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Human-elephant conflict (HEC) occurs across Africa and is a major threat to the continued existence of the African elephant. To effectively implement mitigation measures, a thorough understanding of the spatial and temporal patterns of HEC is required. This study used a systematic, grid-based geographical information system (GIS) to analyse the spatial and temporal relations of HEC intensity in 2004 and 2008 with underlying environmental variables in a forest habitat, the Bia Conservation Area (BCA), Ghana. Relationships between crop-raiding incident data, Moderate Image Resolution Spectroradiometer (MODIS) Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI) values and remotely sensed derived data were investigated at a 10 km2 scale using principal components analysis (PCA) and correlation analysis. Crop-raiding was found to be clustered into distinct areas. The onset of crop-raiding in 2004 and 2008 can be attributed to seasonal variation in vegetation biomass. Decreases in EVI values were matched with crop-raiding incidents. The high number of crop-raiding incidents in 2004 could be attributed to the large fluctuations in vegetation biomass in comparison to 2008. HEC intensity was not significantly related to the environmental variables analysed at the 10 km2 scale. These results suggest that HEC intensity may be influenced by vegetation quality, soil mineral content and/or human density. A grid-based GIS system with a 10 km2 resolution used in combination with remotely sensed data and statistical tools is useful for identifying spatial patterns of HEC, even with relatively small incident data sets. The methods used in this study could be applied to other forest habitats experiencing HEC for comparative analysis. The influence of vegetation quality, soil mineral content and human density on HEC intensity in forest habitats requires further analysis.

In this paper, I put to test Homer-Dixon’s theory which suggest that Environmental resource scarcity, can singly or in collaboration with other factors such as lack of local institutions and poverty work to produce violence due to competition. I start by analyzing a case study of Pokot-Turkana Conflict from 1969-1984. Using available literature, I discuss various motives of raiding by these two groups. And to further test Homer-Dixon’s theory, I analyze a non-violence case study on the Ethiopia-Somali region where agro-pastoralist in the Yarer and Daketa valley cooperate with visiting pastoralists during droughts. The leading question is, Given that both of these case studies take place in areas prone to scarcity of resources and both residents have access to illegal firearms and lack government control, why then are the Pokot and Turkana fighting and raiding each other, while the residents of Ethiopia- Somali region share and cooperate during droughts?

Vildsvinstammen har ökat snabbt i södra och centrala Sverige sedan några individer rymde ifrån fångenskap på 1970-talet. Vildsvin har aptit för jordbruksgrödor vilket resulterar i en konkurrens om dessa grödor mellan arterna människan och vildsvin i en s.k. interspecifik konkurrens. Detta utgör i sin tur en konflikt mellan jordbrukare och vildsvin. Denna konflikt verkar även förvärras av jägares förvaltningsmetoder som, enligt lantbrukare, innefattar ett bristande jakttryck och utfodring i för stor skala. Mina resultat kunde visa en konflikt mellan jägare och lantbrukare som även verkar förvärras på organisationsnivå, d.v.s. Jägareförbundet respektive Lantbrukarnas riksförbund (LRF). Vildsvin anses som oönskade av flera respondenter och samtliga tycker att jakt är viktigt. Det finns olika sätt att öka lantbrukares toleransnivå för vildsvin i lantbruk vilket i sin tur kan minska konflikten mellan lantbrukare och vildsvin. Icke-dödliga förvaltningsmetoder bör vara anpassade för vildsvinens fysiska förutsättningar för att minska skador på lantbruk. Dödliga förvaltningsmetoder som jakt bör innefatta en snabb död för vildsvinet, vilket kräver god kommunikation mellan jägare samt tränade hundar i syfte att leta reda på det skjutna vildsvinet ifall det första skottet inte var dödligt. / Wild boar population has increased rapidly in the south and central parts of Sweden since some individuals escaped from captivity in the 1970s. Wild boars have an appetite for agricultural crops resulting in a competition for these crops between the species man and wild boar, in a so-called interspecific competition. This in turn represents a conflict between farmers and wild boar. Management practices by hunters seem to enlarge the conflict, according to farmers there is a lack of hunting pressure and too much feeding. My results could show a conflict between hunters and farmers, which seems to worsen at an organizational level, Association of Hunters and the Federation of Farmers. Wild boar is considered as undesirable by several respondents and all of them agree that hunting is important. There are various ways to increase farmers' tolerance for wild boar in agriculture, which in turn can reduce the conflict between farmers and wild boar. To have an effect, nonlethal control should be appropriate for the physical conditions of wild boar. Lethal control should include a quick death for the wild boar, which requires good communication between hunters and trained dogs in order to locate the shot wild boar in case the first shot was not fatal.

