BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//Talks.cam//talks.cam.ac.uk//
X-WR-CALNAME:Talks.cam
BEGIN:VEVENT
SUMMARY:Trees\, ‘tribes' and taboos: The political ecology of conservati
 on and culture in Madagascar - Dr Ivan Scales\, Dept of Geography\, Univer
 sity of Cambridge
DTSTART:20150304T170000Z
DTEND:20150304T180000Z
UID:TALK56729@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Alison Harvey
DESCRIPTION:Madagascar’s conservation policy landscape has changed drama
 tically over the last 30 years. NGOs and donors have tried to move beyond 
 coercive legislation to greater community involvement in natural resource 
 management. Policies have attempted to work through existing indigenous in
 stitutions\, as well as create new laws to deal with resource management. 
 At the same time the Malagasy government\, as part of its 2003 ‘Durban V
 ision’\, has tripled the extent of the island’s protected areas. Polic
 y thus continues to reflect tensions between coercion and local participat
 ion. I explore these tensions through a case study of conservation policy 
 in the dry deciduous forests of western Madagascar\, as well my recent exp
 eriences editing a book on ‘Conservation and Environment Management in M
 adagascar’ (Routledge\, 2014). I argue that conservation policy has tend
 ed to be based on problematic stereotypes of ethnic identity and indigenou
 s land use practices. I also argue that efforts by NGOs to engage with rur
 al households have often been ‘lost in translation’ for two reasons: i
 ) the perceptions and priorities of NGOs do not fit with indigenous views 
 of nature\; and ii) indigenous institutions and power nodes do not map eas
 ily onto newly created laws and resource management structures. 
LOCATION:Large Lecture Theatre\, Department of Geography\, Downing Site
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR