Master thesis in Sustainable Development 276
Examensarbete i Hållbar utveckling
Integrating preservation of indigenous culture with the REDD objectives Experiences of the Suruí Carbon Project
Daria Shakisheva
DEPARTMENT OF EARTH SCIENCES
I N S T I T U T I O N E N F Ö R
Master thesis in Sustainable Development 276
Examensarbete i Hållbar utveckling
Integrating preservation of indigenous culture with the REDD objectives Experiences of the Suruí Carbon Project
Daria Shakisheva
Supervisor: Örjan Bartholdson
Evaluator: Oscar Jansson
Copyright © Daria Shakisheva and the Department of Earth Sciences, Uppsala University
Published at Department of Earth Sciences, Uppsala University (www.geo.uu.se), Uppsala, 2015
Content
1. Introduction ... 1
1.1. Problem Background ... 1
1.2. Research Problem ... 2
1.3. Research Purpose ... 3
1.4. Definitions ... 3
1.5. Outline ... 4
2. Method ... 5
2.1. Case Study ... 5
2.2. Literature Review ... 5
2.3. Empirical data collection ... 6
2.3.1. Document Study ... 6
2.3.2. Skype and telephone interviews ... 7
2.4. Analysis of empirical data ... 7
2.5. Restrictions of an off-field research ... 8
3. Theoretical and Conceptual Frameworks ... 8
3.1. Assemblage ... 8
3.2. Discourse analysis ... 10
3.3. The dwelling perspective ... 11
4. REDD, community based forest management, and indigenous groups ... 14
4.1. REDD ... 14
4.1.1. A market mechanism to tackle climate change ... 14
4.1.2. Threat, or opportunities for local communities? ... 15
4.1.3. Ontological conflict ... 16
4.2. Community based forest management ... 18
4.3. Prospects for the indigenous people in the Amazon ... 20
4.3.1. The politics and evolution of indigenousness ... 20
4.3.2. Hypothesis ... 21
5. The Case: Paiter Suruí, and the Suruí Carbon Project ... 21
5.1. The people Paiter Suruí ... 22
5.1.1. Image of life before the contact ... 22
5.1.2. History of contact and its social, cultural, economic and environmental impacts ... 24
5.2. The Suruí Carbon Project: its origins and prospects ... 26
5.2.1. Struggle for autonomy and an alternative development ... 26
5.2.2. 50 Year Plan of Paiter Suruí ... 27
5.2.3. First projects under the 50 Year Plan ... 28
5.2.4. Putting REDD ‘on the table’ ... 29
5.2.5. Advances of the 50 Year Plan within the REDD framework ... 30
6. Suruí Carbon Project and the agenda of cultural preservation ... 32
6.1. Constructing a hybrid ... 32
6.2. ‘Protagonism’ ... 34
6.3. Relationship with the forest ... 35
6.4. Rendering the dwelling experience technical ... 38
6.5. Compromises ... 40
6.5.1. Religion ... 40
6.5.2. Rhythm of life ... 41
6.5.3. Skilled practice of dwelling ... 41
7. Discussion ... 42
7.1. Hegemony or heterogeneity? ... 42
7.2. Cultural preservation, substitution, or creation? ... 43
7.3. Monetized indigeneity ... 44
8. Conclusions ... 44
9. Acknowledgements ... 45
10. Bibliography ... 46
11. Appendix: Interview transcripts ... 51
11.1. Interview with Chicoepab Suruí, conducted by Skype on June 25th, 2015 ... 51
11.2. Interview with Arildo Gapame Suruí, conducted by Skype on July 1st, 2015 ... 57
11.3. Follow-up interview with Chicoepab Suruí, conducted by Skype on July 6th, 2015 ... 66
11.4. Interview with Gasodá Suruí, condicted by phone and Skype on July 8th, 2015 ... 69
11.5. Interview with Ivaneide Bandeira Cardozo, conducted by Skype on July 10th , 2015 ... 74
List of figures Fig. 1. Location of the demarcated TISS on the border between the states of Rondônia and Mato Grosso in Brazil. (Source: Metareilá 2010) ... 22
Fig. 2. Satellite map of TISS with market locations of villages at its edges. (Source: Suruí 2009) ... 25
Fig. 3. The map of ethnozoning of the TISS. (Source: Kanindé et al. 2011) ... 31
Integrating preservation of indigenous culture with the REDD objectives: experiences of the Suruí Carbon Project
DARIA SHAKISHEVA
Shakisheva, D., 2015, Integrating preservation of indigenous culture with the REDD objectives:
experiences of the Suruí Carbon Project, Master thesis in Sustainable Development at Uppsala University, 1R87 pp, 15 ECTS/hp
Abstract: As the urgency of tackling climate change globally is pressed against equally urgent needs for local development, the REDD framework is gaining importance as a flexible market- based mechanism, which can potentially be instrumental for the development of local
communities. However, such win-win ambitions of projects that integrate development and conservation have been tested for the past two decades, and existing research attests to their questionable outcome with respect to either the interests of local communities, or the environmental objectives, or both. Among reasons for poor performance or failure, various analysts point out the suppression of local cultural and socio-productive systems by a
homogenising modernist development agenda. This research is a case study of a REDD project, which claims to have addressed this issue: the Suruí Forest Carbon Project, developed by the indigenous people of Paiter Suruí, who inhabit the Indigenous Territory Sete de Setembro in the Brazilian Amazon. Based on the stated ambition of the Suruí Carbon Project to help preserve the indigenous culture of Paiter Suruí, the inquiry of this research aims to explore the potential of the REDD framework for safeguarding cultural integrity of indigenous peoples. This case study is intended to contribute to the discussion on whether and how ontological and cultural clashes can be mitigated within the REDD framework so as to enhance its benefits on the global and local levels. The experience of the Suruí Carbon Project in integrating the agenda of cultural preservation into the REDD mechanism is analysed by means of document study, telephone interviews with the authors and propagators of the project, and discourse analysis.
Additionally, theoretical frameworks of assemblage, by T.M. Li, and of the dwelling
perspective, by T. Ingold are employed for interpreting the empirical material. Among the key findings of this research is a demonstration that an epistemological intervention, which
developmental projects in this context usually imply, doesn’t necessarily supress local
autonomy. On the other hand, the example of the SCP demonstrates that the autonomy of local communities in defining their own developmental models doesn’t by itself guarantee that they will successfully preserve their ancestral cultures. Judging by the case of Paiter, a substantial modification of cultural and socio-productive models is inevitable, and the point of debate is which cultural aspects are to be compromised and how much.
