| European
Tropical Forest Research Network |
PUBLIC PARTICIPATION IN COMMUNITY FOREST POLICY IN THAILAND: THE INFLUENCE OF ACADEMICS AS BROKERS
By Sacha Zurcher
This study focuses on the role of networks in enhancing public participation in community forestry policy in Thailand. It analyses how conflicts between the state and local people over the right to manage forest resources are no longer regarded as isolated incidents but as part of a structural shortcoming in the law which has to be dealt with nationally. In so doing, we discuss the appearance of networks of actors who question the effectiveness of state control and lobby for formal frameworks to establish the rights of local people with regard to access and control over forest resources. We also address the matter of how the different actors became involved and what their influence was in the process of drafting and presenting a peoples' version of a community forest bill to Parliament in 2000.
Outcome
The results of this study show that conflicts over access rights to forest resources
at local level would not have had widespread national attention were it not
for a group of academics who supported the idea of local management. They became
actively involved in drafting the community forest bill and succeeded in raising
a previously local issue to national level by using the press to publicise their
academic achievements. Academics, non-governmental organisations and people
organisations strategically allied themselves with those actors within the state
apparatus who shared the same opinion. In so doing, they attempted to acquire
a broader base of support for legalising the community forestry bill.
Further information:
Sacha Zurcher
Department of Geography and International Development Studies, Roskilde University,
Building 08.1
P.O. Box 260
DK-4000 Roskilde
Denmark
E-mail: szurcher@ruc.dk