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Abstract The present environmental anthropological study explores the premises and views of forest owners regarding different stages of forest management and factors affecting forest management by interviewing 24 owners of forest in the Northern Ostrobothnia region during 2005-2007. In addition, the views of forestry professionals were examined, mainly by using interviews from the ”Forest Professionals During Forestry’s Period of Transition” project collected during 1999-2002. The collected qualitative data was mostly employed in order to examine processes of reasoning in connection to both periodic- and continuous-cover silviculture. The views of the forest owners were compared to the Forestry Development Centre Tapio’s Forest Management Practice Recommendations. The research source materials also included the official documents from four cases involving forest regeneration and forest harvest sites in different parts of Finland during 2004-2008. The analysis in this study employs three perspectives, namely those of political ecology, cognitive anthropology and actor-network theory. When exploring the views of forest owners from the perspective of political ecology, these perspectives were examined as a part of the historical development of forestry and the discussion on forests in Finland. By applying the concept of cultural models from cognitive anthropology, two generalising models of thought were recognised in the interview material: an established model of forest management and an alternative model of forest management. The established model of forest management followed the management policy presented in the Forest Management Practice Recommendations. The alternative model of forest management diverged from the recommendations, but only in part. Views regarding what is natural, the implementation of different stages of forest management and how financial profitability is achieved from the forest owners’ point of view were, to some extent, different in these two models. However, it was not possible to identify the views of the interviewees as belonging entirely to one of the models only. The actor-network theory was particularly efficient in analysing court case documents in which the different views on forest management that were found in the cultural models become established. Based on the criticism presented in the source materials, it can be said that the differing views and needs of forest owners should be acknowledged in forest administration with greater versatility than is done at present. / Tiivistelmä Tässä ympäristöantropologisessa tutkimuksessa selvitettiin metsänomistajien perusteluita ja käsityksiä metsänhoidon vaiheista ja metsänhoitoon vaikuttavista tekijöistä haastattelemalla 24 Pohjois-Pohjanmaalla metsää omistavaa metsänomistajaa vuosina 2005–2007. Myös metsäalan ammattilaisten käsityksiä selvitettiin käyttäen aineistona lähinnä vuosina 1999–2002 kerättyjä ”Metsäammatit metsätalouden murroksessa” -hankkeen haastatteluita. Laadullisen aineiston avulla selvitettiin erityisesti jaksolliseen ja jatkuvaan metsänkasvatukseen liittyvää päättelyä. Metsänomistajien käsityksiä verrattiin Metsätalouden kehittämiskeskus Tapion hyvän metsänhoidon suosituksiin. Aineistona olivat myös neljän eri puolilla Suomea tapahtuneen metsänuudistamista ja hakkuita koskeneen oikeustapauksen asiakirja-aineistot vuosilta 2004–2008. Analyysissä hyödynnettiin kolmea näkökulmaa: poliittista ekologiaa, kognitiivista antropologiaa ja toimijaverkkoteoriaa. Poliittisen ekologian näkökulmassa metsänomistajien käsityksiä tarkasteltiin osana Suomen metsätalouden ja metsäkeskustelun historiallista kehitystä. Kognitiivisen antropologian kulttuuristen mallien käsitettä käyttäen haastatteluaineistosta nostettiin esiin kaksi yleistävää ajattelumallia: vaihtoehtoisen metsänhoidon malli ja vakiintuneen metsänhoidon malli. Vakiintuneen metsänhoidon malli mukaili Hyvän metsänhoidon suosituksissa esitettyä metsänhoidon linjaa. Vaihtoehtoisen metsänhoidon malli erosi suosituksista osittain. Käsitykset metsänhoidon luonnonmukaisuudesta, metsänhoidon vaiheiden toteutuksesta ja taloudellisen kannattavuuden muodostumisesta metsänomistajien kannalta poikkesivat näissä malleissa toisistaan joiltakin osin. Haastateltujen käsityksiä ei voinut jaotella aina kaikilta osiltaan vain toiseen malliin kuuluvaksi. Toimijaverkkoteoria jäsensi erityisesti oikeustapausaineistoja, joissa tiivistyivät kulttuurisissa malleissa esiintyneet käsitykset metsänhoidosta. Aineistossa esitetyn kritiikin pohjalta metsähallinnoinnissa olisi huomioitava metsänomistajien vaihtelevat käsitykset ja tarpeet entistä monipuolisemmin.