Keywords: Suruí Carbon Project, REDD, indigenous communities, community based forest management, sustainable development, dwelling
Daria Shakisheva, Department of Earth Sciences, Uppsala University, Villavägen 16, SE- 752 36 Uppsala, Sweden
Integrating preservation of indigenous culture with the REDD objectives: experiences of the Suruí Carbon Project
DARIA SHAKISHEVA
Shakisheva, D., 2015, Integrating preservation of indigenous culture with the REDD objectives:
experiences of the Suruí Carbon Project, Master thesis in Sustainable Development at Uppsala University, 1R87 pp, 15 ECTS/hp
Summary: The research related in this report investigates a specific project, which makes part of the REDD framework – the UN-proposed transnational market mechanism aimed at
reducing global greenhouse gas emissions by providing payments for the conservation,
restoration and sustainable management of global rainforests. While REDD projects tend to be integral vessels for the pursuit of diverse interests by multiple stakeholders, they are likely to continue the pre-existing developmental trend of community based forest conservation. This trend has been criticised by the academia and by the public for imposing external
developmental models on local communities, which resulted in degradation of local cultural diversity and at the same time contributed to poor project output both in terms of environmental conservation and social development. This research explores the potential strategies of
mitigating these shortcomings within the REDD framework, by examining the experience of the Suruí Carbon Project – the first REDD project in the Amazon to be proposed and managed by an indigenous community, which specifically states cultural preservation as an integral element of fulfilling the REDD objectives. The case study of the Suruí Carbon Project is performed with the use of data obtained from the official project documents and accompanying publications, as well as Skype and telephone interviews with the actors partial to formulating and implementing the Suruí Carbon Project. In order to analyse the empirical data, theories of discourse analysis, assemblage and the dwelling perspective are employed. The profound social, cultural, economic, and environmental impacts dealt to the Paiter Suruí people after their contact with the national society are related, and the strategy behind the Suruí Carbon Project in addressing the adverse aspects of these impacts is explored. Research findings demonstrate outstanding agency of the Paiter Suruí in succeeding to exercise their autonomy and define their own developmental models despite the extensive epistemological and socio-productive
adaptation which they had to undergo in order to make use of such externally formulated mechanisms as REDD. On the other hand, the research revealed that autonomy by itself doesn’t insure against degradation of cultural diversity, as is exposed in the challenges that the Paiter Suruí people face in preserving their cultural heritage while redefining their socio-economic needs and cultural values. These findings are related and discussed so as to make a contribution for and stimulate productive reflection within both the academic and the practitioner circles engaged in REDD and the development of indigenous communities.
Keywords: Suruí Carbon Project, REDD, indigenous communities, community based forest management, sustainable development, dwelling
Daria Shakisheva, Department of Earth Sciences, Uppsala University, Villavägen 16, SE- 752 36 Uppsala, Sweden
Abbreviations and special terms
50 Year Plan Ethno-Environmental Management Plan of the Indigenous Territory Sete de Setembro (also referred to as the Management Plan of the Paiter Suruí)
ACT Brasil Amazon Conservation Team of Brazil (an NGO)
CBFM (CFM) Community Based Forest Management (Community Forest Management)
CBNRM Community Based Natural Resource Management
ES Ecosystem Services
FUNAI The National Indian Foundation (Portuguese: Fundação Nacional do Índio) – the official Brazilian governmental body that is responsible for the affairs of the indigenous people in the country
ICDP Integrated Conservation and Development Project IDF Ideological-discursive formations (in discourse analysis) INGO International Non-governmental Organisation
IUCN International Union for the Conservation of Nature
MMA Brazilian Ministry of the Environment (Portuguese: Ministério do Meio Ambiente)
NORAD Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation NGO Non-governmental Organisation
NTFP Non-timber Forest Product
Paiter Autonym of the Paiter Suruí indigenous people
Paiterey Karah Name for the Indigenous Territory Sete de Setembro used by the Paiter (alternatively spelled Paiterey Garah)
Paiter Foundation Foundation established by Paiter Suruí in order to manage the funds gained with the Suruí Carbon Project and from other sources
PES Payments for Ecosystem Services
PLANAFLORO Rondônia Natural Resource Management Project – a development project of Rondônian government, funded by the World Bank and the United Nations Development Programme
REDD Reducing [carbon] Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (not distinguished from REDD+ in this report)
SCP (SFCP) Suruí Carbon Project (Suruí Forest Carbon Project)
TISS The Indigenous Territory Sete de Setembro (Portuguese: Terra Indígena Sete de Setembro)
UNEP United Nations Environmental Program
USAID United States Agency for International Development
WWF World Wildlife Fund
1. Introduction
In this chapter the topic of the thesis is introduced, the research problem is explained, and the purpose of the research is presented, together with research questions. Additionally, default definitions are offered for a few terms that are used repeatedly throughout most sections of this report. In the end of the chapter, an outline of the report is presented.
1.1. Problem Background
REDD1, a market-based global initiative to tackle climate change by reducing carbon emissions from tropical deforestation, is steadily growing in importance globally. New project
arrangements, potentially involving a broad spectrum of stakeholders and binding together a range of interests, are constantly being elaborated. Latest experience of running projects is carefully analysed, evidence of replicable success stories for specific interest groups collected, and ways of utilizing REDD mechanisms for various ends further explored. In the Amazon region, where for the past few decades the alarming rate of deforestation has been matched by an accelerated pace of development, fuelled by governmental infrastructure projects and settlement programs, with a massive influx of migrants of different kinds of backgrounds and ambitions, the REDD framework is seen as an appealing source of opportunity for actors with diverse interests, and a potential to address various issues at the same time. In the context of increasing pressure on the ecosystems of one of the world’s most precious biomes, and amidst constant social tensions, where violent clashes in disputes over land and access to resources are not uncommon, and where state structures fail to defend the interest of smallholder forest dwellers, disproportionately favouring the interests of large capitalised actors, terrain is laid out to combine a social cause or causes with an environmental objective, for which REDD is considered to be a promising instrument. At the same time, while various REDD projects are still going through an experimental phase, and there is a sense of novelty and discovery about their algorithms and outcomes, projects that integrate forest preservation and human
development objectives were being implemented in the region throughout a couple of past decades. Since REDD is essentially a funding scheme, which requires a clear and measurable output in terms of carbon sequestration, the specific implementation mechanisms are largely a matter for the proponent’s own judgement and creativity. Predictably, a number of formerly existing project concepts are being offered as a good fit to fulfilling the REDD objectives, among which integrated conservation and development projects are a familiar trend.
