Browsing by Author "Galvin, Kathleen, committee member"
Now showing 1 - 14 of 14
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Item Open Access A guiding model for decolonizing environmental science research and restoring relational accountability with Indigenous communities(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2019) David-Chavez, Dominique M., author; Gavin, Michael C., advisor; Balgopal, Meena, committee member; Cajete, Gregory, committee member; Galvin, Kathleen, committee member; Valdez, Shelly, committee memberIn this body of work, I examine the process and methodologies applied in scientific research by, on, and with Indigenous communities with an emphasis on diverse ways of knowing in environmental sciences, natural resources, and climate research. Effectively addressing complex social-ecological issues faced within our current and future generations, such as extreme climate variability and environmental justice, will require all relevant sources of knowledge and data, including those held by historically marginalized communities who remain close to the land. Indigenous knowledge systems, informed through generations of careful observation of dynamics of environmental changes are recognized as critical resources for understanding and addressing social-ecological concerns, yet many institutions and researchers have yet to directly address colonial-rooted legacies, including centuries of oppression, ethical violations, and lack of accountability towards the communities who maintain these knowledge systems. My dissertation research draws from theoretical developments in Indigenous methodologies, community-based participatory research, participatory action research, and constructivist grounded theory to enhance our contextual understanding regarding factors inhibiting or supporting diverse knowledge exchange in the sciences. Conceptual contributions include an evidence-based, practitioner-informed analytical framework that can be applied for guiding and evaluating responsible Indigenous community engagement across a wide range of research fields. Using this framework, I provide data findings from the first global systematic review assessing Indigenous community engagement in climate research studies, improving understanding of how research design connects to broader social outcomes for Indigenous communities. In this work I also provide conceptual contributions in the form of a working model for decolonizing community-based science research with Indigenous communities through a cross-disciplinary synthesis of codes of ethics, principles and methodologies for supporting Indigenous sovereignty and self-determination in research. My dissertation explores this model through the values of integrity, respect, humility, and reciprocity to shape intentional commitments and actionable methods that can be applied to raise ethical standards and long-term relational accountability within Indigenous lands and communities Empirical contributions within my dissertation include a case study field-testing and grounding the working model for decolonizing science research through an Indigenous community-based climate study led by youth and elders within two rural agricultural communities in the mountainous central region Borikén (Puerto Rico). This case study highlights innovative participatory methods, resources, and lessons learned to inform processes for aligning cultural and academic institutional protocols for research integrity. My dissertation also explores benefits, barriers, and resources for Indigenous scholars and practitioners engaging Indigenous knowledge systems in their work and research through an in-depth regional case study in the Caribbean. Findings from this research enhance our understanding of how colonial legacies manifest as unique and complex challenges and identifies sources of capacity-building for overcoming these challenges, centering underrepresented narratives from those community members directly impacted by colonial histories. Together, these contributions shape our understanding of how every stage of research process itself, beyond solely the outputs, serve a critical role in decolonizing research and how researchers and institutions can adapt this process towards raising ethical standards in research.Item Open Access Agrarian transition in the uplands of central Vietnam: drivers of market-oriented land-use and land-cover change(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2019) Saylor, Kirk, author; Leisz, Stephen, advisor; Galvin, Kathleen, committee member; Boone, Randall, committee memberThis study presents an analysis of changing land-use and land-cover in the North Central Coast region of Vietnam for the period in recent decades, during which rural upland communities have become partially integrated into commodity markets. Market integration has resulted from the extension of transportation network infrastructure under the East-West Economic Corridor (EWEC) project completed in mid-2006. This project has improved market connectivity and accessibility between rural and urban areas, creating flows of goods, information, and money induce agrarian transition and influence land-use / land-cover change processes. Analysis of satellite imagery over the last decade shows some signs of possible agricultural intensification along the Highway 9 corridor, while elsewhere in the study area a clear and consistent trendline cannot be ascertained. Confounding factors include usability of imagery, temporal gaps in