Post-socialist states have increasingly adopted rural governance and resource management policies framed around the concepts of decentralization, devolution, and de-concentration in which formerly central state powers are transferred to lower, more local levels of governance. In more recent incarnations, these policies have become inspired by neo-liberal discourses of minimal government, self-rule, and personal responsibility. Increasingly, the social science literature has argued that such forms of neo-liberal governance lead to a variety of unforeseen and diverse consequences. This dissertation attempts to understand the impact of these political transformations on household vulnerability in the context of hazardous events called zud. I do this through an ethnographic study of institution-building and risk management in a pastoral district of eastern Mongolia where I explore contemporary transformations in the management of critical resources such as livestock, labor, and land. As this dissertation shows, differential mobility practices are strongly correlated to zud-based livestock mortality rates. In particular, households that are more capable of practicing otor, a kind of non-customary and irregular migration strategy, are less susceptible to the conditions that threaten herd loss. Households with a greater capacity for conducting otor are able to move greater distances, in shorter time spans, and to regions with less severe conditions, thereby escaping the possibility of facing high loss rates. Differential capacity to mitigate the risk of zud conditions also was found to be deeply affected by previously under-studied institutional transformations surrounding rights and access to livestock, labor, and land. Primarily, this study demonstrates that decentralization and other neo-liberal models of governance not only open space for significant reconfiguration of the institutional landscape in ways that support social inequality, but also subsequently lead to increased differentiation in vulnerability to disaster. Theoretically, this work contributes to critical understandings of political ecology by uncovering circulations of power through constellations of actors (human and otherwise), institutions, and meanings as well as through bio-physical landscapes. In addition, this study contributes to work in vulnerability studies by shedding light on how administrative governance, local institution-building, and property-making shift the apportionment of entitlements to produce hazardous conditions and unequal distributions of risk and vulnerability.

This thesis, based on twelve months of fieldwork and archival research undertaken in Ladakh, explores the place of wool and weaving in the life of Rupshu. It attempts to trace the nexus between livestock, fibres, textiles, social and symbolic structures in Rupshu in order to understand the multitude of contexts within which wool-oriented activities exist. The craft of weaving was bestowed upon Rupshu by the gods, and thus all acts related to it have a close connection to the sublime. Rupshu lies in the easternmost part of Ladakh in North India, in a Restricted Areas Zone, as is accessible only to Indian citizens. Hence, extensive fieldwork has not been carried out in this area. Further, though there is a little documentation on the craft of weaving in Ladakh, none exists on the nomadic tradition of weaving. The first two chapters introduce the region of Rupshu and explore the historical context. They include a discussion of the origin and development of weaving and textiles in the area, and of the old trade routes in fibres. The next two chapters examine the connections between livestock, the source of fibres in Rupshu, and the Ladakh pantheon. The relationship between the two is reflected in the manner in which livestock are revered and treated in Rupshu. Further, this affinity is widely expressed in Rupshu, and one such occasion is the harvesting of the fibres. The next four chapters look specifically at the craft of weaving, and local representations of the tradition. Using examples of particular pieces woven in Rupshu, I examine the gender, spatial, and hierarchical relations that they express and perpetuate. Not all the fibres harvested in Rupshu are used there, and the final chapter examines their distribution through trade. While woven articles are not traded, specific containers are woven for the transport of fibres and their characteristics are looked at here. The concluding remarks include a discussion of the future of wool and weaving activities in Rupshu, and address the dangers posed by re-settlement schemes, and a shortage of pasture and over-grazing. These trends would eventually lead to a decrease in the number of livestock, and cause the people of Rupshu to abandon their tradition of nomadic pastoralism.