Specifically, the goal of forest conservation is commonly married to that of community development, which results in arrangements that are promoted as projects by and for the poor communities of forest dwellers. When this trend gained momentum, forest dwellers found themselves discursively redeemed from the previous charges of being inherent contributors to forest degradation as well as obstacles to regional development (Bratman 2011), and elevated to the pedestal of perfect forest keepers, who posses unique knowledge that allows for
sustainable forest management, and who are most interested and competent in keeping their forest landscapes ecologically stable (Li 2007). This agenda is not new by now, however, and the existing evidence of how projects under such slogans have been applied in practice demonstrated unsatisfactory or even regressive results (Pokorny et al. 2013; Li 2007; Dove 2006). Examination of reasons for failure shows that pro-poor objectives accommodated by conservation initiatives often aren’t sufficient to address more profound issues related to regional development and economic policies that favour large capitalized actors and marginalize the smallholders. The flawed and clearly mismanaged system of land rights
1 In this report, REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) and REDD+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation, plus: conservation of forest carbon stocks; sustainable management of forests;
enhancement of forest carbon stocks) (FCCC 2011) are both referred to by the simpler abbreviation – ‘REDD’.
distribution, together with poor or inexistent local infrastructure and access to basic services, are also unhelpful factors (Pokorny 2013). But, apart from these external factors, existing research has pointed out that a major factor detrimental to the outcome of such projects is their failure to live up to the rhetoric of making smallholders protagonists of their own forest
management. Pokorny et al. (2013) find the origin of such problem in the fact that ‘these organizations uncritically assume that their cultural logic of sustainable development also applies to the smallholders’, which results in that the majority of such dual goal projects follow
‘market-oriented approaches that widely ignore local management practices, local ways of organizing work, and other local capacities and limitations’. Evaluation of a broad spectrum of projects shows that they systematically prioritise externally defined models of local
development, prescribe externally produced expert solutions, and impose economic and institutional models that were found to be functional sometimes continents away from the site of implementation (Pokorny et al. 2013; Li 2007; Dove 2006). Researchers are advising to
‘strengthen local cultures and practices instead of searching for their replacement’, while expressing concern about the REDD mechanism being capable of improvements in this respect (Pokorny et al. 2013). Notably, the ‘cultural’ conflict is often found particularly evident and unsettling with respect to indigenous groups and traditional communities, whose original cultures are least suited for being adapted to these external models (Shankland & Hasenclever 2011; Pokorny 2013).
In this context, the first REDD project to be launched by an indigenous community in the Amazon – the people of Paiter Suruí – that specifically states preservation of their indigenous culture as one of the principal goals behind the project (Kanindé & Metairelá 2008; IDESAM
& Metareilá 2012) – stands out brightly and promisingly, and is being looked up to as a
pioneering example in preserving indigenous culture via a REDD mechanism (Butler 2012). As a case, which could potentially set the precedent of addressing above described inadequacies of the widespread conservational-developmental approach, this project’s potential appears to be a worthwhile object of a focused study. It is to the experience of the Suruí initiative in
formulating their objectives of cultural protection and autonomy as an integral part of a REDD project that the research of this Master thesis is dedicated.
1.2. Research Problem
The Suruí Forest Carbon Project, or the Suruí Carbon Project (SCP) is a REDD project
proposed and managed by the Association Metareilá – a representative association of the Paiter Suruí indigenous people (self-called ‘Paiter’), who occupy the Indigenous Territory Sete de Setembro (TISS), which covers approximately 248,000 hectares across the border of the Brazilian states Mato Grosso and Rondônia. In the formulations and discourses of the Suruí Carbon Project (IDESAM & Metareilá 2012), as well as other documents related to it (Kanindé
& Metairelá 2008; Povo Paiter Suruí 2014), forest conservation and the preservation of the Suruí original culture are conceptualized as two mutually reinforcing aspects of the same process. While specific cultural content is thus being framed by them as an integral and
functional element in the process of fulfilling the REDD objectives, the project’s design related in the official documents addresses culture on generic terms and doesn’t define specifically, what cultural content is referred to as the project’s functional element, and by what means its preservation is to be provided within the framework of REDD. The exact construction and role of the cultural element as part of the Suruí Carbon Project presents itself as deserving
investigation, given the role-model potential that this particular project has for other indigenous communities and community-managed REDD projects in general.
1.3. Research Purpose
The overarching purpose of my research is to contribute to increased understanding of weather and how REDD projects can be used as vehicles by indigenous people so as to safeguard their cultural and territorial integrity and autonomy. The study also aims to examine how notions of indigenous culture can be articulated and used in a REDD project formulations. This purpose will be achieved by studying the specific case of the indigenous people of Paiter Suruí, who run the REDD project called the Suruí Carbon Project in the Indigenous Territory Sete de Setembro in the states of Rondônia and Mato Grosso, Brazil.
Through the study of official and accompanying documents of the Suruí Carbon Project, as well as Skype and telephone interviews with the project’s proponents and implementers, this research seeks to answer the following questions:
• What specific cultural content do authors and proponents of the Suruí Carbon Project refer to when conceptualising cultural protection as an integral element of this REDD project?
• How is the discussion on culture accounted for in the project’s design and what role does it play as a functional element of the project?
• How does the project’s design address potential risks for the cultural integrity and autonomy of Paiter Suruí?
These findings will be analysed from the point of view of a broad context of community- oriented REDD projects in the Brazilian Amazon and the prospects they pose for indigenous people.
1.4. Definitions
Key terms like ‘culture’, ‘indigenous’ and others are used extensively throughout this report. I assume no blanket definitions for them to be maintained throughout the entire paper. Every time a new context of usage is introduced, it is with respect to the definitions assumed by this context that I am going to use these terms (in those cases I will emphasise what is referred to by a term in that particular context). For cases when it might be unclear, here are some default assumptions, respective of each key term that the reader can rely on:
Culture
Since the main objective of this research implies discovering what the authors of the SCP refer to by using this term themselves, the principle of usage will be case-specific, every time borrowed from my empirical findings and reviewed literature. What I will be paying attention to in the usage of the term ‘culture’ are not epistemological specifics, but real world
phenomena, which will be referred to on each occasion the word is used, as such phenomena are understood by respective speakers or authors. Various sources will be cited on using this term, and while in every case the implied meaning might be slightly different, my intention is to find references to similar types of phenomena, and base my analysis on those. From the point of view of theory to be further introduced, the use of the concept of culture in this report is an example of an assemblage, where different ways of understanding culture have been brought together in the process of making an investigative and explanatory argument.
Traditional
When used in the literature review not specifically related to the case of SCP: refers to communities that have been settled in a region for about a 100 years or more, and the distinguishable lifestyles and modes of production they have developed.
When used in analysing literature, documents and interviews related to the SCP case: can be understood as ‘pre-contact’, refers to practices or other phenomena belonging or related to the scope of mental and physical practices that were common for the Paiter before the official contact with representatives of FUNAI in 1969.
