I am currently involved in a social network research project, partnering with Wildlife Conservation Society, to complete my Master's program. This research is being conducted to gain information
about how people in Bua Province communicate and work together on natural
resource management. Effective resource management requires a range of people
and organizations to plan and take action together. They way these stakeholders
communicate and work together can be referred to as a “network.” We will be administering questionnaires in each village in Bua beginning this month, with hopes of finishing by February this coming year. Read on if you'd be interesting in learning more about the research...
Recently, social network theory as it
applies to natural resource management has emerged as a way to enhance our
understanding of collaborative and adaptive resource governance (Bodin and
Prell 2011, Vance-Borland and Holley 2011). While By applying a network
approach to the Itegrated Coastal Management (ICM) process in Bua, we recognize that stakeholders interact
with each other through networks and that various network characteristics
affect the way in which the network functions. Social network theory explores
how connections and characteristics of networks can affect intended outcomes (Bodin
and Prell 2011). Understanding relational patterns amongst stakeholders in Bua
will be important for effective ICM planning and continual development of the
Bua Yaubula Management and Support Team (BYMST) as a governance body.
Theoretically, applied network analysis can
help both practitioners and network members not only better understand the way
their network functions, but to “engineer” network structure to better optimize
conservation success (Bodin and Prell 2011, Vance-Borland and Holley 2011, Bodin
et al 2006). This can be referred to as
network “weaving” or network intervention (Holley 2012, Valente 2012, Vance-Borland
and Holley 2011).
Studies in other fields suggest that merely
presenting network maps to network members can trigger changes in a network
(Valente 2012), however, it has not yet been determined if network interventions
are indeed a tool that can be used to improve natural resource management
outcomes (Vance-Borland and Holley 2011). Previous works do show SNA to be useful
in stakeholder identification and engagement, understanding resource and knowledge
flow, and understanding power relations (Bodin and Prell 2011).
This particular study proposes to
investigate whether applied SNA can be a useful in the ICM process in Bua. It
is part of longer term research seeking to compare various ICM strategies and
evaluate both their ecological and socio-economic outcomes in a continued
attempt to develop best practices for ICM in Fiji. This study will help create
baseline data for testing the hypothesis that using SNA as a tool in ICM can
increase understanding of ICM stakeholder networks and, when paired with network
weaving activities, can hence improve desired management outcomes. This is
shown conceptually in Figure 1 below.
Figure 1. Conceptual model showing SNA’s
relationship to improved desired ICM outcomes
Particular questions
SNA will help us investigate in this study are:
·
What are some of the network characteristics of
communities/districts who are actively implementing NRM activities?
·
Why are certain people/villages working better
together and on certain issues than others?
·
Are key decision makers receiving information and
communicating about NRM issues and practices?
·
Who
works or wants to work together, and on what kind of NRM issues specifically?
·
How
integrated are ICM stakeholders across sectors and scales? How do communities
currently receive and relay information on NRM?
·
How can
communities, government, and NGOs improve collaboration and communication regarding
ICM?
·
Are working relationships stronger between communities
with traditional ties?
·
How do stakeholders
communicate about NRM and what barriers exist to communicating about best
practices?
The information gathered in the questionnaire will be used
to create a network map like the one shown in Figure 2 below. A social network map can be
useful in many ways. It visually shows how different groups of people communicate
or work together. IT is one tool we hope stakeholders, and specifically the newly formed can find useful.
Figure 2. Example Social Network Map
(Vance-Borland and Holley, 2011)
References
Bodin,
Ö., B. Crona, and H. Ernstson (2006). Social networks in natural resource
management: what is there to learn from a structural perspective? Ecology
and Society 11(2): r2
Bodin, Ö. and C. Prell (2011). Social
Networks and Natural Resource Management : Uncovering the Social Fabric of
Environmental Governance. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Valente, T. W.
(2012). Network interventions, Science, 337:
49-53.
Vance-Borland, K.
and J. Holley (2011). Conservation stakeholder network mapping, analysis, and
weaving, Conservation Letters, 4: 278-288.