This dissertation consists of three essays in applied microeconomics. The first and third essays are in the area of empirical labor economics while the second essay utilizes laboratory experiments to study labor market issues. The first essay investigates the effects of social ability on the earnings of employees. Using a microeconomic model in a two-firm setting, the effects of social ability on a worker's earnings are calculated and shown to be increasing with higher social ability levels. The results show that the more social workers, when compared to the less social workers, end up working a lower number of hours but at a higher hourly wage rate. Because of these offsetting effects, social ability had no net effect on annual earnings. The second essay of the dissertation addresses the same issue by using experimental methods. In the constructed experimental design, subjects are randomly selected and assigned to one of two groups, where the second group is the "control" group. A significant relationship is found between how much subjects earned and the ratings they get from their group members for the social group. The highest earnings of the social group are significantly higher than the earnings of the control group. When subjects are assumed to behave rationally, those in the group which spends more time together earn significantly more than those in the control group. The third essay of this dissertation analyzes the findings of Lazear about raiding, seniority within a firm, and job search during time not worked. Using the NLSY-79, a raiding dummy is included in the classical wage equation to better understand its effects. Seniority within a firm and search while unemployed are also included in the wage equation. Earnings of those who are not raided and stay with the same firm are also compared to those who are raided and switch firms. In both cases, statistically significant results are found confirming the theoretical findings of Lazear. Raiding is associated with higher earnings and staying with the same firm does yield lower earnings. Unemployed search is also examined, and the results support Lazear's statement that search while unemployed yields to lower earnings.

A major challenge in agroecosystems is how to manage the systems so that it reduces crop pests and enhances natural pest control. This thesis investigates patterns of crop pests and top-down effects of birds and arthropod predators in relation to land-use composition across spatial scales. In paper (I) I examined the crop distribution and land-use types in relation to the crop raiding patterns in 15 transectsin sites close to and far from forests along with a questionnaire survey at household level. I found severe crop raiding close to forests, but it had no impact on crop composition growing between the two sites. In paper (II) I examined the effect of forest and tree cover, at local and landscape scales, on the abundance of arthropod predators by collecting specimens from 40 home gardens. My result showed higher abundance of arthropod predators when either the home garden or the surroundings had a high tree-cover, compared to when tree-cover at both scales was similarly either high or low. In paper (III) I investigated the effect of excluding birds and arthropod predators on leaf damage on rape seed in 26 home gardens. I found stronger top-down impacts from arthropod predators on crop pests in tree-poor gardens than in tree-rich gardens. There was no effect of birds. In paper (IV) I explored the effect of landscape complexity on bird and arthropod predation using plasticine caterpillars in 36 home gardens across landscapes. The rate of arthropod predation on caterpillars was higher in simple than in complex landscapes. The rate of bird predation did not vary between complex and simple landscapes. In simple landscapes, arthropod predation was higher than that of birds. The overall results suggest that simplified gardens/landscapes still have enough habitat heterogeneity to support arthropod predators for the significant top-down controlling effect on crop pests. However, I did not find clear effect of complexityon the top-down effect of birds. / <p>At the time of the doctoral defence the following papers were unpublished and had a status as follows: Paper 1: Manuscript; Paper 3: Manuscript; Paper 4: Manuscript</p>

Due to recent crop-raiding incidents an eight weeks field study to survey threats to endemic gorillas have been conducted in Okwangwo Division of Cross River National Park, Nigeria. The report ratifies that smaller mammals than gorillas are responsible for a majority of damage done to Okwangwo farm crops. Additionally the report identifies issues that need to be dealt with in order to secure regional gorilla protection; most acute is the necessity to relocate three villages that remains within the park, and inclusion of villages that are excluded from Support Zone status in the Bumaji area. Collected data expands previously established gorilla range; therefore valuations concerning gorilla habitat range with non-specific suggestions for restructure of park borders are submitted.