Indigenous
In literature review: depends on the source, but generally the usage corresponds to a legally acknowledged status of indigenousness in the case or cases referred to.
In the study of empirical data: persons or phenomena originating from an ethnic group that recognises itself as such (indigenous) and/or that is recognised as such by the national society officially or unofficially.
Non-indigenous
In the study of empirical data: persons or phenomena originating from society that is not
‘indigenous’ as described above. (Often the implied attributes of the ‘non-indigenous’ that are encountered in the empirical material are related to concepts of ‘modernist’, ‘western’, and
‘capitalist’, as will be discussed in the fourth chapter.)
1.5. Outline
Chapter 1 is introductory, presenting the research problem and its context, the research purpose and the specific case to which this thesis is dedicated, describing key terms to be used
throughout the paper and giving an outline of the report.
Chapter 2 relates the methods used for this study, explaining the choice and function of each method.
Chapter 3 presents the theoretical and conceptual framework that was used for the analysis of the empirical data.
Chapter 4 relates the background for the empirical study: general processes and trends within which the SCP is situated are explained, and relevant points of discussion on them are
investigated. A hypothesis against which to evaluate empirical findings is formulated.
Chapter 5 gives a detailed presentation of the empirical case: the history of the Paiter Suruí people, specifically their contact with the non-indigenous society and the multi-faceted impact which it generated; the history of the struggle for autonomy and cultural integrity of the Paiter;
the inception of the Suruí Carbon Project and its role in the broader 50 Year Management Plan.
Chapter 6 contains the results and analysis of the empirical study: discourses on various aspects of cultural preservation encountered in document texts and interviews are summarized and assessed with the help of the selected theoretical tools (reviewed in Chapter 3).
Chapter 7 integrates my empirical findings into a broader discussion, as was introduced in Chapter 4, using the hypothesis formulated based on that discussion. Conclusions and contributing remarks are made.
Chapter 8 gives a final concluding overview of my research, its main findings and contributions.
2. Method
In this chapter my methodological steps in conducting this research are related, and the reasons for the choice of these particular methods form the point of view of the objective of my study are explained.
2.1. Case Study
The general research strategy of my research is case study: an inductive, data-oriented,
qualitative analysis, focused at a concrete case. As Eisenhardt (1989) points out, this strategy of research is appropriate for novel topics and practical spheres of a pioneering kind, which
applies wholly to the case I’ve selected: the SCP is the first case of an indigenous people in Brazil to start a community-based REDD project in the context of Brazilian Amazon. As a project that claims to have integrated preservation of the indigenous culture with the REDD objectives, and reports success, it is a case to which no obvious analogues have been reported, and it is for this reason that the SCP case is closely observed by other indigenous communities in the region: the experience of the Suruí with REDD is likely to set a precedent regionally, and potentially even intercontinentally. The innovative nature of the claim made by the project’s authors, and of their very approach to project formulation and execution, validates a case study, so as to derive valuable information on the desirability and possibility of the replication of this, for the moment probably unmatched experience (Flyvbjerg 2006). The choice of case study as a method explains the predominantly descriptive nature of questions posed to the empirical material (Yin 1991). Due to my technical, temporal and financial restrictions, I was not able to conduct a field study, which imposed certain limitations on the scope and nature of my
empirical data (it had to be reserved to textual representations in document formulations and interviews). This limited scope of empirical material also pre-determined discourse analysis as a likely theoretical tool, which I would end up needing to employ (Jørgensen & Phillips 2002).
Apart from this, after having set initial research questions, I’ve kept my theoretical options flexible, and eventually adapted them to what seemed as most appropriate and relevant to the data which my case presented me with.
2.2. Literature Review
Inevitable for any project of academic research, literature review was carried out at all stages of this research, including the preliminary stage at which the research problem and purpose were being established, and appropriate research methods selected. Literature review primarily revolved around peer-reviewed academic publications, which were researched through digital databases, published references, consultations with my supervisor and other university
superiors and colleages, and via simple Google search. Literature review was instrumental in elaborating the theoretical framework for my research: relevant theoretical tools were sought for based on the content of the preliminary study of case facts and empirical samples – also conducted by means of literature review. At the stage when the case, research problem, and research purpose where established, literature review was a key method for exploring the background discussions on the scope of trends and processes to which my case under study belongs. This overview of relevant academic discussions was utilized in order to formulate a hypothesis, corresponding to these discussions, against which I later evaluated the empirical data of my case study. Literature review was also employed to accumulate empirical data and in order to research the facts of my case. For both of these instances, grey literature, media publications and even social media publications were researched.
2.3. Empirical data collection
Official project documents and publications by the authors and propagators of the SCP, as well as semi-structured interviews with some of these and related persons, all associated with the formulation and implementation of the SCP – constituted the body of my empirical data. The empirical samples where selected qualitatively (Bhattacherjee 2012), corresponding to what the case study method implies (Yin 1991), with the goal of obtaining the most revealing and
informative material from the most representative of informants and publications, whereas the quantitative aspect was left outside of this research. Documents and respondents were chosen based on the potential complementarity of their contributions to the body of data with the specific thematic content, which I established in accordance with my descriptive research questions, and not based on the goal of adding statistical perspective to my findings (Flyvbjerg 2006).
2.3.1. Document Study
Official documents related to the Suruí Carbon Project were analysed, and the mechanisms by which cultural preservation is integrated into their formulations were identified. The key official documents under study were selected based on the literature review and research of the facts of the case, which pointed at the following list of documents as representative:
a) The Ethno-environmental Management Plan of the Indigenous Territory Sete de Setembro (Kanindé & Metairelá 2008) (referred to as the ‘50 Year Plan’)
b) The Suruí Forest Carbon Project (IDESAM & Metareilá 2012) (the final proposal document, which relates the results of all the studies that preceded it’s formulation) c) The Ethnozoning of Paiterey Garah: the Indigenous Territory Sete de Setembro
(Kanindé et al. 2011) (a manual supplement to both the 50 Year Plan and the Suruí Forest Carbon Project)
d) The Codes and Norms of Paiter Suruí (Povo Paiter Suruí 2014)
The specifics of this case is that the authors and implementers of the SCP are themselves predominantly representatives of the indigenous people of Paiter Suruí, and at the same time are partial to the international academic society, since most of the persons involved in the formulation of the SCP have obtained Bachelor or Master degrees in some of the best regional and federal universities in Brazil. As a result, the official documents with formulations of the SCP are ‘accompanied’ by a series of Master theses and research papers, which, each in their own way, explore the circumstances of the SCP and other projects under and for the 50 Year Plan from the perspective of persons who are truly participant observers – since their insertion in these projects preceded their research. Exploration of these publications proved to be a resourceful addition to the main project documents, which allowed me some insight into the motivations, arguments, and ideologies employed by the authors of SCP in its formulations.
