Adaptive collaborative management of community forests in Asia ...

60 • Cynthia McDougall, Hemant Ojha, Raj Kumar Pandey, Mani Ram Banjade and Bishnu Hari Pandit
adaptiveness. It appeared that as the Community Forestry Programme
grew rapidly and became routinised, the social and institutional aspects of
forestry were somewhat overshadowed by the technical aspects, including
afforestation, and the goal of meeting targets for CFUG formation. Some
studies suggest that ‘commonly weak’ CFUG formation processes lead to
weak institutional CFUG processes and often a ‘replication of the village
authority structure in the new [CFUG] institution, in which high caste
and wealthy men dominate by default’ (Springate-Baginski and Blaikie
2003: 11; Acharya 2002). This trend has been abetted by a combination
of factors, including culturally embedded hierarchies and bureaucratic
tendencies. The limited progress in the relations and institutional learning
and adaptiveness have likely hindered the ability of community forestry
user groups, and specifically their marginalised subgroups, to navigate their
complex and changing environments. This mismatch between a complex
and dynamic context with relatively linear and top-down approaches
suggested the need for innovation (Kanel and Pokharel 2002: 47):
… a need has emerged over the last few years for strategies that can
add value to CF processes and relationships so that equity and benefits
can be enhanced. The increasing number of CFUGs, service providing
agencies, stakeholders, and complexities in their relationships, as well
as the changing and dynamic context of community forestry at various
levels point to the need for such a strategy to contribute to making
community forestry concept and procedures more collaborative,
flexible and adaptive (in the sense of ‘proactively responsive’). The
dynamic and multi-level nature of [community forestry] demands
that such strategies be institutionalized in the implementation process
as well as at the policy making level.
Project overview and methodology
The goal of the Adaptive Collaborative Management of Community
Forests Research Project in Nepal was to generate research-based lessons
to enable more effective and equitable community forestry governance and
management practices at all levels as a means of enhancing sustainability
and the well-being of diverse women, men and children. Specific objectives
included the identification, development and critical assessment of
conditions, processes and outcomes of social learning and collaborative (or
adaptive and collaborative) approaches to the governance and management
of community forests 12 .