Human Ecology Research Group (HERG)
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For any further information please contact: Katherine Homewood |
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Research themes
Major research activities and achievements focus on resource use,
conservation and development, as well as population, migration and
refugee studies.
Resource use, conservation and development
Degradation discourses have dominated policies of developing country
governments and international conservation agencies, sometimes in ways
that undermine conservation and development goals. Our research,
focusing on local land use, livelihoods, tenure, access and resource use
impacts, challenges conventional wisdom and practice in important test
cases, including our current project on Biodiversity, Ecosystem
services, Social sustainability and Tipping Points in East African
Drylands (Katherine Homewood, Aidan Keane, with IoZ, ILRI and ATPS:
NERC/ESRC/DFID funded, 2011-2013). Multi-site rangelands research in
East Africa demonstrated the conservation-compatible nature of pastoral
land use in the Serengeti-Mara ecosystem, analysed the microeconomics of
ecotourism’s failure to underpin sustainable conservation and
development, and explored impacts of veterinary interventions (Katherine Homewood, Sara Randall,
with postdocs Michael Thompson, Pippa Trench, Fumi Mizutani Wells;
DfID- and DGIC-funded). This led to practical involvement with UN-OCHA
training for Ethiopian government officials, advice and advocacy; a
Linacre Lecture (Katherine Homewood, 2003) co-chairing a Wellcome Symposium Panel (Animal Health in Developing Countries: Homewood, Cambridge, 2007) and membership of EU-FP7 Advisory Group for International Scientific Cooperation (2006-).
Caroline Garaway addresses comparable concerns in
small-scale fisheries where development, conservation and enhancement
programmes frequently have unexpected and undesirable impacts, either in
terms of fisheries production and/or biodiversity and/or local
livelihoods. Research focuses on how a greater understanding of local
livelihoods, patterns of resource use and systems of control, tenure and
access can both explain and potentially improve
conservation/development outcomes. Systems under study have included
inland Fisheries Enhancement (Lao PDR); Marine Protected Areas
(Carribean); Riverine Reserves (Indonesia) and ricefield ecosystems
(India, Lao PDR). She collaborates with overseas governments (West
Bengal, Lao PDR, Thailand), universities (UWI, AIT), and
national/international research agencies (CANARI, WorldFish, CIFRI,
FAO). Caroline Garaway held visiting fellowships at
Sydney (2003) and Worldfish Cambodia (2007), gave invited presentations
at the 7th and 8th Asian Fisheries Forum 2004, 2007, and contributed to
organising international meetings including Institutional Arrangements
for Marine Protected Areas, Mexico 2002, and International Symposia on
Enhancement and Sea Ranching Seattle, (2007) and Shanghai, China,
(2011).
Related issues surround tropical forest people’s non-timber forest product (NTFP) extraction, conservation and development (Katherine Homewood, Jerome Lewis,
postdocs since 2001 include Terry Sunderland, Noelle Kumpel, Naya
Sharma Paudel) linking to other research groups (co-supervisions with
Primate ecology), departments (Biology, Geography), and the Institute of
Zoology (co-supervisions on people/predator interactions, bushmeat,
NTFPs). Jerome Lewis began working with Pygmy
hunter-gatherers and former hunter-gatherers in Rwanda in 1993. This led
to work on the impact of the genocide on Rwanda’s Twa Pygmies. Since
1994 he has worked with Mbendjele Pygmies in Congo-Brazzaville
researching child socialisation, play and religion; egalitarian politics
and gender relations; and communication. Studying the impact of global
forces on many Pygmy groups across the Congo Basin has led to research
into human rights abuses, discrimination, economic and legal
marginalisation, and to applied research supporting conservation efforts
by forest people and supporting them to better represent themselves to
outsiders.
