Community clusters in wildlife and environmental management: using TEK and community involvement to improve co-management in an era of rapid environmental change

Polar research

Martha Dowsley¹ 

[1] Geography Department, Lakehead University, 955 Oliver Road, Thunder Bay, Ontario P7B 5E1, CanadaCorrespondence

关键词: Adaptation to climate change;    community-based management;    Inuit;    Nunavut;    polar bears;    traditional ecological knowledge.;   

DOI  :  10.1111/j.1751-8369.2008.00093.x

学科分类：自然科学（综合）

来源: Co-Action Publishing

【 摘 要 】

Environmental change has stressed wildlife co-management systems in the Arctic because parameters are changing more rapidly than traditional scientific monitoring can accommodate. Co-management systems have also been criticized for not fully integrating harvesters into the local management of resources. These two problems can be approached through the use of spatiallydefined human social units termed community clusters, which are based on the demographic or ecological units being managed. An examination of polar bear management in Nunavut Territory, Canada, shows that community clusters provide a forum to collect and analyse traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) over a geographic area that mirrors the management unit, providing detailed information of local conditions. This case study also provides examples of how instituting community clusters at a governance level provides harvesters with social space in which to develop their roles as managers, along the continuum from being powerless spectators to ac...

【 授权许可】

CC BY-NC