collection, and the resolution of available and usable imagery. The pattern of changing land-cover emerging along Highway 9 is hypothesized to result from changing land rents, where lower transportation costs and higher agricultural prices increase the profitability of cash cropping, incentivizing local populations to engage in market-oriented production. Such a microeconomic response would be consistent with von Thünen's extrinsic theory of land rent, as well as the multi-scalar frameworks of teleconnections and telecoupling. These dynamics are explored at the village level through a spatially explicit agent-based model that simulates household decision-making using empirically-fitted rules, to better understand the process of transition from subsistence cropping to a mixed mode of production with cash cropping.Item Open Access Connectivity and distant drivers of land change: a case study of land use, land cover, and livelihood changes in Quang Tri, Vietnam(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2016) Rounds, Eric, author; Leisz, Stephen, advisor; Laituri, Melinda, committee member; Galvin, Kathleen, committee memberThe urban lowland areas of Vietnam have been at the forefront of economic liberalization over the last 30 years, while the more remote mountainous areas of the country have lagged behind. Upland areas in the Northern and Central portions of Vietnam in particular remain largely impoverished and disconnected from broader national and regional markets. To address this economic inequality in the uplands, recent economic development efforts such as the East-West Economic Corridor (EWEC) have aimed at expanding road infrastructure to remote areas in Central Vietnam. This study examines the impact of road expansion in the EWEC on a single village in Quang Tri, Vietnam. It draws from social economic data gathered during fieldwork and a historical land cover analysis to address how land use, land cover, and livelihoods have changed in recent decades. Moreover, the paper discusses the distal and proximate drivers of these changes. Findings show that the improved road connectivity provided by new roads has facilitated the transmission of distant market-related drivers into the study area, and that these drivers have fostered significant changes in land use, land cover, and livelihoods.Item Open Access Do you see what I see? Photovoice, community-based research, and conservation education in Samburu, Kenya(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2011) Beh, Adam Wesley, author; Bruyere, Brett L., advisor; Galvin, Kathleen, committee member; Davies, Timothy Gray, 1942-, committee member; Reid, Robin Spencer, committee memberIn the remote region of Samburu East District in north-central Kenya, community-based conservation (CBC) may arguably provide the best way forward for realizing conservation goals. Education is often identified as an integral part in realizing CBC goals in rural African contexts. Moreover, CBC efforts on the African continent have revealed mixed results regarding success, and there no agreed upon method for evaluating the effectiveness of community-based research on specific conservation education issues, particularly with those disempowered human populations living in and adjacent to conservation areas. Photovoice, a community-based participatory action research (CBPAR) strategy, is evaluated as an effective tool for realizing community-based research goals by its ability to address three core criteria: community-centered control, knowledge production and outcome-oriented results. The Samburu photovoice project employed park rangers and scouts, local teachers and community members in this creative CBPAR strategy to identify local conservation education concerns, and propose opportunities for community involvement in addressing these concerns. Over the course of 8 months, during one of the most severe droughts in recent memory, members of the Samburu community photographed their landscape and collectively addressed the current state of conservation knowledge. Through photo and narrative analysis and participant observation, the Samburu photovoice project is evaluated as effectively supported by the local community; has proven to produce conservation knowledge and allow for disempowered members of the community to have a voice on current issues that affect them; and has ultimately empowered some Samburu community members to act on their newly acquired knowledge. Implications for use as a methodology in Kenya and in other conservation education contexts are discussed. Additionally, narrative inquiry and holistic-content analysis strategies were used to uncover the culturally appropriate learning environment that may best allow for effective conservation education in the Samburu communities. Five of the original 26 photovoice participants were involved in semi-structured interviews to explore this learning phenomenon. The approach provided a rich description of three major themes regarding effective and culturally appropriate learning environments for conservation instruction in Samburu. This includes: exposure to new landscapes coupled with guided discussion, place-based and project-oriented instruction, and cultural drivers. Implications for the development of future conservation instruction in Samburu are given.Item Open Access Embeddedness and the market's edge: Lakota artists at an economic fringe(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2013) Dorion, Patrick, author; Sherman, Kathleen, advisor; Galvin, Kathleen, committee