<p>Particle pollution in South Korea has become a matter of significant public concern, culminating in its declaration as a “social disaster” through a government proclamation in 2019. This study shows how the existing interventions to tackle particle pollution in South Korea as a “social disaster” contribute to maintaining the status quo, paradoxically. The study attempts to interpret pollution as entanglements, relations, and processes by addressing the discussions and politics surrounding particle pollution, the interventions to tackle it, and what they presuppose and exclude via multi-sited ethnography.</p> <p>What narratives form the bedrock of the current discourses and politics around particle pollution in South Korea? What kinds of population, knowledge systems, values, and interests are incorporated and excluded around particulate matter in Korea? Drawing upon four months of fieldwork, interviews, and collaborative work with residents, scientists, and activists in South Korea, this thesis offers a new understanding of how citizens’ experiences and knowledge practices have reshaped the concepts of pollution, toxicity, and health. The study indicates that the existing practices and knowledge vis-à-vis pollution control have individualized pollution by presuming particular ways of normalcy and excluding others. In doing so, this study captures the multiplicity of particle pollution and shows the existence and stories of different bodies living with/in pollution.</p> <p>Drawing on the literature in feminist science and technology studies as well as medical and environmental anthropology scholarship, this study problematizes harm reduction-based environmental and health intervention practices by describing the current individualized particle pollution responses. The research reveals how people in Korea living with/in particulate matter have perceived, datafied, defined, adjusted, and responded to particle pollution and its toxicity. The study suggests that pollution should be envisaged as entanglements and relations by shedding light on the stories that particulate matter has been perceived, coordinated, and generated in various ways. Lastly, indicating that the knowledge and interventions surrounding particle pollution have exploited and flattened the environment based on the human–nature dichotomy, the study suggests different ways of conceptualizing pollution, while considering the multiplicity of pollution, toxicities, and bodies.</p>

Cette recherche porte sur les origines et les effets de la dégradation de l’environnement dans le désert de Thar, au Rajasthan en Inde. Elle expose les processus politico-économiques qui conditionnent la gestion des ressources naturelles dans la région du Marwar depuis l’indépendance de l’Inde à aujourd’hui. Les modes de gestion des ressources environnementales et agraires dans le contexte du système jagirdari, un système foncier domanial qui prévalait dans la région avant l’indépendance de l’Inde, sont d’abord présentés. S’en suit une analyse de la manière dont les diverses idéologies liées au développement postcolonial ont reconfiguré le paysage socio-administratif et environnemental de la région. Ces transformations ont engendré des désordres écologiques qui ont donné lieu à une crise environnementale et agraire qui connaît son paroxysme avec les nombreux déficits pluviométriques qui sévissent depuis la dernière décennie dans la région. À partir d’une recherche de terrain effectuée dans la communauté de Givas, l’impact – au plan physique et métaphysique – de ces problèmes environnementaux sur la population locale est examiné. L’étude porte également sur les réponses à ces changements, soit les stratégies de subsistance adoptées par la population locale, de même que les interventions déployées par une organisation non gouvernementale et par l’État indien – à travers le National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). L’analyse démontre que l’expérience de la dégradation de l’environnement, à travers ses effets et les stratégies d’adaptation qui s’en suivent, est tributaire de facteurs politiques, économiques et socioculturels et donc différenciée selon le genre, la classe et la caste. / This research focuses on the origins and the consequences of environmental degradation in the Thar Desert in the State of Rajasthan, India. It outlines the political and economic processes that have influenced how natural resources are managed in the region of Marwar since Indian independence. First are presented the modes of agrarian and natural resources management that were current during the jagirdari, the pre-independence land tenure system that prevailed in this region. This is followed by an analysis of how different ideologies of postcolonial development have reshaped the social, administrative and environmental landscape of this region. These changes have led to ecological disruptions which have given rise to an environmental and agrarian crisis that has now reached a critical point with the rainfall deficits of the past decade in this region. Based on field research conducted in the community of Givas, the implications – physical and metaphysical – of these environmental problems are analyzed. The study also looks at the responses generated in order to cope with these changes, namely the livelihood strategies adopted by the local people, as well as the interventions from a non-government organization and the Indian state – through the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). The analysis reveals that the experience of environmental degradation, through its effects and responses, is conditioned by political, economic and sociocultural factors, and thus differentiated by gender, class and caste.

