Partnerships between local and scientific knowledge

[...] How can PPSR can help foster collaboration between scientific and local knowledge? [...]

Thank you Anne and Daniela for hosting this discussion forum!

I recently attended the 2011 Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference in Vancouver, BC.  The USGS Pacific Coastal and Marine Science Center presented  a cool project that integrates water quality monitoring with the Coastal Salish annual canoe Tribal Journeys.  The canoes carry water quality monitoring equipment and characterize coastal ecosystem conditions and change along Coast Salish ancestral water highways (traditional travel routes).  This is a great example of Tribal participation in water quality monitoring and partnership/collaboration with government agencies to collect this important data.  I will send the group the link to the conference proceedings when they become available.

That’s really interesting, Karen.  Do you know anything about how the project got started?  It would be interesting to know about the brainstorming process that led this to this idea – if it was something that the community proposed, or if it came out of a planning workshop, etc.

Thanks Karen! Nice example to get us started with this forum on collaboration between local and scientific knowledge in PPSR—yes please send the conference proceedings link when you have it. From your description it sounds as though local people were helping USGS scientists extend water quality monitoring into critical areas via their traditional waterways, great idea. Do you know if there was inclusion of Coastal Salish knowledge and observations of change to complement the USGS monitoring? I’m asking because social scientists have for a long time proposed different scales of “participation”, especially in development work. In an interesting article Cornwall (Cornwall, A. (2008). Unpacking ‘Participation’: models, meanings and practices. Community Development Journal 43: 269–283) documents a number of these typologies, most from the perspective of the extent of local peoples’ involvement. Typologies include classes ranging from non participation, nominal, consultatory, functional, to work that is initiated by local people
themselves. In many cases extent of participation is assumed to be synonymous with amount of time or effort expended. As we report and discuss partnerships in PPSR it might be useful to ask ourselves if our examples fit into a basic typology, but also to ask if the amount of time or effort is a good measure of participation and partnership. What about when the idea for the research is a local one? What about when the field labor is local, but the agenda is set by the scientists alone? Let us know your experiences
with partnerships and how you might gauge the participation involved.    

I learned about this project from a colleague that works with one of the main tribes involved–but an important element is that the project involves many tribes/First Nations. Here’s the website link: 

http://www.coastsalishgathering.com/With regard to Daniela’s question, the website notes, “The Coast Salish leadership has joined forces to begin the process of gathering and developing environmental indicators that incorporate modern and traditional science from the Salish Sea. The outcome is to incorporate traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) with the science-based environmental indicators of the Salish Sea. The blending of modern and traditional science will provide the leadership with information to develop policy to protect and sustain the culture of the Coast Salish Peoples.”

This article referred to the origins of the project circa 2007 and the intent of integrating water quality science with cultural traditions: http://www.coastsalishgathering.com/news/2009JuneAwardrecognizesCoast%20Salish.pdf

I’ll focus this post on the choice of target groups to work with for these kinds of collaborations. The project I’ve been involved with has worked with high school and college students who are tribal members (see http://www.terralingua.org/bcdconservation/?p=227). We’ve been able to work with a community school to develop a summer ecology program for this group. This age group offers several advantages for collaborations:
1) The jump from high school to college is a critical juncture for many tribal members who have the skills, interest, and time to serve as intermediaries between local/traditional knowledge (especially through their grandparents/informal educators) and scientific knowledge (through their formal education). While there are often older individuals who have more experience, it can be challenging for them to complete the college programs that are useful for getting a solid grounding in the scientific methods (particularly because they have more family commitments).
2) We can tap a variety of different funding/staffing approaches at this age, through college internships and high school programs, and encourage participants to continue their work in college. There are fewer opportunities to provide such continuity as participants grow older.
3) It can be a challenge to build a program that works with both youth and elders equally well. We have been able to benefit from other programs that have worked more closely with elders with specific traditional knowledge, by using materials that they have developed (i.e., maps, stories, and plant guides).
4) Our program has developed ties with the Tribal government, which has hired one of the program alumni as an intern. This collaboration is helping to translate the participatory research into on-the-ground restoration actions, and provides another means to connect cultural knowledge (such as identifying important cultural resources) and scientific knowledge (such as monitoring programs).
A bottom line is that this kind of work requires broad, long-term investments, so collaborations that leverage resources are very important.