During recent years the high country of the South Island has attracted a good deal of attention from farm economists, soil conservationists, geographers and also politicians. With the present need for increased national production the problem of keeping the high country in productive occupation is the subject of justifiable concern. The purpose of this regional study is to describe one of the most distinctive areas in the high country, and to discuss the problems which have caused the recent Royal Commission on the Sheep-farming Industry in New Zealand to investigate the general economic position of the runholders. Besides being a well-defined physiographic unit, the Mackenzie Basin or, as it is better known to the local people, the Mackenzie Country has a distinctive character of its own. On entering Burkes Pass even the most casual observer cannot fail to notice how different the landscape within the basin appears compared with that outside. This large, gravel-filled intermontane depression with its vast expanse of dun coloured tussock and its clear, dry climate seems to have a special flavour which distinguishes it from any other part of either Canterbury or Otago. Probably the most striking feature of the basin is its monotonous uniformity of both physical conditions and human activities. The extensive sheep-farming economy has imposed a distinctive pattern of land use over the whole area. Not only does the landscape have a similar appearance everywhere but, because of their common int erests, the people all tend to live alike and think alike. Before 1939 the basin was solely a sheep-grazing area but, with the recent developments connected with the storage of water in the lakes for the generation of hydro-electricity, the Mackenzie Country has assumed a new importance. With the dam-building schemes at Tekapo and Pukaki an entirely new element has been introduced into the landscape - the large Public Works Camp. These camps, however, are, for the most part, temporary features and the sheep-station remains the typical unit of settlement. For this reason the major part of this study is devoted to a description of the landscape as it has developed under the extensive sheep-farming economy and a discussion of the problems resulting from the exploitation of the natural vegetation. When the early settlers first took up their runs they had the opportunity of making the Mackenzie basin one of the best merino grazing areas in New Zealand. In most cases that opportunity was lost, due partly to ignorance of proper grazing methods under sub-humid conditions and partly to short-sighted practices caused by temporary economic difficulties. Over-burning and over-stocking extracted an early toll from the vegetation cover which, in spite of numerous attempts can never be fully repaid. By deliberately introducing rabbits into the area the early runholders made their third and possibly their greatest mistake. These rabbits were allowed to multiply unchecked for nearly twenty years before it was realised what a menace they were likely to become. By that time it was too late. Today, the rabbit is generally considered to be the chief cause of the disturbing decline in the sheep carrying capacity of the Mackenzie Country. Altogether, unwise burning, overstocking and rabbits have caused such a deterioration in the tussock cover that Cumberland's description of some parts of the basin as "deserts in the making" is quite appropriate. Admittedly conditions are not as bad as in the "man-made deserts" of Central Otago but a serious problem at present confronts the Mackenzie runholders.

This dissertation reconstructs a history of the greater Qacha’s Nek district of Lesotho, southern Africa from 1880 when farmers first settled the area, until 1965 on the eve of independence from Great Britain. This place-based study speaks to broader questions. How have people incorporated new and often foreign ideas into existing beliefs and practices? How did a person’s social position affect how they interacted with new ideas? How have people applied knowledge to make and remake environments such as in gardens and fields? This study is based on field research in Lesotho, South Africa, and the United Kingdom. The author examined archival materials including colonial records, agricultural reports and surveys, national council proceedings, and vernacular newspapers. During four months of rural fieldwork in Lesotho the author collected oral histories, took photographs, and participated in village life. The approach focuses on colonial government interventions into agriculture and pastoralism. These interventions serve as sites for examining historical changes in how Basotho people engaged with the non-human world. In so doing, the study makes three main interventions. First, the claims are situated within scholarly conversations about local knowledge, science, and environment under colonialism. Second, the stories of chiefs, farmers, and government employees told here extend the literature on Lesotho’s political and economic history by highlighting the nuance of local politics, ecology, and agency. Finally, to contribute to the environmental historiography on Africa and rural places in general, the study probes the interplay of culture and nature. To do this, it narrates how people deployed eclectic knowledge to build, rebuild, and redefine environments. The dissertation argues that the compilation of environmental knowledge must be understood as a historical process that encapsulates the meanings that people have imbued the landscape with, for example, by building homesteads, along with how people have understood the landscape as a system of resources to be used economically for subsistence and market purposes. These aspects of knowing are part of a single process that has unfolded, and continues to unfold, along a temporal trajectory that has varied across different social groups, such as men and women and chiefs and commoners.