No description available.

Cette recherche porte sur les origines et les effets de la dégradation de l’environnement dans le désert de Thar, au Rajasthan en Inde. Elle expose les processus politico-économiques qui conditionnent la gestion des ressources naturelles dans la région du Marwar depuis l’indépendance de l’Inde à aujourd’hui. Les modes de gestion des ressources environnementales et agraires dans le contexte du système jagirdari, un système foncier domanial qui prévalait dans la région avant l’indépendance de l’Inde, sont d’abord présentés. S’en suit une analyse de la manière dont les diverses idéologies liées au développement postcolonial ont reconfiguré le paysage socio-administratif et environnemental de la région. Ces transformations ont engendré des désordres écologiques qui ont donné lieu à une crise environnementale et agraire qui connaît son paroxysme avec les nombreux déficits pluviométriques qui sévissent depuis la dernière décennie dans la région. À partir d’une recherche de terrain effectuée dans la communauté de Givas, l’impact – au plan physique et métaphysique – de ces problèmes environnementaux sur la population locale est examiné. L’étude porte également sur les réponses à ces changements, soit les stratégies de subsistance adoptées par la population locale, de même que les interventions déployées par une organisation non gouvernementale et par l’État indien – à travers le National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). L’analyse démontre que l’expérience de la dégradation de l’environnement, à travers ses effets et les stratégies d’adaptation qui s’en suivent, est tributaire de facteurs politiques, économiques et socioculturels et donc différenciée selon le genre, la classe et la caste. / This research focuses on the origins and the consequences of environmental degradation in the Thar Desert in the State of Rajasthan, India. It outlines the political and economic processes that have influenced how natural resources are managed in the region of Marwar since Indian independence. First are presented the modes of agrarian and natural resources management that were current during the jagirdari, the pre-independence land tenure system that prevailed in this region. This is followed by an analysis of how different ideologies of postcolonial development have reshaped the social, administrative and environmental landscape of this region. These changes have led to ecological disruptions which have given rise to an environmental and agrarian crisis that has now reached a critical point with the rainfall deficits of the past decade in this region. Based on field research conducted in the community of Givas, the implications – physical and metaphysical – of these environmental problems are analyzed. The study also looks at the responses generated in order to cope with these changes, namely the livelihood strategies adopted by the local people, as well as the interventions from a non-government organization and the Indian state – through the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA). The analysis reveals that the experience of environmental degradation, through its effects and responses, is conditioned by political, economic and sociocultural factors, and thus differentiated by gender, class and caste.

The central aim of this thesis is to provide a detailed ethnographic account of the human ecology of the Broads - a protected wetland region in the East of England - focussing upon how working lives shape and are shaped by this reedy landscape. In conversations about the management of the Broads, the concept of "common sense" is a frequent trope; encompassing a wide range of associated meanings. But what are these meanings of "common sense" in English culture, and how do they influence the peoples of England, and landscapes in which they work? This thesis addresses these questions ethnographically; using academic and lay deployments of common sense as a route into the political economy of rural Norfolk. Based on 12 months of fieldwork in the Broads National Park, this thesis draws together interviews and participant observation with land managers of various kinds - including conservationists, farmers, gamekeepers, volunteers, gardeners, and administrators. Chapter 1 dissects the differences between academic and popular understandings of "common sense" as a phrase, and produces an ethnographically-derived, working definition. Chapter 2 examines the attitudes of farmers, establishing "the common" as a root metaphor for social and practical rectitude, actualised through labouring in a shared landscape. Chapter 3 explores how the common is sensed, reflecting upon the diverse sensoria afforded by different degrees of enclosure on a single nature reserve. Chapter 4 explores how the concept of common sense intersects with a prevailing culture of possessive individualism, creating a fragmented society in the Park, wracked by controversies over management. Chapter 5 examines bureaucracy in Broadland - frequently cast as the very antithesis of common sense. In the conclusion, we return to the title, and ask - what do the reeds have to say about land, labour, and human nature?