Another program that I learned about recently is the Elwha Science Education Program which received NSF support. This project worked with middle and high school students in the Elwha watershed. http://www.naturebridge.org/olympic-park/elwha-science-education-project. The website includes a section on evaluation of the project, which I think is fairly representative of the challenges that these kinds of programs face. Those challenges may be even greater when working with younger students for whom college or science jobs are a bit more remote.

Hi Anne,

Great questions. Thanks for starting the discourse!

A few themes related to methods or approaches that may help support collaboration between local and scientific knowledge in PPSR emerging from the ELOKA conference can be summarized as methods that (1) perpetuate pracice, (2) connect people, (3) tell stories, (4) recognize comunity ownership, (5) provide community access, (6) share information, and (7) compare trends in resource condition over time, space, and discipline.

Examples discussed include Yuptik community engagement through preservation of oral histories etc. It seems that methods that stem from the culture/community itself and that are embraced by that culture work best and those that allow communities to tell their own story appear to also be successful.

Cheers from ELOKA – Geg

One of the organizations I work with is the South Coast Conservation Program. We have worked with local community groups and municipal/regional authorities (corresponds to county level in the US) to deliver BioBlitzes (biodiversity marathons). These are one of the key ways in whch citizen scientists (local interests, naturalists and non-specialists) become linked to specialists and experts. Together participants inventory as many species of flora and fauna as they can in a set period of time. While the data gathered by non-experts can be very coarse level, having the combined expertise of specialists helps to quality assure the inventory data.  In the end a relatively good biodiversity snapshot can be developed and things like new invasive species or at risk species can be confirmed or identified. All this creates a baseline that local interests can hopefully build on over time, especially by conducting BioBlitzes every few years. Local decision makers can also use the data gathered as part of land use planning and baseline inventory.

Thanks for this Greg – and we are really looking forward to hearing back on some of the results of the ELOKA conference in a couple of weeks!
Lately I’ve been doing a lot of reading on this subject – especially in community-based natural resources mgmt projects – and a common question that comes up is one of integration or ‘synergy’.  Is it possible, or even desirable, to try to bridge or combine different knowledge systems?  Or are they best used to complement one another in a mutually inclusive way?  Perhaps one way of thinking about this is to look at participatory monitoring programs.  In what way can such programs (that are typically based on western science models of data collection) integrate local knowledge into the different steps of the process?  A couple of interesting articles on these ideas are:

Becker, C. D. and K. Ghimire (2003). “Synergy Between Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Conservation Science Supports Forest Preservation in Ecuador.” Ecology and Society 8(1): 1.

Huntington, H. P. (2000). “Using Traditional Ecological Knowledge in Science: Methods and Applications ” Ecological Applications 10: 1270-1274.

The entire issue 41 of Biotropica (2009)

For more references please check out or join our zotero group: http://www.zotero.org/groups/local_knowledge_in_ppsr

Hello all

I am new to this field and am interested to know whether people think the approaches and theories developed with regard to indigenous knowledge and Western science would be applicable to ecologists working with farmers in the UK? I am very interested in exploring how scientists value land managers’ knowledge in Cumbria.

Could (some?) UK farmers be thought of as having traditional knowledge?

Any links, suggestions etc gratefully received. Apologies if this is a naive posting!

Thanks, Beth

Welcome, Beth! There’s some foundational work by Brian Wynne that speaks to this, looking at the case of sheep farmers in Cumbria and the interplay of farmers’ and scientists’ knowledges of the impact of fallout after the Chernobyl disaster. Here’s a link to just one of his papers (don’t know about your institutional access, but if you do a Google scholar search on this it should come up with a link to a PDF):
http://pus.sagepub.com/content/1/3/281.short
I’d love to hear others’ thoughts and reflections, both on Wynne’s work and contributions, and on other cases that would speak to Beth’s query!

The examples we are getting are so
far seem to show a range of different methods for PPSR. Pam and Jonathan gave
examples of supporting stewards and stewardship via technical & other
training, and improving the scope and capacity of science. Jonathan also
mentions the importance of a clear understanding of the specific opportunities,
knowledge and needs of different community members, a pretty critical
methodological issue.

I found it especially interesting
that the Pictures of Apache Land project (http://www.terralingua.org/bcdconservation/?p=227)
mentions elder involvement in the project as sources of descriptive cultural
knowledge of the sites today and in the past, but also of more conceptual knowledge such as the discussion of different water sounds as
indicators of water body health. What a terrific example of the power of
careful, thoughtful observation and analysis! Perhaps it is my bias, but I see
many of these comments as bringing us around to a topic which we’ll look into
in the weeks ahead—models of knowledge and how those impact our collaborations.

