texas Press.
Wilshusen, P.R., L. Raleigh, and V. Russell. 2002. "By, For, and Of the People:
The Development of Two Community Protected Areas in Oaxaca, Mexico." Journal
of Sustainable Forestry 15(1): 113-126.
Politics of International Biodiversity Conservation
Biodiversity conservation programs have assumed increasing importance
worldwide to stem the tide of species loss and habitat degradation,
including tropical deforestation. Conservation organizations focus the bulk of their
efforts on "biodiversity hotspots," which are ecologically rich
areas of the planet that face intense threats from human action. Interestingly,
these biodiversity hotspots also tend to be social and political
hotbeds; places like the Democratic Republic of Congo, Colombia,
and the Philippines feature violent conflict, political instability,
and economic stagnation. Social and political hotbeds in
many cases also feature burgeoning popular movements that link
nature protection, local development, and social justice.
My research in this area seeks to untangle the complex social
processes and negotiations that unfold where conservation interventions
seek to limit human use of natural resources in order to protect
ecologically valuable areas. In exploring the politics of
nature protection, I also examine applied measures--such as institutional design, organizational restructuring, and conflict resolution--to overcome
the inevitable organizational and political challenges that emerge.
Publications in this area:
Brechin, S.R., P.R. Wilshusen, C.F. Fortwangler, and P.C. West. 2003 Contested Nature: Promoting International
Biodiversity with Social Justice in the Twenty-first Century. Albany:
SUNY Press.
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Individual Chapters:
Wilshusen, P.R., S.R. Brechin, C.F. Fortwangler, and P.C. West. 2003. "Contested Nature: Conservation and Development at the Turn of the 21 st Century." (Pp. 1-24).
Wilshusen, P.R. 2003. "The Political Contours of Conservation: A Conceptual View of
Power in Practice." (Pp. 41-58).
Wilshusen, P.R. 2003. "Territory, Nature, and Culture: Negotiating the Boundaries of
Biodiversity Conservation in Colombia's Pacific Coastal Region." (Pp. 73-88).
Brechin, S.R., P.R. Wilshusen, and C.E. Benjamin. 2003. "Crafting Conservation Globally and Locally: Complex Organizations
and Governance Regimes." (Pp. 159-182).
Wilshusen, P.R. and R.E. Murguía. 2003. "Scaling Up From the Grassroots: NGO Networks and the Challenges of Organizational Maintenance in Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula." (Pp. 195-216).
Brechin, S.R., P.R. Wilshusen, C.F. Fortwangler, and P.C. West. 2003. "The Road Less Traveled: Toward Nature Protection with Social
Justice." (Pp. 251-270).
Wilshusen, P.R., S.R. Brechin, C.F. Fortwangler, and P.C. West. 2002. "Reinventing a Square
Wheel: Critique of a Resurgent 'Protection Paradigm' in International
Biodiversity Conservation." Society and Natural Resources 15:17-40.
[PDF]
Brechin, S.R., P.R. Wilshusen, C.F. Fortwangler, and P.C. West. 2002 "Beyond the Square
Wheel: Toward a More Comprehensive Understanding of Biodiversity
Conservation as Social and Political Process." Society and
Natural Resources 15:41-64. [PDF]
Wilshusen, P.R. 2000. Local Participation
in Conservation and Development Projects: Ends, Means, and Power
Dynamics. Pp.
288-326 in Clark, Willard, and Cromley (eds.). Foundations
of Natural Resource Policy and Management . New Haven: Yale
University Press.
Practice Theory, Power Dynamics, and Political Ecology
The field of political ecology presents a number of important areas of inquiry related to conceptualizations of power. I am interested in exploring the work of French social theorist Pierre Bourdieu's theory of practice as it related to power dynamics. Bourdieu's and related writing on practice theory offer both an actor-centered and structural understanding of social life that have yet to be fully explored in the political ecology literature.
Publications in this area:
2009. Shades of Social Capital: Elite Persistence and the Everyday Politics of Community Forestry in Southeastern Mexico. Environment and Planning A 41(2):389-406 . [View article]
2009. Social Process as Everyday Practice: The Micro Politics of Conservation and Development in Southeastern Mexico. Policy Sciences 42(2):137-162. [View article]