Therefore, the following research publications where also considered as important empirical material for my analysis:
a) Master thesis by Chicoepab Suruí, titled: ‘Reforestation of the Indigenous Territory Sete de Setembro: a change of perceptions and behaviour of the people Paiter Suruí of
Rondônia?’ (Portuguese: Reflorestamento da Terra Indígena Sete de Setembro: uma mudança da percepção e da conduta do povo Paiter Suruí de Rondônia?) (Suruí 2013) b) Peer-reviewed academic paper co-authored by Chicoepab Suruí, Almir Narayamoga
Suruí, Ivaneide Bandeira Cardozo, Emílio Sarde Neto, and Adnilson de Almeida Silva, titled: ‘The protagonism of the Paiter Suruí in the indigenous education scenario:
elements for possible dialogue of interculturality’ (Portuguese: ‘O protagonismo Paiter Suruí no cenário educacional indígena: elementos para um diálogo possível de
interculturalidade’) (Suruí et al. 2014)
c) Master thesis by Ivaneide Bandeira Cardozo, titled: ‘Iway and Metare: the territorial marker of Paiter Suruí’ (Portuguese: ‘Iway e Metare: a Marca do territorio Paiter Suruí’) (Cardozo 2012)
The document study was used in order to identify specific narratives and arguments that are repeatedly and consistently employed by the authors in conceptualizing and formulating the integration of cultural preservation goal into the environmental objectives of the SCP. These findings were then verified, further elaborated, supplemented, and enhanced by means of telephone and Skype interviews.
2.3.2. Skype and telephone interviews
In order to compliment and verify the findings of document study, Skype and telephone
interviews were sought with the authors and propagators of the Suruí Forest Carbon Project and 50 Year Plan. Because of the busy schedules of my respondents, who occupy responsible positions in the 50 Year Plan implementation team and with other projects, and also because of their remote locations and technical problems with establishing connection, not all persons whom I sent interview requests were able to contribute to my study. I did, however, manage to conduct lengthy, in-depth and insightful semi-structured interviews with the following
respondents: Chicoepab Suruí, Arildo Suruí, Gasodá Suruí, and Ivaneide Bandeira Cardozo.
Among these respondents, everyone was involved in one way or other in the formulation and discussions on the SCP, and every respondent is also currently involved in implementing the projects within the 50 Year Plan in some capacity. Except for Ivaneide Cardozo, all my respondents belong to the people of Paiter Suruí, whereas Ivaneide Cardozo isn’t a part of the Paiter people by birth, but is related to the Paiter by family ties, apart from which I. Cardozo has been consistently involved in the process of formulation and implementation of the 50 Year Plan and specific projects within it from its very inception.
I conducted the interviews in a semi-structured manner, following certain pre-formulated focus points (based on the results of my document study and on the hypotheses elaborated in the literature review), but looking for possibilities to pick up the topics brought up by my respondents, digressing from my pre-determined scenario, so as to incentivize them to share with me narratives and descriptive insights which I wouldn’t have stumbled upon by
consciously searching for them (Perey 2015). Based on the manner of response of my
interviewees I would pay attention to their clues so as to correct and spontaneously amend my initially planned course of questioning, following the directions that were thus being discovered through the conversation itself. At the same time, because virtually all of my respondents are partial to the formulation of documents I had previously studied, at times I would make very specific questions referring to the formulations in those documents, and I would also propose my interpretation of those formulations for them to agree with or correct. For example, one of the questions I asked all my respondents was: ‘The way I understand it, the preservation of culture is one of the principle objectives of the 50 Year Plan – is that correct?’. By formulating this and other questions in a ‘yes or no’ manner, I was imposing certain content into their narratives (albeit my content impositions would always derive from formulations that I had heard or read from the respondents or organizations they represent). When analysing my empirical data, I paid attention to such instances of yes or no questions and was careful not to employ them as citations, but as my own interpretations.
2.4. Analysis of empirical data
Empirical data was analysed with the use of theoretical instruments, which are explained in detail in Chapter 3 of this report. Discourse analysis, the analytic of assemblage and theory of the dwelling perspective were utilized in order to:
• Identify and understand the ideological-discursive formations constructed by the
authors of the SCP in formulating the objectives of cultural preservation and integrating these objectives in the project (Fairclough 1983);
• To understand the functions of these ideological-discursive formations as elements that comprise the assemblage of the SCP, following the assemblage analytic, exposing the assemblage mechanisms and their interactions according to the theory of T. M. Li (Li 2007);
• To make sense of the ideological-discursive formulation of the SCP authors on the topic of relationship with the forest of the Paiter people, and the significance of this
relationship for their culture, identity, and development – using the theory of the dwelling perspective by T. Ingold (Ingold 2011).
These analytical instruments allowed me a considerable insight into the meanings, arguments, interests and goals vested into the formulations of the preservation of culture that make part of the SCP formulations. These results were then compared to the hypothesis derived from the background academic discussion, and contributions, which this case study may offer to this discussion, where formulated.
2.5. Restrictions of an off-field research
It is important to stress that the scope of my empirical data, my findings and conclusions – is derived exclusively from textual and discursive representations, employed in documents texts and in the content of my interviews. It therefore needs to be considered that my conclusions and interpretations are only logically and empirically founded within the space of these textual representations. While extensive study of case facts and even of historical ethnographic
research was carried out in order to make sense of the representations that comprised my primary empirical sample, the reader needs always to remind themselves that the validity of my arguments and conclusions is proportionate to the validity of my empirical data – which I cannot determine in absolute terms. However, if the extent to which representations constitute our experienced realities is if but a half of what is insinuated by postmodernist scholars (Hall 1997), the relevance of a study of representations can be expected to be significant both for real-life practitioners and for scholars of real-life processes.
3. Theoretical and Conceptual Frameworks
In this chapter, theoretical instruments that were employed for the analysis in my research are listed and explained. I draw my analytical tools from three principle theories – that on
assemblage, that on discourse analysis, and the theory of the dwelling perspective. Key
concepts that bear instrumental functions within each respective theory are highlighted in italics upon first appearance in my text, and all following usages of these concepts throughout this report can be expected to indicate the application of a particular theory.