Population and migration
The implications of mobility for demogrpahic dynamics, livelihoods and
human well-being is of major theoretical, methodological and applied
importance. Sara Randall’s work challenges purely
quantitative demography, demonstrating the importance of anthropological
approaches. Her ESRC-funded research on demographic implications of
repatriating former refugee pastoralists contributed to the emerging
field of demography of conflict. This work supported an RA and led to
visiting fellowships (American University of Beirut, 2003 and Université
Laval Québec 2011). Consultancies with FAO (migrant fishers) and OXFAM
(pastoralist survey methodologies) led to further ESRC-funded research
2007-9, with important applied implications for poverty mapping (see
below on households). Sara Randall is involved in the Ouagadougou
Population Observatory in collaboration with ISSP, Ouagadougou Burkina
Faso. This demographic surveillance system is following six poor urban
communities. She is focusing health issues amongst migrants to
Ouagadougou and the welfare of the elderly in these communities.
Further West African work collaborating (funded by Nuffield small social
science grant) with Nathalie Mondain (University of Ottowa) and Alioune
Diagne (IN-DEPTH NETWORK, Accra) is investigating the impact of
international migration on those left behind in Senegal, Alioune was
awarded a British Academy visting research fellowship to spend two
months working with HERG in 2008.
Current projects
1. Changing Maasai Land Use and Livelihoods (Katherine Homewood, ongoing):
Multi site comparative study and synthesis of the outcomes of changing
land use and the implications for wildlife conservation, poverty
reduction and economic development: Kenyan, Ethiopian and Tanzanian
rangelands. Funded by ESPA (ESRC/NERC/DfID); ASARECA (USAID), EU.
2. Forest people resource use and rights (Jerome Lewis, ongoing):
Studying the impact of global forces on many Pygmy groups across the
Congo Basin has led to applied research supporting conservation efforts
by forest people and supporting them to better represent themselves to
outsiders, as well as research into human rights abuses, discrimination,
economic and legal marginalisation. Recent work has examined the impact
of international standards for industrial companies working in areas of
high biodiversity, and used this information to promote best practice,
with publications on free, prior and informed consent (2008), and
corporate greivance mechanisms (2011) and by contributing to the
development of the Forest Stewardship Council’s regional guidelines for
the Congo Basin.
As part of efforts to increase local capacity to implement higher
standards in eco-system management, Jerome Lewis was central to the
establishment of The Centre for Social Excellence in Cameroon that
trains young Congo Basin post-graduates in social forestry, and the
community radio station Biso na Biso in northern Republic of Congo that
promotes local understading of environmental and social issues in local
languages. Work developing Extreme Citizen Science has lead to a major
new project funded by EPSRC (2011-2016) to develop the technologies and
practices to support any community, regardless of literacy or
educational levels, to elaborate and implement Citizen Science projects
as a means to address environmental problems and human rights issues.
3. Anthropological demography, especially of African nomadic pastoralists (Sara Randall, ongoing):
The consequences of conflict and displaced or refugee
populations; migration and mobility: Integrating qualitative and
quantitative data to improve our understanding of population and
environment data and the biases within them.
4. The human ecology of living aquatic resources use
(particularly in SE Asia) and the development of integrated approaches
to living aquatic resources management and research. (Caroline Garaway,
ongoing research interests):
Impact of fisheries and agricultural development on living aquatic
resources, local livelihoods and human/environment interactions; Marine
Protected Areas: Conservation; tourism; and development; CBNRM and
institutional approaches to common pool resource management; Action
research, in particular Adaptive Learning Approaches in Fisheries
Management; Development of integrated approaches to living aquatic
resources management and research.
5. Households and other data categorisations (Sara Randall, ongoing):
Much research on poverty, well-being, livelihoods and many international
indicators of wellbeing (eg Millenium Development Goals) depend on data
produced from small scale or international household surveys. This
research (financed by ESRC and ANR) and in collaboration with Ernestina
Coast (LSE, ex HERG) French, Senegalese, Burkinabe and Ugandan
researchers is investigating the implications of definitions of key
social units such as the household for the ability of to represent
people’s daily lives. This may be particularly important when studying
poverty, minority groups and interventions which are informed by such
data. (see www.householdsurvey.info)