Greg’s list of PPSR methods of
interest to the current ELOKA workshop (Exchange for Local Observations and
Knowledge of the Arctic, http://eloka-arctic.org/news/eloka_workshop.html)
struck me as useful responses to the question of “Why should we share our local
knowledge? Why should we participate?” Protecting/preserving culture, community
and territory is a major motivator (numbers 1-5 on the ELOKA list), and the
Apache project certainly focused on this. Perhaps the other motivation for
participation might be summarized as the hope that doing so can result in
positive change otherwise not possible (6-7 in ELOKA list). How then can that
goal, synergy between local and scientific knowledge be accomplished in a form
more balanced than in the past? What do you think?

PS: Just the fact that we are
having this discussion is a great sign in itself; the shift from “citizen
science” to PPSR seems a mini occupy movement of this area of research!

Thanks very much Jennifer

Great point Beth! That is specifically why we chose to use “local knowledge” in the  title of this discussion instead of “indigenous” or even “traditional”. We are implying that it is the specific, empirical, lived experience and observations that create a knowledge which may, in some parts, differ from knowledge gained via processes that grow out of more formalized approaches that may not be locally-based. Using “local” is also helpful because it does not assume that traditional or indigenous people have static, ancient knowledge. 

Certainly there are UK farmers and land managers whose observations and experiences have created a deep local knowledge of their environments. Have you noticed particular insights among land managers you have worked with that are distinct from scientists’ knowledge? 

Great point Beth! That is specifically why we chose to use “local knowledge” in the  title of this discussion instead of “indigenous” or even “traditional”. We are implying that it is the specific, empirical, lived experience and observations that create a knowledge which may, in some parts, differ from knowledge gained via processes that grow out of more formalized approaches that may not be locally-based. Using “local” is also helpful because it does not assume that traditional or indigenous people have static, ancient knowledge. 

Certainly there are UK farmers and land managers whose observations and experiences have created a deep local knowledge of their environments. Have you noticed particular insights among land managers you have worked with that are distinct from scientists’ knowledge? 

Thanks Anne and Daniela for this timely discussion. On question 1: Conservation is a field where there is a lot of interesting and innovative methodological work that draws on (sometimes conflictual) partnerships between local and scientific knowledge. One example I know is the Chinantec communities in Oaxaca, Mexico that set up the Regional Committee for Chinantla Alta Natural Resources (CORENCHI) to strengthen conservation efforts and obtain more socio-economic benefits from landscape management. With the help of a variety of technical and financial partners, CORENCHI developed statutes for the management of natural resources and demarcated different land use zones, including conserved areas where the communities’ general assemblies agreed to strictly forbid land use changes, watershed disturbances and hunting of wildlife. The Global Diversity Foundation has been working with three of the communities which have formed teams of local researchers who are assessing these conservation actions while formulating management plans for their Voluntary Conserved Areas. The communities are also evaluating the impact of a Payment for Environmental Services (PES) program which has provided financial incentives to the communities, but has also required significant changes in traditional agricultural practices, land use and resource management. The methods are diverse … participatory mapping, focus groups, local herbaria, community video and many more.

Hello, my work with Cumbrian farmers is just beginning…. Thanks for the response. Beth

Beth,

You may want to look at the work of Lynn Huntsinger and her lab at UC Berkeley. She works in range management and ecology in different places including California, USA, and with farmers and landowners. Some of her work includes participatory methods, local knowledge.

http://ourenvironment.berkeley.edu/people_profiles/lynn-huntsinger/

Hello Gary–great to hear from you! This is a really interesting example of your long term work in Oaxaca and I think you have many insights that would be valuable to the group. One thing I would like to hear more about in terms of methods relates to the type of Chinantec knowledge that is included in this project. Many of the local-scientific knowledge partnerships that I have seen or read about focus on the rich descriptive capacity of local knowledge. However, it seems pretty rare that what might be called conceptual knowledge–things like causal relationships, fundamental principles etc–are included from the part of local knowledge. So my questions are: 1) Can you give us some quick examples of the type of local knowledge being brought into the CORENCHI work? and 2) A brief idea of a specific method being used to include that knowledge? Your answers would be really useful for us all as we look for and discuss the nitty gritty of how to create such partnerships.

