Browsing by Autor "James P. Robson"

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Engaging youth in conversations about community and forests: Methodological reflections from Asia, Africa, and the Americas
(Elsevier BV, 2019) James P. Robson; Hugo Asselin; Miriam Castillo; Leigh Fox; Scott Francisco; Birendra Karna; Amanda Karst; Julia Quaedvlieg; Michelle Sánchez Luja; Maria Paula Sarigumba
Guiding principles for transdisciplinary sustainability research and practice
(Wiley, 2023) Maureen G. Reed; James P. Robson; Mariana Campos Rivera; Francisco Chapela; Iain J. Davidson‐Hunt; Peter Friedrichsen; Eleanor Haine; Anthony Blair Dreaver Johnston; Gabriela Lichtenstein; Laura S. Lynes
Abstract Transdisciplinary sustainability scientists are called to conduct research with community actors to understand and improve relations between people and nature. Yet, research hierarchies and power relations continue to favour western academic researchers who remain the gatekeepers of knowledge production and validation. To counter this imbalance, in 2018 we structured a multi‐day workshop to co‐design a set of principles to guide our own transdisciplinary, international and intercultural community of practice for biocultural diversity and sustainability. This community includes community collaborators, partner organizations, and early career and established researchers from Argentina, Bolivia, Canada, Germany, Mexico and South Africa. In 2021, we undertook online critical reflection workshops to share our research experiences and deepen our intercultural understanding of the application of the principles. Through these exercises, we adopted seven principles for working together that include: honour self‐determination and nationhood; commit to reciprocal relationships; co‐create the research agenda; approach research in a good way: embed relational accountability; generate meaningful benefits for communities; build in equity, diversity and inclusion; and emphasize critical reflection and shared learning. We explain these principles and briefly highlight their application to our research practices. By sharing these principles and associated practices, we seek to facilitate debate and spur transformations in how we conduct international and intercultural sustainability research. Our efforts also illustrate a strategy for on‐going knowledge co‐production as we cultivate safe and ethical spaces for learning together. Lessons learned may be particularly useful to those who engage in intercultural, collaborative research to advance sustainability transformations. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.
Understanding the role of youth in Indigenous territorial governance
(Frontiers Media, 2023) Maria Paula Sarigumba; Marlene Soriano; James P. Robson; Ignacio Quiviquivi; Olga Lidia Cabrera
Indigenous territories cover more than one-fourth of the world’s land surface, overlap with distinct ecological areas, and harbour significant cultural and biological diversity; their stewardship provides critical contributions to livelihood, food security, conservation, and climate action. How these territories are accessed, used, and managed is an important question for owner communities, state governments, development agencies, and researchers alike. This extends to how broad community memberships remain invested in territorial use and management, with young people comprising one sub-group often underrepresented in decision-making spaces. We know that internal community norms and structures–often dominated by older, adult males–can limit opportunities for youth to contribute their energy and ideas. We also know that youth can and do leave their home communities to pursue life, work, or education goals and aspirations. Drawing on insights from 5 years of collaborative research with the Indigenous Territory of Lomerío (ITL), Bolivia, we explore the roles that youth play in territorial governance, their perceptions of current structures and novel engagement strategies, and consider what lessons from this case could be applied more broadly. Our findings point to the ITL as an instructive example of how Indigenous (and other rural and remote) communities might enable young people to participate more fully in territorial governance, highlighting the importance of an enabling, underlying socio-cultural context. Based on our work in Bolivia, and lessons from other places, we discuss ways to enhance youth-community-territory linkages to support Indigenous land sovereignty and stewardship and reflect on how research co-design and knowledge co-production can help deliver more robust, inclusive, and useful (in an applied sense) empirical insights in support of such efforts.