Rethinking 'expert' knowledge in community forest management in Tanzania

From the 1980s great hopes have been placed on community forest management to promote socio-economic development along with forest protection. Empirical research has shown, however, that while community forest management has often improved forest conditions, the goals of poverty alleviation and local empowerment have not been fully attained. The wide gap between theory and practice of community forest management has caused scholars to emphasise the role of power and politics in the design, practice and outcome of decentralisation. More recently, the roles of techno-bureaucratic values, practices and the authority given to 'expert' knowledge have been highlighted as important factors impeding its successful implementation. Building on these insights, this paper, conjoined with other contributions to this special issue, aims to examine the role of professionalisation and 'expert' knowledge in community-based forest management in Tanzania, particularly with regard to its economic development and local empowerment benefits. Drawing on long-term research in the Angai village land forest reserve in Liwale, Lindi Region, Tanzania, this paper illustrates how almost 20 years after the inception of community-based forest management, villagers are still waiting for the promised political and economic benefits to materialise. We argue that professionalisation and the privileged role of 'expert' knowledge hampered forest decentralisation. Based on our findings, we join other authors of this special issue in calling for less technically and bureaucratically demanding ways of forest management and planning to allow local communities to fully take over ownership and control of forest resources and to relieve state and non-state actors of cumbersome and overburdening development requirements.

Renting in the informal city: The role of dignity in upgrading backyard dwellings in Cape Town, South Africa

In South Africa, informal rental accommodation constructed in the backyards of formal houses is the fastest growing housing segment. These backyard dwellings (BDs) are makeshift structures made from timber frames, metal sheets or wooden planks. Despite the proliferation of BDs, national and local governments have done little to improve the living standards of backyard dwellers. The research uses focus groups, interviews and building surveys to examine the current state of backyard dwellings and identify opportunities and barriers for government interventions. We analyse the barriers to home improvements, highlighting the important role of tenant dignity and landlord-tenant relations. Furthermore, the research discusses the challenges of potential government-led interventions, which could easily fail in the context of resistance, mistrust and anxiety over housing. We present four key considerations that any intervention to upgrade BDs in South Africa or similar rental units in other localities must consider

Promising change, delivering continuity: REDD+ as conservation fad

REDD+ is an ambition to reduce carbon emissions from deforestation and forest degradation in the Global South. This ambition has generated unprecedented commitment of political support and financial funds for the forest-development sector. Many academics and people-centered advocacy organizations have conceptualized REDD+ as an example of 'green grabbing' and have voiced fears of a potential global rush for land and trees. In this paper we argue that, in practice and up until now, REDD+ resembles longstanding dynamics of the development and conservation industry, where the promise of change becomes a discursive commodity that is constantly reproduced and used to generate value and appropriate financial resources. We thus argue for a re-conceptualization of REDD+ as a conservation fad within the broader political economy of development and conservation. We derive this argument from a study that compares the emergence of REDD+ in Tanzania with that of a previous forest-policy model called Participatory Forest Management. Our study describes how the advent of REDD+ implies change at the discursive level, but also continuity and repetitiveness in terms of the initial promises and expectations leading to substantial donor financing, pilot project activities, and policy development and implementation processes. In both epochs, these have achieved little in terms of changing actual forest management and use on the ground outside selected pilot project sites, but have sustained the livelihoods of actors within the development and conservation industry, including academics. Given that there are still many who look to REDD+ in the hope of addressing global climate change, despite less than hoped for financial support at the global level, our study provides an important starting point for questioning the uses of the finances for REDD+ that are actually amassed.