Topic Area: Indigenous Knowledge Systems
Geographic Area: James Bay area in Subarctic Region of
Canada
Focal Question: To what extent can indigenous knowledge
systems provide alternative frameworks for sustainable uses of the
environment?
Sources:
(1) Berkes, F. 1994. ÒIndigenous Knowledge and Resource
Management Systems: A Native Canadian Case Study from James
Bay.Ó Speech delivered at the Canadian Anthropology Annual
Conference, Vancouver, May 1994.
(2) Holling, C. S., ÒThe Resilience of Terrestrial Ecosystems:
Local Surprise and Global Change.Ó In W. C. Clarke and R. E.
Munn, eds., Sustainable Development of the Biosphere,
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 292-317
. (3) Banuri, T. and F. Apffel Marglin. 1993. ÒA
Systems-of-Knowledge Analysis of Deforestation.Ó In T. Banuri
and F. Apffel Marglin, eds., Who Will Save the Forests?
London: The United Nations University/Zed Books, pp. 1-23.
(4) Alvard, M. S. 1993. ÒTesting of the ÔEcologically
Noble SavageÕ Hypothesis: Interspecific Prey Choice by Piro
Hunters of Amazonian Peru.Ó Human Ecology
21:355-87.
Reviewer: Staunton St. C. M. Bowen, Colby College
Ô97.
Review:
There are certain skepticisms surrounding the notion of indigenous
knowledge systems. Resource management professionals have always been
suspicious about claims of Ònative wisdomÓ in the use
of natural resources. Cases have shown (Alvard, 1993) evidence from
different groups of hunters that foragers tend to maximize their
short-term harvests and that apparent resource management is merely
an artifact of optimal foraging strategies. Indigenous peoples may
have a profound knowledge of their environment, yet it does not
follow that they use this knowledge for a conscious conservation of
their resources.
Indigenous knowledge systems are defined as local knowledge held by
indigenous peoples, or local knowledge that is unique to a given
culture or society. This is different than western resource
management systems which is designed scientifically to lock out
feedback from the environment and to avoid natural perturbations. An
indigenous person would look at nature and observe its vibrancy and
meaning as well as regard it with awe and uncertainty, while a
ÒWesternerÓ would see nature as an inanimate clock
governed by simple, universal laws and behaves as an automaton which
once programmed will continue to follow the rules inscribed in the
program.
The fur trade in the 1800Õs, which was initiated by European
firms like the HudsonÕs Bay Company (HBC), introduced Western
resource management to the indigenous peoples in North America.
However, it is difficult to measure the effect that the European
management system had on the conservation of big game and fish. The
Western management system incorporated prescriptions against the
killing of young animals and mothers, and against hunting during
reproductive season. Their strategies may work well for farm animals,
yet have no relevance to hunting and fishing strategies in complex
ecosystems. The bottom line with regards to the effectiveness of
British conservation prescriptions exported to Canada by the HBC is
that beaver were hunted to extinction in England by the
1500Õs.
These two systems of knowledge interact in a very cautious manner. As
Banuri and Apffel Marglin (1993) put it Ò...indigenous and
modern communities are not just different political groups aiming to
maximize their income or wealth, but embody different systems of
knowledge, different ways of understanding, perceiving, experiencing,
in sum, of defining reality, which includes the notions of
oneÕs relationship not only to the social milieu but also to
the natural environment.Ó As well, both camps have different
views on one another. The western view on indigenous systems is that
they usually see indigenous peoples not as a source of solutions to
resource environmental problems, quite on the contrary, they often
see indigenous peoples as themselves being the source of the problem
- due to increasing population growth rates, for example. The
indigenous peoples incorporate the ÒhuntedÓ into their
act of hunting and fishing. In Western management systems there is no
room for reciprocity between the hunter an hunted. Indigenous peoples
understand the importance of their detailed local knowledge. Even
with all their differences and disbeliefs, there has been a growth of
interest in indigenous knowledge systems in recent years. It is due
in large part to the failures of conventional resource management
science, since, even with all of its modern managerial
Òpowers,Ó it is unable to halt or reverse the depletion
of resources.
C. S. Holling (1986) sees the apparent convergence between indigenous
knowledge ideologies and nonlinear, multi-equilibrium ecosystems as a
source of possible integration of Western science and indigenous
knowledge. He has developed a systematic critique of the view of
science as consisting of linear, cause and effect and predictive
relationships. In his view, ecosystems are characterized by changes
that could not, on looking back, be anticipated. He dubs them
ÒsurprisesÓ and their study is called the
Òscience of surprises.Ó Holling observed that when
ecosystems are managed for human benefit, perturbations are
eliminated to increase efficiency of management and hence the
productivity of the resource, whether it be trees, wheat or big game.
This, however, causes the ecosystem to become more brittle, or
fragile. This brittleness does not tend to occur in indigenous
cultures. This is due to the knowledge base that has evolved that
provides guidance on how to deal with these perturbations and
feedback, and how to respond to environmental changes.
Traditional knowledge and resource management can best be assessed in
terms of their own long-term survival, as evidence of ecological
sustainability. All groups of resource users have powerful, built-in
incentives to conserve the resources on which they depend. In many
cases they do conserve them, provided they can control access to the
resources and can work out rules for collective action, that is,
solve the exclusion and jointless problems of common-property
resource management. Indigenous management systems have provided
adaptations for societies to cope with their environment. In terms of
operation, the indigenous systems are characterized by much closer
attention to and much greater sensitivity of environmental feedback,
such as declining local catches.
A common fallacy is that Westerners believe that indigenous peoples
are not in equilibrium with their resources. This is true and is due
to the fact that there is no such equilibrium, presumably because
equilibrium in the ecosystem is such an elusive notion. Instead,
indigenous hunters may be harvesting opportunistically and maximizing
short term gains. However, especially in the cases represented in
Berkes (1994), the indigenous peoples are also safe-guarding
long-term productivity by territorial behaviour and prey-switching.
Lessons can be learned from the many long surviving indigenous
fishery systems.
The difference between the indigenous and Western management systems
described in Berkes (1994) is that indigenous peoples are managed by
rules and practices limiting ÒhowÓ to fish and hunt,
while Westerners attempt to regulate Òhow muchÓ can be
taken. In the indigenous system there is a great deal of learning by
doing, and it can be seen as a part of a general process of
self-organization arising from the necessity of a social group to
deal with information from the environment. The knowledge held by
social groups contain recipes for responding to and managing
ecological feedback. Western science is moving away from the
positivist emphasis on objectivity towards a recognition that
fundamental uncertainty is large and certain processes are
irreversible and that qualitative judgments do matter. In the larger
scheme of things, the gap between scientific knowledge and indigenous
knowledge may be narrowing.