Browsing by Author "Johnson, Craig"
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Journal Article Coupling Biophysical and Socioeconomic Models for Coral Reef Systems in Quintana Roo, Mexican Caribbean(2011) Melbourne-Thomas, Jessica; Johnson, Craig; Perez, Pascal; Eustache, Jeremy; Fulton, Elizabeth A.; Cleland, Deborah"Transdisciplinary approaches that consider both socioeconomic and biophysical processes are central to understanding and managing rapid change in coral reef systems worldwide. To date, there have been limited attempts to couple the two sets of processes in dynamic models for coral reefs, and these attempts are confined to reef systems in developed countries. We present an approach to coupling existing biophysical and socioeconomic models for coral reef systems in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo. The biophysical model is multiscale, using dynamic equations to capture local-scale ecological processes on individual reefs, with reefs connected at regional scales by the ocean transport of larval propagules. The agent-based socioeconomic model simulates changes in tourism, fisheries, and urbanization in the Quintana Roo region. Despite differences in the formulation and currencies of the two models, we were able to successfully modify and integrate them to synchronize and define information flows and feedbacks between them. A preliminary evaluation of the coupled model system indicates that the model gives reasonable predictions for fisheries and ecological variables and can be used to examine scenarios for future social ecological change in Quintana Roo. We provide recommendations for where efforts might usefully be focused in future attempts to integrate models of biophysical and socioeconomic processes, based on the limitations of our coupled system."Conference Paper Environmental Stress, Economic Risk and Institutional Change: Inshore Fishing and Community-Based Management in Southern Thailand(2000) Johnson, Craig"Theoretical propositions about the emergence and evolution of common property regimes suggest that individuals will conserve (or at least manage) natural resources when they believe the risks of maintaining existing relations are unacceptably high. Individuals, it is argued, are more likely to overcome problems of malfeasance and free riding when they share both an interest in the new institutional arrangement and a legacy of successful cooperation. A contradictory proposition argues that individuals will ignore or fail to implement rules of resource conservation when the stakes of survival are most extreme. Implicit here is an assertion that the costs and risks of survival are so great that they preclude participation in all but the most vital forms of social interaction. This paper considers these debates by exploring the conditions under which villagers in Southern Thailand implemented and enforced rules of restricted access in a traditional inshore fishery. Particular emphasis is placed on the ways in which socio-economic differentiation affects the willingness and ability to bear the costs of enforcing and maintaining rules of common property. The principal methodology was a case study (conducted between 1997 and 1998) of a coastal community in Southern Thailand, where villagers started enforcing rules of regulated fishing in 1995. Using household surveys, key informant interviews and secondary sources, the study provides convincing evidence that increasing resource pressures encouraged members of this village community to implement and enforce rules of common property. Variations in status and wealth, however, had a profound impact on the extent to which villagers at the lower end of the socio-economic spectrum could participate in this important socio-political activity. Because they lacked the boats and engines that were essential for monitoring and enforcing the enclosed fishing area, poor villagers were effectively excluded from the act of 'protecting' the village, an act that carried tremendous status within the village community. An important implication here is that individuals who were most vulnerable to the risk of economic misfortune were also least able to participate in (and benefit from) the implementation and enforcement of common property."Conference Paper Grounding the State: Poverty, Inequality and the Politics of Governance in India's Panchayats(2003) Johnson, Craig; Deshingkar, Priya; Start, Daniel"Decentralization is commonly defended on the grounds that it will bring government closer to people, thereby creating political structures that are more transparent and accountable to poor and marginal groups in society. However, a problem that is well-recognized in the decentralization literature is that the devolution of power will not necessarily improve the performance and accountability of local government. Indeed, in many cases, decentralization simply empowers local elites to capture a larger share of public resources, often at the expense of the poor. Reflecting on these relatively long-standing problems, an important strand of scholarship has argued that central government can play a central role in counterbalancing the forces that tend to disfavour the poor. In this paper, we aim to inform this scholarship by reflecting on the interface between local government and local people