Integrated conservation and development projects have been widely promoted across Africa. These often involve public-private partnerships targeting tourism. Despite this encouragement, there are conflicting views regarding their impact. Conservancies have emerged bordering the Maasai Mara National Reserve in Kenya. These conservancies are the latest in a series of attempts by residents to capture benefits and developmental assistance from the safari industry. Drawing upon 19-months of fieldwork, the thesis examines the contentious relationship between conservancies and development through a case study of Olare Motorogi and Naboisho Conservancies. The thesis analyses diverging interpretations of development between and within stakeholder groups active in the study site. Three key development indicators are identified: basic needs, economic implications and livelihood security. These indicators are used to assess how the conservancies are perceived to be impacting upon development, what motivating factors for involvement are, and whether this affects society evenly. Findings suggest that conservancies and their affiliated organisations are now widely seen as the main development actors within the study site. This is largely through the creation of community projects, income-earning opportunities and grazing schemes. The involvement of conservancy-based tourism businesses in these development initiatives suggests that inclusive business models are being adopted. There is still a degree of discontent regarding conservancies, especially within neighbouring communities. Successful project outputs do not always result in successful outcomes. Without steps to ensure that these outcomes are realised, community projects may be more beneficial for tourism marketing than they are for neighbouring residents. Significant disparities also remain in income distribution, although economic benefits accruing from the conservancies are now distributed more evenly than they were in previous community-based tourism attempts in the Mara. The most emotive issue amongst local residents is access to essential resources for the dominant livelihood, pastoralism. During the research period, more comprehensive grazing schemes were introduced which simulate communal grazing systems. These practices would otherwise have been lost following land subdivision. Some pastoralists maintain that fines for grazing illegally continue to outweigh other benefits, although others assess that they are beginning to see that conservancies can have a positive impact on their livelihood. Conservancy businesses adopting more inclusive strategies constitute a more conscious form of capitalism. Motivations for this centre around the importance of place, and incorporate an Africonsciousness. As such, the conservancies exemplify Africapitalism, a new concept within the broader inclusive business arena. To date, the effectiveness of inclusive capitalism as a development agent has been inconclusive due to insufficient data. This thesis begins to address this broad literature gap, and also expands research on Africapitalism to a new industry. Although a positive relationship with development is widely perceived within the study site, the sustainability of the conservancies is questioned in the face of multiple prevailing threats. These challenges can be recognised and mitigated against, but the future of the Maasai Mara Conservancies – and their ability to continue being development actors – remains uncertain.

This thesis is a study of ethnicity with specific regard to the pastoral Maasai group of Tanzania, East Africa. I frame the analysis proposed in this study within two sets of anthropological theory: economic anthropology and the literature on African pastoralism, with the former working as the primary theoretical framework to contribute and add knowledge to the latter. The overarching objective of the thesis is to contribute to outline the contemporary state of affairs of the socio-economic position and conditions of the Maasai group in the broader national context of Tanzania, departing from a distinctly spatial investigation across the rural/urban interface. Specifically, I pursue this objective by analysing the local economy of a rural village on the fringes of expanding urban territory. In the thesis I investigate issues that include thrift, exchange, consumption, and the market by making use of these ‘objects’ as analytical devices to explore how Maasai ethnic identity is produced, reproduced, and negotiated across multiple terrains. This study intends to fills the gap that exists within literature on pastoralism and the ‘cash economy’ as regards to these issues and ‘objects’ of analysis. The sequence of the chapters unfolds to show the manifold terrains and domains in which Maasai ethnicity ‘matters’, from everyday actions and practices of consumption to longer-term investments, to conclude eventually with the organization of the livestock market in which Maasai ethnicity contributes to facilitate trading and the building of trust between market actors. In the end, the anthropological enquiry of the ‘cash economy’ intends to enhance the understanding of how forms of ethnic identification, in this case Maasai, are an essential quality and aspect of the contemporary globalised world and that neoliberal market policies, commoditization and urbanization as expressions of globalisation contribute to strengthen rather than lessen their importance.