Thanks! 

Daniela

Thanks for your post Gary!  This is just to second Daniela’s request for more details on the specific methods used – any best practices that you could identify, or references that people could access?

Anne reminded me to mention that the organization Terralingua has useful case studies of efforts focused on bio-cultural diversity conservation:

http://www.terralingua.org/bcdconservation/

That website has a section on projects around the globe (including our project in Cibecue Arizona, but mostly ones outside the U.S.) that are addressing conservation of biocultural diversity. These projects have been written up in a “Global Sourcebook for Biocultural Diversity Conservation” that is available as a hardcopy book. They are inviting folks to add their projects to the sourcebook. They also have a newsletter and a forum for discussing topics, one of which is “gaps in biodiversity conservation.” The discussions get more active when they host their webinar sessions, which may interest folks in this group.

Terralingua has released an interesting assessment tool called VITEK, “Vitality Index for Traditional Ecological Knowledge,” which is intended to “focus on rating the vitality status of TEK (i.e. inferrable trends of retention or loss over time) within selected groups and allow for relative comparisons of that status among groups at different scales of inclusiveness. Another intended feature is to measure the vitality status of different semantic/behavioral domains within the rubric of TEK in order to identify which types of knowledge are most vulnerable to change.” 

http://www.terralingua.org/projects/vitek/vitek.htm 

I’ve thought about whether it might be useful to apply this tool for assessment or monitoring. Perhaps others will be interested in this approach.

Thanks Jonathan—Are there people at TerraLingua, or the project they support, who may want to join this discussion? I mean, in addition to you of course!

Also, it would be really great to just get a glimpse of how local and scientific knowledge interacted in the Cibecue project. Could you give us an example? I know you have already told us some important aspects and lessons, but for me it always helps to learn about a specific, on the ground example of the local-scientific interaction.

Thank you!

Daniela

Well, there are lots of practical examples that I could mention, such as identifying places that had resources of ecological interest, relocating historical photos, and getting insights into past conditions. Another  example was when one of our students reported that he was working on a paper for one of his classes describing different varieties of reed (Phragmites), which is a culturally important plant. He was working from cultural traditions about there being two different kinds with different cultural uses, and I described to him some of the ecological sources of variation (including different genotypes and water chemistry) that might contribute to that variation. This has led to discussions about how students in the project could examine the different kinds of reed in the region and their habitats to understand what factors are driving the observed differences. Unlike most other parts of the country, reeds in our area have undergone significant declines and cultural advisors consider them a priority for restoration, so this line of inquiry could have practical implications.

This forum encouraged a few PhD students from the Lancaster Environment Centre (a large department covering geography, ecology, environmental science and others) to get together to discuss the question posed on methods used in supporting PPSR.  None of us
has a lot of experience in this field, but most of us are interacting in some way with local communities either locally in the UK or abroad in the Neotropics through our research.  As a group we are keen to encourage more interdisciplinary work, so thanks very much for helping us get a discussion group going!

We came up with a few key things we felt would be useful for people who are interested in starting working in this area of research to consider:
     
1) Researcher preconceptions – before starting your research, you need to accept that you will have to let go of many of your assumptions and perspectives on particular issues – it is quite easy to assume that the people you will be working with are likely to think about issues in a similar way to you, although this is probably not the case.  One way to deal with this could be to explicitly consider what assumptions you might hold, in order that you do not end up being blinded by them – especially when working in communities you are not familiar with. 

2) Power interactions are a key issue to consider – there is often a suggestion that scientists should work with local communities to create a joint system of understanding and knowledge about an issue.  However, it seems that there is a strong likelihood that during this process, the people with the more powerful knowledge system will pick and choose the most complimentary aspects of the lower power knowledge system, thus ignoring potentially important and interesting elements of the latter.  Considering techniques like horizontal knowledge transmission may be a way to equalise relationships between different groups – rather than a very top-down approach to sharing information.   

3) It may also be necessary to consider different scales of integration between knowledge systems depending on the situation – sometimes it may be possible to attempt to completely integrate two knowledge
systems together, thus creating synergy in a management scheme or policy, whereas other times a more complimentary, dual system approach would be more appropriate.
 
