Browsing by Autor "Daniel Rojas"

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Crossing boundaries for environmental science and management: combining interdisciplinary, interorganizational and international collaboration
(Cambridge University Press, 2010) Stephen G. Perz; Silvia Brilhante; Foster Brown; Andrea Chávez Michaelsen; Elsa Mendoza; Veronica Passos; Raul Pinedo; Juan Fernando Reyes; Daniel Rojas; Galia Selaya
SUMMARY Literature on environmental science and management endorses crossing boundaries between disciplines, types of organizations and countries for environmental conservation. A literature review on interdisciplinarity, interorganizational networks and international cooperation highlights their justifying rationales and strategic practices. Crossing boundaries implies substantial challenges to managing collaboration itself, notably politics and uncertainty. Challenges to collaboration become compounded when crossing multiple boundaries simultaneously, here illustrated using the case of three projects in the south-western Amazon. Strategic practices such as net brokering and organizational courtships are highly important when crossing multiple boundaries. There are important commonalities in strategic practices for crossing different boundaries, such as recognizing grievances to manage politics, constituting functional redundancies in networks to manage uncertainty and non-aligned collaboration to manage both difficulties.
Private and communal lands? The ramifications of ambiguous resource tenure and regional integration in Northern Bolivia
(Utrecht University Library Open Access Journals (Publishing Services), 2014) Stephen G. Perz; Grenville Barnes; Alexander Shenkin; Daniel Rojas; Carlos E. Vaca
Major integration initiatives such as large-scale infrastructure projects are moving forward in Latin America, creating the conditions theorized by the ‘evolutionary theory of land rights’ (ETLR) for the shift from communal to private individual tenure. This however assumes a clear distinction between communal and private individual tenure that avoids ambiguities such as those arising from contrasts between de jure tenure rights and de facto practices. We take up these issues by focusing on northern Bolivia, an ambiguous case because groups of families with individual land claims recently received communal titles as ‘independent communities’. This has occurred in areas near a major market integration initiative, the Inter-Oceanic Highway, which has recently been paved. We draw on a survey of households in putatively communal lands in northern Bolivia to evaluate the claims of the ETLR concerning regional integration and formalization of private claims and its consequences. We find evidence of practices consistent with private individual tenure, but they are not related to market integration. Further, indications of formalization of private individual rights do not lead to the outcomes anticipated by the ETLR. These findings call for additional comparative work on integration and tenure.
Redefining Gender in Early Childhood: Inclusive Practices for Pre-K Education
(Latin American Association for the Advancement of Sciences, 2025) Elvia Jimena Alviar Rueda; Daniel Rojas
This study focuses on integrating gender inclusivity into Kindergarten 2 English as a Foreign Language (EFL) classrooms in Bogotá, Colombia. It explores how societal norms influence young children’s attitudes, behaviors, and identities, highlighting how education can challenge stereotypes and promote fairness. Using Action Research, two cycles of activities were implemented to help students reflect on and question traditional gender roles, fostering a more inclusive environment. The findings show that including gender awareness in language lessons boosts empathy, critical thinking, and acceptance of diversity, transforming the classroom into a space where all identities are valued. This work emphasizes the importance of teachers as role models for inclusion and social justice. Ultimately, it shows that teaching English can go beyond language skills to address important social issues, helping students develop broader, more equitable perspectives from a young age.
Road building, land use and climate change: prospects for environmental governance in the Amazon
(Royal Society, 2008) Stephen G. Perz; Silvia Brilhante; Foster Brown; Marcellus M. Caldas; Santos Ikeda; Elsa Mendoza; Christine Overdevest; Vera Reis; Juan Fernando Reyes; Daniel Rojas
Some coupled land-climate models predict a dieback of Amazon forest during the twenty-first century due to climate change, but human land use in the region has already reduced the forest cover. The causation behind land use is complex, and includes economic, institutional, political and demographic factors. Pre-eminent among these factors is road building, which facilitates human access to natural resources that beget forest fragmentation. While official government road projects have received considerable attention, unofficial road building by interest groups is expanding more rapidly, especially where official roads are being paved, yielding highly fragmented forest mosaics. Effective governance of natural resources in the Amazon requires a combination of state oversight and community participation in a 'hybrid' model of governance. The MAP Initiative in the southwestern Amazon provides an example of an innovative hybrid approach to environmental governance. It embodies a polycentric structure that includes government agencies, NGOs, universities and communities in a planning process that links scientific data to public deliberations in order to mitigate the effects of new infrastructure and climate change.
Trans-Boundary Infrastructure and Changes in Rural Livelihood Diversity in the Southwestern Amazon: Resilience and Inequality
(Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute, 2015) Stephen G. Perz; Flávia Leite; Lauren Griffin; Jeffrey Hoelle; Martha Rosero; Lucas Resende de Carvalho; Jorge Castillo; Daniel Rojas
Infrastructure has long been a priority in development policy, but there is debate over infrastructure impacts. Whereas economic studies show reductions in poverty, social research has documented growing income inequality. We suggest that a focus on livelihoods permits a bridge between the two literatures by highlighting decisions by households that may capture economic benefits but also yield social inequalities. We therefore take up two questions. First is whether new infrastructure allows households to diversify their livelihoods, where diversity begets resilience and thus affords livelihood sustainability. Second is whether households with more diverse livelihoods exhibit greater increases in livelihood diversity, which would widen livelihood inequalities. We take up the case of the Inter-Oceanic Highway, a trans-boundary infrastructure project in the southwestern Amazon. Findings from a rural household survey for the first question show a strong effect of accessibility on increasing livelihood diversity in areas receiving infrastructure upgrades, an indication that infrastructure fosters household resilience. However, results regarding the second question indicate that households with more diversified livelihoods also exhibit larger increments in diversity, which implies growing livelihood inequality. There remains a need to account for inequalities in livelihood diversity, since less diversified households benefit less from new infrastructure and remain more exposed to risks to their livelihoods.
Trans-boundary infrastructure and land cover change: Highway paving and community-level deforestation in a tri-national frontier in the Amazon
(Elsevier BV, 2013) Stephen G. Perz; Youliang Qiu; Yibin Xia; Jane Southworth; Jing Sun; Matthew Marsik; Karla da Silva Rocha; Veronica Passos; Daniel Rojas; Gabriel Alarcón Aguirre