Approximately 200 people, mostly Dukhas of Tuvan ancestry, live nomadically with reindeer, horses, and dogs as ‘Tsaatans’ in the taiga of northern Mongolia. How do they effectively realize their livelihoods? Does qualifying corporeal manners, or bearings, in which livelihood practices are performed in the moments of actualization offer insight into ways in which longer-term decision-making processes like nomadic settlement and livestock management are embodied? Informed by a phenomenological approach in anthropology during nearly four months of cooperative co-habitation with Tsaatan mentors, I argue that Tsaatans effectively realize livelihood practices as they cheerfully embody poised improvisation and acrobatics in both skillful discernment and movement. Simultaneously anticipating and performing diverse tasks in playful cooperation with friends, family and other animals along nomadic lifestyles in a wilderness habitat involves persistent, sensory-rich, versatile manipulation of environmental materials, as well as extensive geographic knowledge and frequent experiences of risk in remote, rugged terrain and powerful meteorological conditions impossible to completely avoid. These lifestyles catalyze the development of quick-witted and materially sensitive resilience with which people are capable of corresponding with beings, materials, and situations, and thereby of continuing to develop ancestral traditions of reindeer husbandry in a rapidly changing social, economic, technological and geo-political context.

Central-northern Namibia is home to an approximate 43% of the country’s population, a large proportion of which still depends directly on natural resources for their livelihoods. The main land use in this area is agro-silvo-pastoralism i.e. a combination of subsistence farming and silvi-culture. The few phytosociological and biodiversity data available in Namibia are not substantial to motivate environmental management and sustainable utilization of the country’s natural wealth. The Vegetation Survey Project of Namibia coupled with the BIOTA southern Africa Project therefore share a common goal of re-classifying Namibian vegetation by building on the Preliminary Vegetation Map of Namibia of 1971 and the Homogenous Framing Areas Report of 1979. The vegetation of Omusati and Oshana regions which are situated in the Mopanne Savanna in central-northern Namibia was classified and described by subjecting 415 relevés to multivariate analysis i.e. classification and ordination. The geographical distribution of these community types was established by supervised classification of satellite data of the study area. Data collected in this study will be used for hypothesis generation of further ecological investigations while the map can be used for planning and conservation of vegetation resources in the area. Copyright / Dissertation (MSc)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Plant Science / unrestricted

In the Ugandan context, the Karamojong are the most well-known pastoralists and the ones most likely to be presented by government and development actors as a “problem in need of a solution”. The author identifies a gap existing between empirical research indicating the need for creative solutions to the “pastoralist dilemma” and the legal and policy frameworks governing the lives of Karamojong in Uganda. The emphasis of the study is on the rights of the Karamojong to collective ownership of property (land) as well as the right to culture in a development context. Although these rights are provided for in international and regional human rights law, such instruments are of general application and make no specific reference to protection of pastoralists. Without specific legislation, the rights of Ugandan pastoralists are insufficiently implemented at national level. The author argues that the provision of proper legal protection to pastoralist communities is a crucial step in ensuring their survival as people. / A dissertation submitted to the Faculty of Law University of Pretoria, in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Masters of Law (LLM in Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa). Prepared under the supervision of Prof Nico Steytler, University of Western Cape, South Africa. / LLM Dissertation (Human Rights and Democratisation in Africa -- University of Pretoria, 2009. / http://www.chr.up.ac.za/ / Centre for Human Rights / LLM

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