4) Communicating results – the current academic system is heavily weighted towards rewarding peer-to-peer achievements such as publishing scientific papers, rather than encouraging academics to communicate their results to non-academics.  This is an issue for academics working with communities or in a PPSR context, where sustainable interactions are key to long-term research projects, and good relations between academics and community members makes
research a lot easier.  A key element of this, which also related to point
2) is that academics need to ensure they are listening, both to each other and to non-academics. 

Any feedback on our ideas is much appreciated!

Recently, we assessed the various methods used for supporting collaboration between local and scientific knowledge in those PPSR contexts in developing countries where the aim is to create sustainable and resilient livelihoods by improving natural resource management. Our assessment was based on
a review of the literature and an international symposium we held here in Denmark. This led us
to propose five non-exclusive, generic methods that seem suitable:

Patrol records.

Transects.

Species lists.

Photography.

Village group discussions.

We have reviewed each of
these methods and provided some examples of published case studies that use the
methods (described on pg 2514 onwards in

http://monitoringmatters.org/articles/full1.pdf).

Hi Jonathan and all,

Thank you for this interesting discussion. When
investigating the success or failure of PPSR approaches, I suggest there is a
need for rethinking current evaluation approaches.  Often methods for monitoring and assessing the environment are evaluated
mainly on the basis of their power to detect a trend in e.g. species abundance
within a certain level of significance. Methods are rarely evaluated for their
ability to impact management and conservation of natural resources.

I suggest that we should also evaluate monitoring and assessment (incl.
PPSR) methods on the basis of the number and characteristics of conservation management
interventions that emanate from the schemes. A ‘management intervention’ can
for instance be a municipal byelaw that only allows harvesting of shellfish
beyond a certain size.

This would encourage a holistic approach whereby monitoring and
assessment (and PPSR schemes) are seen as integrated aspects of management. The
‘management intervention’ unit is close to the end-point: conservation and
sustainable resource use on-the-ground. Keeping track of management
interventions can also help provide direction in PPSR schemes.

I am sure that many PPSR practitioners know very well that their
initiatives have led to a great number of conservation management
interventions. This needs attention, I think.

Finn,
Excellent points! One of the complexities of this particular topic is that there are so many interrelated, multiple-scale objectives of these programs that it can be difficult to design an evaluation strategy that effectively captures the various levels/scales of impact. You point to the importance of community/societal level impacts. I also really like your phrase, “ whereby monitoring and assessment (and PPSR schemes) are seen as integrated aspects of management,” because some of the most powerful examples of success may be when people so value the monitoring/assessment activities that they sustain them and integrate them into management for their own sake.

Emily,

Thanks to you and others in your group for this post! You bring up some good points that I think are a great segue for the next topic in this discussion–models of knowledge. So lets keep these points alive as we move into that discussion!

Daniela

Yes, I second Jonathan’s comment about your post Finn! Great points. 

Perhaps an essential metric for  monitoring and evaluation (M&E) should be explicitly recognized and documented ‘Impact on practice’, or lack thereof. I can imagine this might not necessarily have to be a change in practice; it could be support for current practices, or identification of viable parameters for current practices.

Anything that diminishes the ‘space’ between research and application seems likely to improve the likelihood that the M&E specifically, or PPSR in general, will persist and interest in participation will be maintained. 

I look forward to reading the lit review and conference papers that you linked to below.

Also, though your examples refer to conservation contexts,the metric of impact on practice seems to me to be equally relevant to non-conservation PPSR situations. What do you think?

Do you see local and scientific knowledge as being fundamentally different….or not?  What are the implications for your work in PPSR, and for practice and policy?

Join us as we move to a new question in our discussion of “Partnerships between local and scientific knowledge in PPSR”

Here’s our new question, the third in this forum:

3.What model or models
of knowledge do we each implicitly (or explicitly) adhere to, what are the
accompanying assumptions, and what do those mean for collaboration between
local and scientific knowledge?

Let us know what you think, and what your model means for practice.

I think that central to this discussion is the concept of worldviews.  Even when conservationists aim to take into account local ways of knowing and doing, they often fail to recognize that such knowledge and behaviours are based on values and beliefs that may be very different to those of the conservationists.  

There seems to be increasing realization that the ‘indigenous’ view of conservation is not the same as the typical western way of looking at the need to ‘preserve nature.’  To many aboriginal communities, there is no separation between people and nature – the land, the organisms in it and the way that they act upon it cannot be separated and reduced in the way that western science tends to do.  

