Browsing by Author "Mandondo, Alois"

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    Dialogue of theory and empirical evidence: A weighted decision and tenurial niche approach to reviewing the operation of natural resource policy in rural southern Africa
    (Institute for Poverty Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), 2005) Mandondo, Alois
    Considerable research has been conducted on community-based natural resource management in rural southern Africa. Many interesting insights have accumulated from the literature on the research issues of earlier generations. The challenge is to break new ground by unraveling insights relevant to later generations. This study identifies the issue of scale in complex natural resource management systems as one of the more important among emerging issues in the sector. The study develops a theoretical framework implying trade-offs between deciding for others, deciding with others and deciding for oneself in the operation of natural resource policy. This weighted decision framework is used to critically interrogate the human ecology of land and resource use across a variety of tenurial niches in rural southern Africa. The study argues that in arriving at decisions regarding the operation of natural resource policy, the emphasis needs to shift from what should be done, to how it should be done. The study suggests that the ‘how it should be done’ of policy operation is a calibration problem. The calibration problem concerns itself with reconciling diverse preferences through the medium of decisions made for others, with others and for oneself. It is concluded that negotiation provides the most appropriate basis for calibration since it reconciles the contradictions within and among decisions made for others, with others and for oneself.
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    The membership problem in people-centred approaches to natural resource management in Southern Africa
    (Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, University of the Western Cape, 2006) Matose, Frank; Mandondo, Alois; Mosimane, Alfons; Aribeb, Karl; Chikozho, Claudious; Jones, Mike
    Who should qualify to be a member of a natural resource management (NRM) programme in Southern Africa with the attendant benefits and responsibilities? In Zimbabwe, membership of such programmes could be described as membership by decree, in Namibia, membership tends to be characterised by coalescence of interest, while in Botswana there is a combination of the two approaches. Other types of membership in the region are membership by cultural affiliation, membership deriving from association with an NGO, and membership by virtue of being a member of a civic agency (as has been done in South Africa). This policy brief sets out some of the issues which should be considered when seeking answers to this vexed question.