3.1. Assemblage
According to Markus & Saka (2006), assemblage is a concept introduced into its current
popularity among social and cultural theorists through the work titled ‘A thousand Plateaus’, by French philosopher Gilles Deleuze and psychoanalyst Félix Guattari (Deleuze & Guattari 1987). The essence of this concept, as presented by Deleuze and Guattari, is that assemblage is a way of capturing the emergent nature of ‘assembled’ bodies – emergent in a sense that the quality of the whole is not the same a the sum of the parts – where inherently heterogeneous elements are brought together to constitute a functioning whole (Smith & Protevi 2013). The emergent nature of assemblage puts an emphasis on systems as processes rather than structures understood in their static state:
The time-space in which assemblage is imagined is inherently unstable and infused with movement and change. Assemblage thus seems structural, an object with the materiality and stability of the classic metaphors of structure, but the intent in its aesthetic uses is precisely to undermine such ideas of structure. It generates enduring puzzles about
‘process’ and ‘relationship’ rather than leading to systematic understandings . . . (Marcus & Saka 2006, p.268)
This basic understanding of the concept of assemblage has been appropriated for diverse use by theorists, who tailor the more extensive specifics of the concept and its application as they deem best fitting to their particular lines of inquiry. One of such theoretical elaborations is the
‘analytic of assemblage’ suggested by Tania Murray Li, who deployed such an analytic to examine ‘how heterogeneous elements – discourses, institutions, laws, administrative measures, scientific knowledge, moral prescriptions, material interests – are assembled to constitute a technical field fit to be governed and improved’ (Li 2007, p.286). Namely, Li pictures interventions into social processes as assemblages – interventions with the purpose of producing ‘desired outcomes’ and averting ‘undesired ones’, which is how the author
characterizes the governing process. Li problematizes the disparity of elements that an assemblage is composed of, emphasizing agency – ‘the hard work required to draw
heterogeneous elements together’, contingency, which characterizes the process, and fractures – problematic ‘seams’ between the assembled elements, weak relay points, where the ‘the ever- present possibility that an assemblage may disintegrate under the weight of its own
contradictions’ (2007, p.287) becomes evident. Thus framing assemblage in terms of ‘the will to govern’, Li identifies 6 practices that, according to the author, ‘must exist to keep any assemblage together’, which are: (1) forging alignments – ‘linking together the objectives of the various parties to an assemblage [emphasis added]’ (2007, p.265); (2) rendering technical – presenting the ‘unruly array of forces and relations … as a bounded arena in which calculated interventions will produce beneficial results’ (2007, p.270); (3) authorizing knowledge –
selecting academic foundation to help sustain the assemblage, carefully avoiding potentially unbalancing critique; (4) managing failures and contradictions – where failures are attributed to technique rather than to contradictions, which are smoothed out, and compromises are devised; (5) anti-politics – ‘reposing political questions as matters of technique’; (6)
reassembling – reworking the assemblages with old and new elements and connections, so as to keep the assemblage together through the dynamics that might threaten its intactness.
Li’s analytic of assemblage is an appealing theoretical tool for this research, because it provides an insightful perspective on the ‘improving’ interventions into social processes – interventions, which my case under study is the example of. Moreover, Li’s demonstrative analysis (Li 2007), where the application of the above-described analytical tools is explained, is based on a
practical field to which my case in this research can be attributed – namely, the field of
community based forest management (CBFM). I will review Li’s conclusions and observations regarding CBFM as an example of an ‘assemblage’ with the purpose of government and improvement in the section of this report specifically dedicated to CBFM. Meanwhile, I would like to observe that in order to apply Li’s analytic one needs to consider the ‘disparate
elements’ that constitute an assemble, and in this research the scope of such elements will be limited to the elements that my empirical data will present any relevant material on. While my assessment of such elements as institutions, policies, scientific knowledge – will be less central from the point of view my research questions and as such, relatively superficial, a detailed scrutiny of particular moral prescriptions, material interests, and especially discourses as assembled elements that together produce dynamic unity with emergent properties will definitely be one of the main parts of my analysis. By examining the SCP as an assemblage I will seek to identify ‘parties to the assemblage’ that manifest themselves and their interests
through available empirical data, as well as fractures and points of contingency, and relay points as means of holding the assemblage together.
3.2. Discourse analysis
Discourse analysis is a product of the so-called ‘linguistic turn’ in the history of social sciences and humanities (Hammersley 2002), whereby the linguistic and semiotic mechanisms of production of meanings came to be observed in virtually all of social and cultural phenomena, so long as those, it would be assumed, are communicative by nature, thus requiring a language system, or a system of meanings. Meanings are produced through signifying practices, and those construct representations of reality, thus imposing a framework of interpreting reality onto subjects who engage in that particular system of meanings (Hall 1997). This perspective opens up the discussion of power of language over individuals and over reality as is
experienced by individuals – a discussion much elaborated on by Foucault and his followers (Fairclough 1992). The mechanism of such power is well illustrated in the following passage by John Fiske, an author renowned for their work on discourse analysis of the media:
...There is no pristine experience which social man can apprehend without the culturally determined structures, rituals and concepts supplied to him via his language. Language is the means by which men enter into society to produce reality (one part of which is the fact of their living together in linguistic society). (Fiske & Hartley 2004)
As opposed to language, which is, so to speak, ‘just’ a system of semiotic representations, discourse implies the rules and tendencies which govern the way such representations are produced – therefore the term ‘discourse’ reflects a tendency, a bias – an ideology – behind the production of meanings. Like language in general, discourse is seen as exerting power over the experience of individuals as long as they enter the social domain: ‘Since all social practices entail meaning, all practices have a discursive aspect. So discourse enters into and influences all social practices’ (Hall 2011). And since discourses are seen by theorists as always indicative of a particular ideology at work, terms like discursive formations (coined by Foucault) (Hall 1997) and ideological-discursive formations (IDF) (Fairclough 1983) are employed in order to direct discourse analysis to attributing ideologies and their discourses to specific social groups and/or institutions, with their political agenda and interests. Disparate IDFs can coexist, relate to each other and compete for power within the same textual space – the latter understood here as the sphere where linguistic meanings are activated. Contest for power is often represented by the varying degree of naturalization (Fairclough 1983) observed among discourses, where the most naturalized ones are often dominant discourses, which represent respectively dominant IDFs, and often are also attributed to politically and economically dominant social groups. The term naturalization originates in Barthes’ ‘Mythologies’, and points to discourses that are successful in appearing to the reading subjects (individuals that encounter and comprehend these discourses) as common sense (Hall & O’Shea 2013), thus constructing representations of reality that have successfully claimed the status of orderliness (Fairclough 1983). These discourses are often revealed to be the most powerful in actually influencing social reality and other experienced reality of their subjects. This naturalization mostly occurs when the semiotic process of signifying is disguised, thus limiting the subject’s capacity for questioning the attribution of meanings: for example, when meanings are produced symbolically, or when meanings are implied through complete absence of any direct linguistic reference to their matter – by not pronouncing certain formulas, discourses pose themselves as truths that ‘go without saying’ (Fiske & Hartley 2004). Fairclough (1983) proposes distinguishing subjects and clients of discursive practices, where subjects are relatively permanent (although not at all necessarily conscious) carriers of ideologies, both subject to being constructed by discourses, and active in reproducing the same discourses. Clients, on the other hand, are free to either comply or not with normative frameworks imposed by discourses. Discourses thus have the
power to construct subjects, and are also constructed by them, and the result of such closed loop reciprocal constructing processes exceeds the limits of verbal expression, so that ideologies at stake are constituted, played out, and reinforced through the very practices of individuals.