member; Hammerdorfer, Carl, committee memberThe purpose of this research project is to investigate the liminal space Lakota people occupy between market and traditional economies. Rapid integration into a market-based economy and historical resistance to it has pushed the Lakota to an economic fringe, where cash needs demand that Lakota families engage with a market that does not sufficiently provide for them. On the Pine Ridge Reservation, Lakota people are able to absorb the limitations imposed by the market by engaging in a traditional economy embedded in social relations. In particular, this paper focuses on Lakota artists at this economic fringe, and discusses the decisions they make in order to survive.Item Open Access Evaluating social equity and conservation attitudes in community based conservation: a case study of the controlled hunting area program in the Bale Mountains of Ethiopia(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2021) Astella, Bethlehem Abebe, author; Jones, Kelly, advisor; Evangelista, Paul, advisor; Solomon, Jennifer, committee member; Galvin, Kathleen, committee memberThis dissertation research examines perceptions of social equity and conservation attitudes in community-based conservation (CBC) programs in the Bale Mountains, Ethiopia. While there has been an increasing shift towards inclusive and participatory approaches in conservation over the past 40 years, the social and environmental outcomes of CBC programs remain limited. One reason for this is the failure to recognize the diversity of local actors involved in CBC programs, the different costs and benefits they face, and how embedded power relations shape participation and empowerment in CBC programs. Devising effective and fair CBC programs requires putting social equity concerns at the core of conservation, which should in turn improve both social and conservation outcomes. This dissertation makes conceptual, methodological, and empirical contributions to the fields of social equity and CBC by implementing a mixed methods assessment of perceptions of social equity and conservation attitudes, as indicators of long-term conservation outcomes, and the factors that influence these perceptions and attitudes. Specifically, Chapter 1 provides an overview of the dissertation starting with a background of the underlying premises and implementation challenges of CBC programs globally and in Ethiopia. The chapter introduces social equity and conservation attitudes as central themes of the dissertation, gives a backdrop of the community-based controlled hunting area program in the Bale Mountains, and highlights the key research questions. In Chapter 2, this dissertation draws from a multi-dimensional social equity framework to generate a nuanced understanding of different groups' perceptions of equity in the distribution of benefits and costs, the processes of engagement and participation, and the recognition of needs and priorities in a CBC program. I conducted 15 focus group discussions in different communities and apply grounded theory to elicit locals' nuanced perceptions of social equity. The chapter underscores the need to evaluate local actors' diverse and contextualized relationships with other actors and the natural world and give recognition to how perceptions of equity interplay with broader social and environmental processes, in designing and implementing CBC programs. For Chapter 3, I conducted household surveys in four communities. This chapter builds on the previous qualitative analysis by assessing the effects of socio-economic and institutional factors in shaping perceptions of equity across different communities and CBC program models. I integrate the Sustainable Livelihoods Framework (SLF) to assess how access to various capital assets influences equity perceptions. The results signify the need to address the heterogeneity among local actors affected by conservation programs in equity design and assessment. These findings further highlight the need to strengthen weak institutional ties with external organizations, facilitate intra-community organization, and design programs that emphasize transparency to facilitate more equitable conservation outcomes. Finally, in Chapter 4, I use household survey responses to assess how conservation attitudes vary across different communities based on different social, economic, and/ or institutional characteristics. I also examine the role of social equity in mediating how social capital affects conservation attitudes. To foster positive conservation attitudes, results suggest CBC programs need to build on and strengthen internal communal institutions and external links with conservation organizations. The findings also emphasize the need for adopting equity conscious designs that recognize the needs and priorities of marginalized groups. Overall, this dissertation contributes to the science and practice of CBC in Ethiopia and beyond. Empirically, the dissertation advances the contribution of mixed methods in assessing the complex construct of social equity. The focus group discussions with different community members and the use of grounded theory helped elicit local people's nuanced and contextualized perceptions of social equity. Informed by these qualitative findings, I developed locally relevant indicators to quantitatively measure equity perceptions across communities and program models. This contributes to the literature on social equity by adopting and refining existing