There is also a need to acknowledge that native and non-native people have very different ways at looking at concepts such as ‘traditional ecological knowledge’ and ‘indigenous knowledge’.  I read a great article yesterday on this topic by Deborah McGregor:  http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/american_indian_quarterly/v028/28.3mcgregor.html

As someone with more of a natural science background I am sometimes surprised by the general lack of understanding of, or curiousity about, the history and philosophies behind ‘Western science’.

I think this relates to the question Anne and Daniela pose as if  we, as scientists, do not know about the assumptions, belief-systems and context for the development of ‘Western science’, how can we properly understand other societies’?

Sorry if this is a bit off topic!

As an example of the reductionist tendencies of scientific approaches that Anne mentions, I would point to the many of the practices associated with experimental design, such as identification of experimental units and randomization of controls and treatments. Ecological studies may look at study sites as units, while environmental education projects may regard students as experimental units. These practices associated with experimental design may make less sense to local collaborators who see the systems as interconnected and emphasize the uniqueness of those places, persons, and communities. Local people may tend to be more understanding of longitudinal comparisons (changes over time) than cross-community comparisons. Local community members are also more likely to be concerned with holistic solutions to their issues more than generating generalizable findings.

Participatory action research is a useful way to promote reflection on the methods and assumptions underlying a research approach, and to confront the tensions between scientific and local perspectives. Such PAR efforts seem to generally foster greater use of mixed methods of analysis and qualitative approaches,  a more long-term and cyclical view of the science process, and greater recognition of the importance of community values in framing questions and identifying appropriate interventions. Having and cultivating individuals who can move comfortably between the different frames of reference is extremely helpful in the quest for consilience.

I am also a PhD student in the Lancaster Environment Centre
with Emily Adams; a group of PhD students met again on Friday to discuss the
third question posed by Daniela.

Here are some of the points that we raised based on
observations we have made in our own research in the UK and overseas:

We felt that it was important as researchers to realise that
when attempting to understand a community and their practices that they are not
‘specimens’ to be examined, but may possess many similarities to ourselves. This
is related to the level of trust between the researcher and the community being
researched, which is central to achieving successful interaction; it is
important to ‘earn your entry’ to the community.

This follows on to our next point that no community is
homogeneous and the audience of any project should be well known first; the
temporal and spatial aspects of any project should be considered as a
researcher. This consideration is vital in communicating effectively with
communities.

In thinking about how to integrate with communities it is
important to communicate with these groups with respect to their own frames of
reference or worldview, and to portray ideas in a context that they will
understand, which may be significantly different to one’s own worldview.

 ‘WHY? and SO WHAT?’
are frequently asked by community groups and ‘the public’ in relation to the
reason for conducting research. The answers to these questions need to be
clearly identified by ‘the scientists’ (especially when researchers may be more
interested in theoretical rather than empirical contributions to knowledge)
before conducting research so maintain enthusiasm and trust by communities.

Thank you everyone for your discussion so far.

The comments below were formulated from a discussion among several researchers in the Conservation Science Group at the University of Cambridge, led by visiting student Anne Toomey.

We identified several assumptions that conservation scientists may bring with them to a study site and discussed other issues that are important to consider when planning research that will involve interactions with local communities.

Interestingly, several of these points mirror those raised in the discussion at the Lancaster Environment Centre (see previous blog post). 

Knowledge systems and assumptions

1. An understanding of how environments and ecosystems work
 Local communities may have very different understandings of how environments and ecosystems function based on values and beliefs, compared to a conservation scientists’ knowledge based on science and theory. For example some communities may have no concept of a
species declining or going extinct because they believe that animals are put on Earth by God for food.

2. The methods we use to learn and make decisions
Scientists collect data and rely on numbers, maps, models and theory to explain how the world works. In some cultures, discussion and oral based understanding is much more important. We may arrive in a study area with preconceived methods of science and experiments, planning tools and decision making processes. Local communities may be shy, nervous or apprehensive about the methods we use. On the other hand, maps may serve as useful tools to engage with communities, facilitating discussion and understanding.

3. The ecosystem assets and services that we value as important
While conservation scientists value species richness and endemism as important measures of biodiversity, local communities have different needs and uses for the land and therefore value species and landscapes differently. For example rather than valuing forest as an aesthetically pleasing biodiverse carbon storage biome, local communities may see the forest as space to grow crops and hunt. 