<p>This dissertation focuses on raiding and sovereignty in the Central African Republic's (CAR) northeastern borderlands, on the margins of Darfur. A vast literature on social evolution has assumed the inevitability of centralization. But these borderlands show that centralization does not always occur. Never claimed by any centralizing forces, the area has instead long been used as a reservoir of resources by neighboring areas' militarized entrepreneurs, who seek this forest-savanna's goods. The raiders seize resources but also govern. The dynamics of this zone, much of it a place anthropologists used to refer to as "stateless," suggest a re-thinking of the modalities of sovereignty. The dissertation proposes conceptualizing sovereignty not as a totalizing, territorialized political order but rather through its constituent governing capabilities, which may centralize or not, and can combine to create hybrid political systems. The dissertation develops this framework through analysis of three categories of men-in-arms -- road-blockers, anti-poaching militiamen, and members of rebel groups -- and their relationships with international peacebuilding initiatives. It compares roadblocks and "road cutting" (robbery) to show how they stop traffic and create flexible, personalized entitlements to profit for those who operate them. The dissertation also probes the politics of militarized conservation: in a low-level war that has lasted for twenty-five years, the European Union-funded militiamen fight deadly battles against herders and hunters. Though ostensibly fought to protect CAR's "national patrimony" (its animals and plants), this war bolsters the sovereign capabilities of a range of non-state actors and has resulted in hundreds of deaths in the last few years, many of them hidden in the bush. The dissertation then shows how CAR's recent cycle of rebellion has changed governance in rural areas. Though mobile armed groups have long operated in CAR, they used to work as road cutters and local defense forces and only recently started calling themselves "rebels" -- a move that has landed them in new roles as "governors" of populations while leaving them without the welfare largess they seek. Throughout these various raiders' projects, the idea of the all-powerful state serves as a reference point they use to qualify themselves with sovereign authorities. But their actions as rulers undermine the creation of the unitary political authority they desire and invoke. Failure to appreciate these non-centralized micropolitical processes is a main reason peacebuilding efforts (such as disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration) in the region have failed.</p> / Dissertation

<p> </p><p>Due to recent crop-raiding incidents an eight weeks field study to survey threats to endemic gorillas have been conducted in Okwangwo Division of Cross River National Park, Nigeria. The report ratifies that smaller mammals than gorillas are responsible for a majority of damage done to Okwangwo farm crops. Additionally the report identifies issues that need to be dealt with in order to secure regional gorilla protection; most acute is the necessity to relocate three villages that remains within the park, and inclusion of villages that are excluded from Support Zone status in the Bumaji area. Collected data expands previously established gorilla range; therefore valuations concerning gorilla habitat range with non-specific suggestions for restructure of park borders are submitted.</p><p> </p>

This thesis analyses economic change among the bedouin of northern Arabia by examining four factors: the trade in camels; intertribal raiding; large-scale attacks by the Akhwan (Ikhwan); and trade and smuggling. Many writers have assumed that the sale or hiring out of camels for transport by camel-herding tribes was their main source of income, and that the spread of modern transportation caused a decline in the demand for camels, resulting in lower prices for the animals and an economic crisis for the bedouin. The well-documented case-studies in this thesis demonstrate that this assumption is flawed. The bedouin economy was more complex than the portrayals in many sources, and the reasons for economic hardship and political decline among the camel-herding tribes are more varied. In the story of how the wheel overcame the camel, it is clear that while transportation technology had some effect, even more important were such factors as drought, the rise of new states, colonial policies, intertribal politics and the varied factors pulling nomadic peoples to become sedentary.