frameworks in ways that are pertinent to specific contextual realities. From a policy perspective, the findings suggest that CBC programs in Ethiopia need to critically address differences in access to resources and decision-making power and to reframe notions of benefits to encapsulate multiple dimensions of equity. Additionally, the findings from this dissertation suggest that CBC programs more broadly will benefit from building internal social capital and strengthening links with external conservation organizations and resource management agencies, as social capital is key in crafting more equitable CBC programs and influencing positive conservation outcomes.Item Open Access Evaluating the utility of global versus local geospatial data for secondary cities(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2019) Davis, Danielle Brooke, author; Laituri, Melinda, advisor; Tulanowski, Beth, committee member; Galvin, Kathleen, committee memberThe 21st century is experiencing the emergence of the world's secondary cities as major urban growth areas. Secondary cities are regional hubs for commerce, logistics, services, and governance. They have populations ranging from under 300,000 to 5 million and are experiencing rapid, unplanned and informal growth patterns. Their dynamic growth means secondary cities are often data-poor and under-resourced, which impacts the ability of governments to target development efforts, respond to emergencies, and design sustainable futures. This research is a result of the Secondary Cities (2C) Initiative of the U.S. Department of State, Office of the Geographer and Global Issue. This initiative utilizes field-based participatory mapping for data generation to help secondary cities prepare for resilience, human security, and emergency preparedness. Geospatial data are key to the sustainable development of secondary cities for the future. Given the importance of geospatial data I explore two types of geospatial data for informed city planning: globally available data and locally collected data. First, I examine globally available data by assessing Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Indicator 11.3.1, which compares land consumption rate to population growth rate, utilizing the recommended data. I apply SDG Indicator 11.3.1 to five 2C cities: Denpasar, Indonesia; Esmeraldas, Ecuador; Kharkiv, Ukraine; Medellín, Colombia; and Mekelle, Ethiopia. Second, I examine locally collected geospatial data of urban springs data collected in Kharkiv, Ukraine as a potable water source during a case of emergency. Specifically, these examinations utilize suitable data that are products of the 2C Initiative. The results revealed unexpected nuances of both data types that proved complimentary to each other.Item Open Access Ilchamus pastoralists' indigenous knowledge and its use in coping with and adapting to climate change in Marigat, Kenya(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2016) Lenachuru, Clement Isaiah, author; Fernandez-Gimenez, Maria, advisor; Reid, Robin, advisor; Galvin, Kathleen, committee member; Meiman, Paul, committee memberIn view of present and future changes in weather and climate, documenting how pastoralists use their indigenous knowledge (IK) in coping with and adapting to climate change in their localities is increasingly important, as this knowledge may inform climate adaptation policies and practices. The objectives of this dissertation are: 1) to document the Ilchamus pastoralist IK about weather and climate, including indicators of environmental change; 2) to establish how the Ilchamus acquire, share and transmit their IK over generations and within their community; and 3) to investigate how their IK informs Ilchamus decision-making in their livelihood production systems. To address these objectives, I conducted focus groups discussions with men and women in four communities, and administered a household questionnaire to 331 households in Marigat Sub-County, Kenya in 2010 and 2011. I found that the Ilchamus possess rich local knowledge on weather and climate, and use a variety of physical and biological indicators to detect environmental change. They observe changes in many of these indicators, and attribute many of these changes to climate change. Ilchamus obtain their indigenous knowledge through interactions with the biophysical environment, and from a variety of other traditional and non-traditional sources within the community. Ilchamus community members also use a number of formal information sources about weather and climate, including radio and television. Indigenous knowledge is not evenly distributed in the community, and Ilchamus often consult local experts in addition to using their experiential knowledge. Use of traditional and formal sources of knowledge varies with age and education level. Community elders and those with less formal education rely more on traditional knowledge sources while younger and members that are more educated more often use formal sources of information. Ilchamus IK is passed from parents to children though daily interactions and folklore, and is shared within the community through social networks and organizational structures. Although there are many social structures through which knowledge is shared, most of them are exclusive to men. Women are therefore disadvantaged in that only one informal social network is available to them, and this network is task-specific and short term. Traditional means of IK transfer remain intact, but face a challenge