4. The reason for research and why are we there
It is important to question what you are doing and why, while trying to be objective, in consideration of other worldviews. While conservation scientists visit an area with the purpose of good-doing, based on previous experience local communities may think that scientists come with hidden agendas, e.g. for gas or mineral exploration or to buy land. From the perspective of a conservation scientist, the aim of research is to acquire knowledge. However, a local community may see it as an opportunity to make money from the scientists.

We also raised some important issues that conservation scientists should consider before interacting with local people and when
researchers think about this topic.

1. We shouldn’t dichotomise scientific and local knowledge
There is a continuum of knowledge. It is important to recognise that a lot of traditional knowledge supports and complements scientific knowledge. It is important to define ‘local’ knowledge in the context of each situation, because local communities could range from
indigenous people who have little contact with other civilisations to recent migrants who have colonised an area a few decades ago, to land owners and farmers who play a vital role in wider society, whose knowledge may be based on science.

2. What type of interaction with the local communities we are aiming for? 
Should local communities have a participatory or consultative role? Are we aiming to monitor a population of monkeys, or are we trying to engage with the community to reduce the pressure of monkey hunting and pet trade? If we are planning to work collaboratively
with local communities it is important to asses and perhaps recalibrate the values underlying the project to reflect those held by both global conservation scientists and the local people. The level of involvement required will determine which strategies should be used to integrate and communicate with the local people. This raises the question about the appropriate level of responsibility scientists should have to educate or engage local people in their research.

3. Do no harm
It is also valuable to be aware of the attitudes and expectations local communities have towards you. For example, there may be an implicit belief that arriving in a car or studying their land will bring development or better times. Even if research is not relevant or has little value to local communities, it is important to clearly communicate what you plan to do (initially) and the conclusions of the study (post-research), in the context of their model of knowledge and worldviews.
 
These ideas do not form a comprehensive list and further brainstorming would be valuable to identify other assumptions that may hinder our connections with local people. It would be useful to produce a set of guidelines outlining the implicit assumptions that conservation scientists work with and possible methods that address, or at least acknowledge, other epistemological frameworks of thinking.
____________________
Please note that the examples used here are not intended to make generalisations across all conservation scientists or all local communities, but are used to illustrate possible extreme situations of the points discussed.

This is our final week for discussing the questions raised on the forum this past month, and to round-up the debate we are posing the forth and last question in this thread:

What kind of ‘cultural competence’ is
needed to facilitate collaboration between different kinds of knowledge, and
how can we continue to learn and grow and gain such competence?Please share your experiences of working with different knowledge systems, practices and worldviews.

I’m a member of the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) and a Co-chair of their Aboriginal Traditional Knowledge Subcommittee.  Our job is to access and integrate the best available scientific, community knowledge (e.g. NGOs, industry) and Aboriginal Traditional Knowledge (ATK) into our decisions about species thought to be at risk of extinction in Canada. 

Our ATK Subcommittee is relatively new (6 years) and had to develop new processes from scratch that fit within the processes of a 30 year advisory body that was original grounded in science.  There are huge challenges with integrating different forms of knowledge and potentially some large implications for First Nation, Metis and Inuit communities sharing their knowledge publicly, but it is possible and it leads to better quality information on which to base conservation decisions.

Sometimes different forms of knowledge do not report the same patterns about species (e.g. polar bear, bowhead whale, woodland caribou), but I expect that.  Each form of knowledge observes the world at unique spatial and temporal scales and should be expected to detect different patterns and processes.  ATK is often localized, but can include observations over millenia; whereas most scientific studies are less than 4 years in duration. Community knowledge is usually somewhere in between.  Scientific studies are designed to eliminate confounding factors in order to simplify the system.  ATK embraces the complexity of systems.   All knowledge is subject to differing filters.

In 2004 I presented on the need for integrating local knowledge into decision making for habitat restoration, the paper can be downloaded from here: http://www.forrex.org/events/mebc/PDF/Part2-5.pdf

Over the last 16 years or so as my career has evolved in conservation biology I have found a disconcerting amount of institutionalization in how professional practitioners and regulators view integrating local ecological knowledge and expertise. Whether its traditional (i.e. indigenous or First Nations as we refer to it here in Canada) or local experts who have been setting the bar for conservation in their communities. There is an “us and them attitude”, which is unfortunate and unproductve. Its even more concerning when I see professionals and government dismissing the value of indigenous knowledge, though at least there is a requirement legally to consult and listen. Fortunately I do see things shifting in a more positive light as both an advisor within my profession and on citizen science projects , but instances of old myopic attitudes and approaches continue. Lets hope though through everyone’s work that we can dispel those bad habits.

