Land is Life, Conservancy is Life 9783906927022

landislife
250,00 NAD each

Land is Life, Conservancy is Life

The San and the N≠a Jaqna Conservancy, Tsumkwe District West, Namibia

Cameron Welch with Introduction by Dr. Galaty

ISBN Print 9783906927022

Basel Namibia Studies Series 20, March 2018

Community-based natural resource management or CBNRM, with its attention to community partici-pation, its call for de-centralization of rights to local resource users through democratic and equita-ble structures, and its potential to deliver benefits to local livelihoods and national conservation inter-ests, now forms the predominant strategy for rural development in the communal areas of Namibia. This framework is presumed by the Namibian government and international bodies concerned with conservation and development to deliver measurable and positive economic, environmental, and political results for the State and all of its citizens. CBNRM has taken on particular form and signifi-cance for the San in Namibia.Focusing on the experiences of a group of predominantly San communities in the North-East of Namibia, the historical and contemporary situations of the San of the N≠a Jaqna Conservancy and their engagement with CBNRM are examined. In looking to the future, this work seeks to understand what mechanisms and institutions give Indigenous groups, such as the San, a foothold in the State and an avenue though which to navigate and shape their own modernity(ies). This work explores the modalities through which conservation comes together with interests of Indigenous groups and how these groups deploy leverage gained through invoking conservation as discourse and practice.

Cameron Welch obtained his PhD from McGill University in Montreal. He is currently a policy ana-lyst with the Lands and Resources Department at the Anishinabek Nation, an advocacy organization for 40 First Nations across the Canadian province of Ontario.