Exploring the context and elements of local environmental stewardship: An embedded case study of the Niagara Region,Canada

Environmental stewardship—a concept that describes the relationships between humans and the environment—is gaining increased attention as an approach that can address planetary sustainability issues. In-depth empirical investigations of local environmental stewardship are needed to understand how social-ecological context influences stewardship, as well as the arrangement of conceptual elements in applied settings. This study addresses these needs by conducting an in-depth exploration of environmental stewardship in the Niagara Region of Canada. A single embedded case study design is employed, with environmental stewardship initiatives constituting the individual units of analysis with the case. Analysis of the spatial arrangement of a total of 89 initiatives indicated that initiatives tended to cluster closer to the Niagara River and in more populous municipalities. The significance of collaboration, tensions between the environment and economic development, and concerns about political impacts emerged as themes across contextual factors. The configuration of stewardship elements reveals interesting discrepancies between initiatives and previous stewardship research focused on larger scales, individuals, and organizations. Further analysis is encouraged to illuminate environmental stewardship in other settings as well as advance relational understanding of conceptual elements.     

Exploring stakeholder groups through a testimony analysis on the Hawaiian aquarium trade

ABSTRACT

A remote archipelago, Hawai'i, offers a plethora of sought after coastal and marine tourism experiences. The same unique marine fauna that draws tourists also makes Hawai'i a major player in the international ornamental aquarium trade. For many residents of Hawai'i, the marine realm is part of their island home and interactions with tourists and tourism activities are a part of everyday life. For many residents, the ocean is an important resource and for some a staple source of livelihood, be it through tourism, fisheries, or the aquarium trade. This variance between extractive and non-extractive marine resource use creates conflicts between stakeholder groups in Hawai'i. This study thematically analyzes public testimony records, which included 1652 individual testimonies, from proposed legislation aimed to establish ‘an aquatic life conservation program in the Division of Aquatic Resources to implement conservation measures, including limited entry areas and certification requirements, to regulate the collection of fish and other aquatic life for aquarium purposes. Public opinions evident in individual testimonies are representative of the disagreement in the literature regarding the stability and health of reef fishes populations in Hawai'i and broader resource-user conflicts. This study aims to better describe the user conflict between stakeholder groups in the marine resources of Hawai'i by exposing themes concerning change in natural environments.     

Stylistic variability of stemmed obsidian tools (mata’a), frequency seriation,and the scale of social interaction on Rapa Nui (Easter Island)

Easter Island, or Rapa Nui, has been the focus of much research and speculation, particularly with reference to the island’s hundreds of giant, enigmatic statues and the set of conditions that supported their construction and transportation. In this paper, we analyze an abundant class of lithic artifacts, mata’a, to study of patterns of cultural transmission with implications for the evolution of groups, competition, and scale of socio-political organization among this island population. While these kinds of studies often draw upon assemblages of decorated ceramics, here we show how analysis of variability unconstrained by performance allows us to measure aspects of inheritance related to the manufacture of these artifacts. In the case of mata’a from Rapa Nui, we demonstrate that it is possible to reach falsifiable conclusions about the evolutionary dynamics that shaped the remarkable archaeological record on Rapa Nui.     

Development for Whom? Rural to Urban Resettlement at the Three Gorges Dam,China

When farmers are dispossessed of their lands to make way for a development project it is often inevitable that there will not be enough land to go around. It is unlikely that parcels of fertile land are lying vacant in the surrounding areas awaiting distribution. It therefore becomes necessary for people who previously derived their livelihoods from the land to move into cities. This research explores what happens to a sample of such people and whether they are able to restore their livelihoods. It examines the Three Gorges Dam resettlement in China's Hubei province and discovers that while the Chinese government has devised an inspired toolbox of benefit-sharing initiatives, the gains accrue to a minority who live in the most amenable location of the Three Gorges area. It concludes that the availability of capital through benefit-sharing initiatives does not guarantee its productive use.     

Unmanaging the past: Truth,data and the human being

Management systems in archaeology seek to impose the scientific objective‐reductionist paradigm on archaeologists and their data. This orthodoxy has been enshrined in English Heritage's document Management of Archaeological Projects (English Heritage 1991) which prescribes rigorous application of a standardized methodology. MAP II, as it is known, is based on a processual model in which ‘data’ enter at one end and valuable archaeology emerges at the other. Such a view not only lacks any appreciation of the distinctions between ‘data’ and ‘information’ but also fails to acknowledge the beliefs and values which underpin the decision‐making criteria crucial to the model. In this paper we argue for an approach which un‐manages the past — by building relativistic humans into our strategies for dealing with the past. Examples are given which demonstrate how such an approach might work in practice.