Since the nature of my empirical data is clearly textual (texts of documents related to the SCP, and the content of interview conversations with project proponents), by definition the only level at which I can assess the case is the level of linguistic and, inevitably, discursive
representations. As was mentioned in the section on assemblage, discourses are important heterogenic elements that comprise an assemblage, and thus in this research my intention is to analyse the assemblage of discourses, where parties to the assemblage are represented within a discursive space. Discourse analysis is necessary to me for identifying ideological-discursive formations, understanding ideologies that are manifest in them, attribute the ideologies to their
‘social bases’, and to analyse assemblage with the help of these findings.
3.3. The dwelling perspective
As Fairclough puts it, ‘discourse makes people, as well as people make discourse’ (Fairclough 1992) – but this is not to say that discourse is all that people are made of, although, as Tim Ingold observes, there are many who argue that ‘there is nothing that is not socially or
culturally constructed’ (Ingold 2011, p.2). Ingold, an anthropologist, found such an assumption unconvincing, and equally so the opposite extremity – belief that ‘all that there is to know about human beings is written into our genetic constitution’ (2011, p.2). Ingold’s book of essays ‘The Perception of the Environment’ (Ingold 2011) is a product of the author’s quest for a logic that can explain humanity without falling into either of the extremes, and, more
importantly, without depending on any of the dichotomies that the Western2 intellectual
tradition of the scientific reason has produced. These constructed polarities between nature and culture, between organisms and social subjects, between instinct and intellect, between the perceiving mind of the self and the surrounding environment – are, according to Ingold,
incapable of explaining the ontology of human beings, who are organisms and social subjects at the same time. Ingold argues for a relational thinking in anthropology, emphasising sociality of human beings, as both organisms and social subjects, whose relations extend to non-human surrounding objects. After consulting ecological thinking in psychology (the author refers to James Gibson on placing perception, and therefore, mind, not within the body, but outside of it, being the ‘organism’s own explanatory movement through the world’ (Ingold 2011, p.3)), and developmental systems thinking in biology (which observes that properties of organisms are not so much transferred genetically, as acquired through experience in the environment), the author came up with the theory of what they called the dwelling perspective, which is a synthesis of the three abovementioned approaches from different disciplines. Instead of ascribing
definitions based on static dichotomies, the dwelling perspective considers a human being as an emergent totality of ‘the whole-organism-in-its-environment’ (Ingold 2011, p.19), whose ‘both cultural knowledge and bodily substance … undergo continuous generation in the context of an ongoing engagement with the land and with the beings that dwell therein [emphasis added]’
(Ingold 2011, p.12). It is in their engagement with the environment that a human being (or any social subject) is constituted, and the process of engagement is both the origin and the
expression of perceptions, knowledge, and beliefs. Experience of engagement produces skills, which are ‘capacities of awareness and response’ in ‘coping’ with the world. Rather then being transmitted by the cultural tradition as a set of representations through the process of
enculturation (comparable to the transmission of genes to descendants), skills are acquired
2 Ingold acknowledges reasons why the terms ‘Western’ and ‘modern’ are questioned by academics and are seen as
undesirable, but insists on using them to refer to the fundamental belief in the ‘absolute worth of disciplined, rational inquiry’
that permeates his own work – and that of any other academic (Ingold 2011, p.6).
through the process of enskillment, whereby knowledge of the world is discovered through experience, guided by an education of attention.
It is important to note that Ingold’s background in ecological anthropology involved focused studies of hunter-gatherer communities and pastoralists – communities that modern civilization labels as ‘primitive’, referring to the level of complexity of their productive systems. Much of Ingold’s theory on dwelling is derived from observations of these communities, and, although ultimately Ingold argues that people in the West are as much organisms-in-the-environment as members of traditionalist communities are, the author highlights a sharp contrast between hunter-gatherers, who represent the dwelling perspective in a purer form, and the modern people, whose experience of dwelling is obscured by intellectual systems that assume a disengaged perspective of the world. By comparing the two perspectives Ingold highlights a number of aspects of dwelling, which specifically characterize hunter-gatherer communities3 as opposed to what Western society has prescribed for itself (not quite managing to fully live up to it). I will briefly review Ingold’s observations concerning some of these aspects – such that will be made use of later in my analysis.
Knowledge
It is through the revelation of meanings in the environment, through personal encounters with it that knowledge is produced, and the significance of cultural tradition is in guiding this process by offering clues rather than delivering knowledge as a ready product. A clue is a ‘landmark that condenses otherwise disparate strands of experience into a unifying orientation’ (Ingold 2011, p.22), and it incentivises the apprentice to associate surrounding objects with meanings (Ingold alludes to a signifying practice, where signifiers are made to be the constituents of the environment through the subject’s engagement in it). Ingold exemplifies this with hunter- gatherers, who learn their trade (hunting) by doing, and whose knowledge is situated in the world outside, amidst the unfolding relations with the environment, rather then inside of their heads. Being relational, their knowledge is not so much information as feeling. This leads Ingold to state that intuition is a perfectly valid type of knowledge which stems from every person’s dwelling, not from a set of abstract formulae that science finds more credible, to which Ingold responds that scientific minds shouldn’t be ‘embarrassed’ by intuition (Ingold 2011, p.25). The environment where one dwells, then, can be seen as space for communicating meanings – a scope of phenomena, which Ingold generalizes under the term ‘poetics of
dwelling’. Specific landscapes, loaded with meanings, thus come to be physically inseparable elements of local cosmogonies.
Sociality
In the dwelling perspective, a social subject perceives the constituents of their environment as both social and possessing agency. There are many examples of indigenous communities where relations with nature are seen as an extension of family relations between humans, or modelled on another type of social relations that a disengaged modern man would reserve for humans.
Ingold labels this phenomena ‘interagentivity’, which is a recognition that ‘at root, the constitutive quality of intimate relations with non-human and human components of the environment is one and the same’ (Ingold 2011, p.47).