The book, “Louise Fortmann (ed.), Participatory Research in Conservation and Rural Livelihoods: Doing Science Together” addresses competencies needed to build research partnerships with local communities through a series of case studies.

Many proposed efforts to try to incorporate TEK components into more “conventional” studies, even when well-intentioned, come across as superficial additions, because the constraints of the research do not allow for sufficient time to forge relationships with local community members based upon mutual interests. Unfortunately, short-lived projects, such as master’s theses, typically do not provide sufficient time or other resources to develop the necessary competencies, trust, and relationships by researchers from outside the communities. An alternative approach that we’ve encouraged is to cultivate researchers from within communities who already have language, relationships and other skills to work in their local knowledge systems.

Great, interesting contributions! Clearly everyone has noted the differences/ divide between scientific and local knowledge in some form or another as I think the last few posts have described. We tried a different approach, testing the hypothesis that all knowledge is a complex product  of a number of elements including empirical observations, values, context. This definition might allow broader inclusion in all aspects of discussions and work , in our case conservation of agrobiodiversity—Can farmers be included in discussions of crop genotype x environment interactions? Can scientists be included in discussions of the influence of culture on each of our perspectives on agriculture and change? Working in local farming communities in a number of countries, we found farmers very capable of understanding and commenting on hypothetical controlled experiments, the same experiments that guide the basis of agricultural scientists own work. All of this to say that while I agree there seem to be many differences, there are also many similarities between local and scientific knowledge and relegating each to particular domains of research and practice (i.e., local knowledge to cultural values and scientific knowledge to causal relationships) does not appear necessary or wise. For those interested, a number of our papers on this research can be found here (can’t figure out how to post them to the zotero site…!!):http://es.ucsb.edu/faculty/cleveland/CV/pub.htm

Best,

Daniela

Hello

Four of us from Lancaster Environment Centre met up last week to discuss this topic. We are from a mix of different academic disciplines and found it a useful starting point for examining our research.

The natural scientists amongst us, who are working towards integrating local knowledge into our research, were wondering about practical and theoretical case studies for recognising and using different types of knowledge. We can find lots of theoretical ponderings on the benefit of incorporating such knowledge, but fewer examples of this approach in practice, especially in the UK and other Western countries.

We discussed needing to break-down your ideas about knowledge in order to put them back together and in this process understand them and find commonalities.

A concern was raised that in practice we were probably missing a lot of  ‘hidden’ knowledge – because we don’t know what we are looking for, because of our approach, and because of who we are (e.g. a young female talking to some farmer groups in the UK may not be taken into confidence – especially if our grant funding does not allow for extended research!).

One of our group mentioned that, whilst working in an unfamiliar culture, she had experience of, initially irrelevant, sentiments being repeated over a significant period of time, which became relevant as she learned more about the community she was immersed in.

We also discussed motivations – that they can be masked by language, misunderstood, and also they can be at odds with the community under observation. We turned the tables and considered someone from another country turning up in our village. The person understood very little English, and although they seemed pleasant enough they proceeded to survey and even dig up some of our, precious,  village green without explanation. They then left and never returned…..

Off (on another tangent!) we considered researchers as translators. We are here to make things simpler – not more complicated.

Sorry not very fluent – but neither was our conversation!

A couple of good texts/papers were suggested too -

‘Participatory Research in Conservation and Rural Livelihoods’ Eds. Louise Fortmann – part of a series ‘Conservation Science and Practice’ Pubs Wiley Blackwell

‘Rethinking Expertise’ Collins and Evans

‘Some elements of a sociology of translation: Domestication of the scallops and the fishermen of St. Brieuc Bay’ M Callon in john Law ‘Power, Action and Belief A New Sociology of Knowledge?

Thanks to all who have contributed to this discussion! A summary of these thoughts (compiled by Anne) has been added to the Citizen Science Toolkit, so your insights can help inform others as they design and refine PPSR projects. Please feel free to keep this discussion going!

Link to the summary:   http://www.birds.cornell.edu/citscitoolkit/toolkit/design/knowledges