in two Indian States: Andhra Pradesh (AP) and Madhya Pradesh (MP). Drawing upon 12 months of primary research, we argue that although the Government of AP has not devolved power to the extent that proponents of decentralization would have liked, its populist approach to certain forms of poverty reduction has empowered the poor in ways that the more ambitious decentralization agenda in MP has not. This, we argue, is due in part to the fact that MPs decentralization process failed to challenge the well-entrenched power of the village chiefs, the sarpanches. But the discrepancy can also be explained in terms of the historical evolution of 'development populism' in AP. In particular, we argue that the strong performance of programmes aimed at subsidizing rice for low income households and providing credit to womens 'self-help groups' (SHGs) is part of the State governments wider political strategy of enhancing and maintaining electoral support among women, scheduled castes and the poor."Journal Article Natural Length Scales of Ecological Systems: Applications at Community and Ecosystem Levels(2009) Johnson, Craig"The characteristic, or natural, length scales of a spatially dynamic ecological landscape are the spatial scales at which the deterministic trends in the dynamic are most sharply in focus. Given recent development of techniques to determine the characteristic length scales (CLSs) of real ecological systems, I explore the potential for using CLSs to address three important and vexing issues in applied ecology, viz. (i) determining the optimum scales to monitor ecological systems, (ii) interpreting change in ecological communities, and (iii) ascertaining connectivity between species in complex ecologies. In summarizing the concept of characteristic length scales as system-level scaling thresholds, I emphasize that the primary CLS is, by definition, the optimum scale at which to monitor a system if the objective is to observe its deterministic dynamics at a system level. Using several different spatially explicit individual-based models, I then explore predictions of the underlying theory of CLSs in the context of interpreting change and ascertaining connectivity among species in ecological systems. Analysis of these models support predictions that systems with strongly fluctuating community structure, but an otherwise stable long-term dynamic defined by a stationary attractor, indicate an invariant length scale irrespective of community structure at the time of analysis, and irrespective of the species analyzed. In contrast, if changes in the underlying dynamic are forcibly induced, the shift in dynamics is reflected by a change in the primary length scale. Thus, consideration of the magnitude of the CLS through time enables distinguishing between circumstances where there are temporal changes in community structure but not in the long-term dynamic, from that where changes in community structure reflect some kind of fundamental shift in dynamics. In this context, CLSs emerge as a diagnostic tool to identify phase shifts to alternative stable states associated with loss of resilience in ecological systems and thus provide a means to interpret change in community composition. By extension, comparison of the CLSs of ostensibly similar communities at different points in space can reveal whether they experience similar underlying dynamics. Analysis of these models also reveals that species in the same community whose dynamics are largely independent indicate different length scales. These examples demonstrate the potential to apply CLSs in a decision-support role in determining scales for monitoring, interpreting whether change in community structure reflects a shift in underlying dynamics and therefore may warrant management intervention, and determining connectivities among species in complex ecological systems."Journal Article Re-Thinking the Role of Compensation in Urban Land Acquisition: Empirical Evidence from South Asia(2013) Johnson, Craig; Chakravarty, Arpana"Planned efforts to relocate human populations often entail protracted struggles over the terms on which local populations may be compensated for the loss of land, assets and livelihoods. In many instances, compensation has been established on the basis of historical market value, which in effect excludes stakeholders (e.g., encroachers, landless laborers, sharecroppers, etc.) whose livelihoods are adversely affected by land acquisition. Establishing ways of recognizing and compensating the loss of informal land and livelihood is therefore a pressing policy priority. This paper explores the challenge of compensating losses incurred as a result of rapid urban land acquisition in the Indian State of West Bengal. Drawing upon 6 months of empirical field research, it explores (1) the ways in which national and local development authorities have structured processes of land acquisition in areas surrounding Kolkata; (2) the rights and entitlements that have been used in compensating losses incurred as a result of land acquisition; (3) the degree to which local populations have been incorporated into this process; and (4) the extent to which public policy may be used in strengthening the rights of vulnerable populations to basic forms of entitlement, such as housing, employment, and social assistance."