Indigenous identity from the points of view of genealogy and land
Ingold draws attention to how the word ‘indigenous’ originates in a colonialist demarcation between natives (indigenous) and settlers (non-indigenous), and labels such a logic of
3 Or other types of communities, which may be labelled as ‘indigenous’ or ‘traditionalist’. The generic use of these terms within this section solely indicates the same characteristics of dwelling as showcased by Ingold in the example of hunter- gatherers.
identifying indigenousness as the genealogical model. The genealogical model is based on the principle of genealogical descent, entailing a presumption that genetically inheritable substance and knowledge, which is transmittable through representations, regardless of contexts in which the knowledge is received – are the key constituents of the indigenous identity. By this logic, land is reduced to ‘surface to be occupied’, and the activity of dwelling in the land – to ‘mere occupancy’ (Ingold 2011, p.151). Ingold’s inquiry into the dwelling of communities that call themselves or are called indigenous demonstrates that for these communities themselves their identity is defined by a fundamentally different approach – which author calls the relational model, according to which, ‘the indigenous people draw their being from their relationships with the land’ (Ingold 2011, p.150). In view of life as dwelling in the environment, where common memory, knowledge and ancestry are situated in the shared practice of inhabiting the land, the ‘heritage’ of indigenous identity is inseparable from the land and from the shared activity of engaging in it. Ingold concludes that the genealogical construct of indigenous is ‘a product of the representation of difference in the discourse of homogeneity’ (Ingold 1993), which ‘contravenes those very understandings, that for indigenous groups themselves, are most fundamental to their way of life’ (Ingold 2011, p.150).
In this construction, the very relationships within which persons are positioned and from which they derive their identity and belonging are recast as outward expression of inner, inherited properties or attributes that belong to them. It is in the attempt to
recover a lost or threatened sense of relational identity in attributional terms that people come to define themselves, and to be defined by others, as ‘indigenous’. (Ingold 2011, p.151)
Making, producing and art
Commodity-oriented Western intellectual tradition has been and continues to be very
pronounced in discourses of transforming nature, which is treated as a static resource for made artefacts, and for goods produced with the use of technology. The dwelling perspective, on the other hand, consider human-induced transformation of nature as growth (albeit assisted), where crops and artefacts come into being as a result of people discovering the right skill of
responding to their environments, maintaining that the influence is seen as reciprocal (not necessarily at equal terms, however). Art, which for the traditionalist communities is just one of such skills – a skilled practice of dwelling – in the West is categorized instead as individual creativity, making it categorically different to the activity of production.
Time, work, and exchange
Clock time, as Ingold refers to it, has sliced up the lives of those who live by the clock into ‘free time’ and ‘work’, where work is expected to be devoid of everything that characterises social time, or life itself. Deriving the term ‘social time’ from sociologists P. Sorokin and R. K.
Merton, Ingold stresses ‘its inherent rythmicallity and its embeddedness in activities that are indexical of a person’s belonging to locality and community’ (Ingold 2011, p.325). Social time is where temporality is measured by tasks rather than time units – it is task-oriented, and thus is considerate to the full scope of sociality of dwelling, where there is no divide between work and leisure, there are just diverse tasks for ‘coping with the environment’. And if work isn’t extractable from life, it doesn’t result in a product or money, but in a lived identity (Ingold 2011, p.327). Monetary exchanges symbolise a disengagement from one’s own relational identity within a dwelling space, a disengagement that reduces production (work) to time (which costs money), and life (free time) to consumption. Under the dwelling perspective, work is life, and life, therefore is continuous production (Ingold 2011, p.329).
Relationship with the environment is, as will be related further in this report, one of the most significant discourses behind the SCP, and is also the central relay point in its assemblage.
Employing Ingold’s theory is therefore essential to understand what is referred to by the discourses that indicate such a relationship, and what role this relationship plays in the assemblage. I would like to stress that for this research I do not, and cannot apply Ingold’s theory in order to make an ethnographic study of the Paiter. The theory is used instead as a reference in order to make sense of what the Paiter say, and not to try to decipher who they are.
4. REDD, community based forest management, and indigenous groups
This chapter explores the background for the case that is in the centre of my empirical study.
General processes and trends that the SCP is a part or an example of are explained, and relevant controversial aspects and critical discussions on them are related.
4.1. REDD
4.1.1. A market mechanism to tackle climate change
REDD, the UN-promoted global initiative of Reducing [greenhouse gas] emissions from deforestation and forest degradation emerged from the discussions on payments for ecosystem services (PES) as a strategy for environmental conservation. The concept of PES was
elaborated under the assumption that by measuring the value of ecosystems economically it is possible to create efficient programs to address the loss of ecosystem services (ES) globally.
Understood as functions of the environment that humans (as well as other species) benefit from or even depend on in order to satisfy their needs (Daily 1997), examples of ES include climate regulation, watershed management, biodiversity conservation, or carbon sequestration. In order to qualify for payments, ES need to be measurable, and the service providers (entities that get paid to ensure the supply of ES) – subject to monitoring and certification (Hall 2008). Buyers of ES are voluntary, they range from private purchasers to public and third sector entities, and are expected to be interested in the purchased ES either directly, for their own use, or as a part of a donor agenda, to which the entity has committed itself. It is observed that private
purchasers are more commonly targeted by the ES marketing (Wunder 2008). There is a great diversity of schemes and mechanisms of PES involving an equally diverse selection of
supplying or mediating agents, with examples ranging from national governments to, as with the case of SCR, indigenous communities (Shankland & Hasenclever 2011). Vigorous
experiments with PES, which unfolded on the turn of the century and have since been growing and expanding continuously, generated various controversies and criticisms, arising from complexities of implementation, which at times would undermine the benefits for the
environment and for local stakeholders. Amongst such criticisms there are voices pointing out that market-based approach to environmental conservation, which PES is, results in global commodification of nature and environmental services, reducing the complexity of ecosystems to mechanisms of monetary exchange, which fails to capture both the real spectrum of values of ecosystems for various social groups, and consequently fails to respond to the real needs in natural resources and services (Kosoy & Corbera 2010). Kosoy and Corbera (2010) have labelled this trend of market-based environmental politics ‘commodity fetishism’, and commented that it implies (1) a degraded perception of the environment, whereby its values beyond monetary are disregarded, (2) a degraded form of people’s relationship with the environment, which is reduced to market transactions, and (3) reproduction and possible aggravation of social inequalities arising from or reinforced by global economic neo- liberalisation (Kosoy & Corbera 2010, p.1234). Nevertheless, PES continue to grow in
importance, seen as a promising strategy for securing the goals of diverse agents, and concerns
