AEGIS ECAS 2007 - View abstract

Panel	26. Decentralising power and natural resource control: responses and perspectives
Paper ID	88
Author(s)	Dubois, Olivier
Paper	View paper (PDF)
Abstract	The context where small-scale natural producers operate contains a significant dose of uncertainty, linked to changing policy, legal and institutional frameworks, changing market conditions and often erratic climatic events. This is combined with the need to account for various stakeholders (often) divergent interests. Therefore, a working definition of capacity building should focus on those capacities needed for local stakeholders (government agencies, communities and private operators) to adjust to changing ecological, socio-economic and institutional circumstances. The emphasis on changes means that both resource capacities and institutional capacities of local stakeholders need to be strengthened, where:  Resource capacities refer to adequacy of resources in terms of “hardware” (funds, equipment, material and infrastructure) and “software” (information, knowledge and skills); and  Institutional capacities (or governance capacities) relate to the enabling institutional environment, which allows for a cost effective use of resource capacities. Changing and uncertain circumstances mean that stakeholders’ roles in NRM are often in the process of being or will soon have to be negotiated. As a result  Capacity to manage role changes must be added to the definition of capacity building provided above. A simple definition of capacity could then become “the capacity to manage changing circumstances and roles in relation to land husbandry and natural resource management”;  An operational definition of the rather vague term of roles then becomes crucial. In other words, answer questions such as who has and should have the right and responsibility to do what, followed by who should benefit and pay for use/management/conservation, and finding the right balance between these things. However, the most important factor local stakeholder arrangements is the quality of relationships. This is not easy to assess in a constructive way. One possible way to address this question is through the use a tool aimed to define stakeholders’ roles via their respective ‘4Rs’, i.e.  the balance of Rights, Responsibilities and Returns/Revenues, both within and between stakeholder groups;  The characteristics of stakeholders’ mutual relationships, in terms of quality, degree of formality/informality and type of dependency.  Finally, capacity needs should be assessed on the basis of stakeholders’ new roles in the context of NRM. This implies that only once these roles have been negotiated and agreed upon by local stakeholders. The need for partnerships between different stakeholder groups also implies that one must address the issues of power disparity between these groups, and the capacities to deal with it. Indeed the sustainability of participatory processes has often to do with the local power game/power disparity. Hence the importance of assessing and managing power issues for participatory processes to be successful. The problem with assessing power is twofold:  You can't asses it directly, i.e. no use in telling the mightier party that is too powerful  Power disparity is often assessed ex post, i.e. as an outcome of an agreement, when one notices the losing and winning parties. One possible way forward is to assess power indirectly,. via proxies such as stakeholders' roles. This brings us back to the need to clearly define roles, and of the possible use of the ‘4Rs’ in that respect.

The Capacity to Manage Role Changes and Power Issues in Natural Resource Management: How the '4Rs' tool can contribute to it