from young and educated members of the community, who disregard or dismiss IK and value foreign cultures and practices over local traditions and lifestyles. Ilchamus elders complain of formal education eroding their culture. However, the elders also support formal education for the community’s children, which they see as providing more livelihood options for the future, beyond pastoralism. Ilchamus use a number of customary coping and adaptation strategies to deal with a variable and changing climate. They are aware of the possible consequences of climate change on their production systems and make livelihood decisions based on this knowledge coupled with their experience. However, the majority fail to take timely action in response to changing conditions. This study demonstrates that Ilchamus community members hold extensive indigenous knowledge of weather and climate and that this knowledge has been used over time to inform livelihood decision-making in the community. I therefore recommend the Ilchamus indigenous knowledge system to be recognized by scientists and policy makers for its potential value in adaptation to climate change.Item Open Access Land tenure security and land-cover change: a case study from protected area buffer zone communities in Madagascar(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2023) Chang, Stephen, author; Leisz, Stephen J., advisor; Galvin, Kathleen, committee member; Ojima, Dennis, committee memberTenure and property rights define the relationship that people have with land and natural resources. Customary tenure systems are predominant in Madagascar, where locally administered rule systems have the flexibility to adapt to changing conditions, inherent conflict resolution mechanisms, and often, community buy-in. However, laws and regulations at different governmental levels throughout the country's history have often caused tenure systems to overlap in rural areas, which, in turn, often causes conflict and tenure insecurity. One important alteration to existing land and natural resource tenure systems is the creation of protected areas, which are commonly created to preserve the endemic biodiversity of the country. Many investigations have attempted to link land tenure to land-cover change using earth observing satellite imagery, but the study reported here is the first of the kind for Madagascar. This study addresses the following questions: if and how a land tenure system and its relative security influence land-cover change within a community and if and how land tenure outside of a protected area influences change within. Land cover classifications created from the Landsat TM and ETM+ images achieved high accuracies despite low image availability due to the period during which the study took place and the significant cloud cover found over the study sites. Findings of the study show that protected areas are relatively unaffected by surrounding land-use and land tenure security in the villages near the protected areas, and that the protected areas are effective at conserving the forests within their boundaries. Within each community, however, conflict and tenure insecurity are associated with elevated conversion of forest areas to other land-covers, regardless of tenure. These results highlight the need to prioritize land tenure security to both ensure local communities access to land and natural resources and meet widespread goals related to conserving biodiversity held by the international conservation community through the support of customary tenure systems and the promotion of socially responsible agricultural transitions.Item Open Access Liberal international environmental justice and foreign direct investment at the International Finance Corporation(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2012) Ehresman, Timothy G., author; Stevis, Dimitris, advisor; Betsill, Michele, committee member; Charlton, Sue Ellen, committee member; Galvin, Kathleen, committee memberIn recent years there have been broad and important debates about whether international environmental justice is attainable within the liberal model. This issue warrants examination, particularly in a context which reflects the strongest possible potential for liberal claims. An especially potent commendation of the liberal model is found in North-to-South foreign direct investment, where liberal advocates identify investment as a key strategy to improve the life chances of the poor. However, foreign direct investment today reflects in many cases dimensions of injustice as between investor and affected populations. Such injustices arise in particular where an investment project taps into local resources such as land, air, water, precious metals, and so on without sufficient participation by affected persons in the benefits of such resource access. These sorts of inequities are especially troubling where the investor originates in one of the wealthier countries of the global North and the recipient country and affected population resides in the global South. This study attempts to then answer the question: may such injustices be remediated within the scope of a liberal model of economic activity and development? That is, can liberal prescriptions for justice be satisfied by liberal economic precepts and patterns? The study first posits a social liberal amendment to dominant contemporary neoliberal understandings. The analysis then turns to the World Bank Group's International Finance Corporation as a potential best-case example of efforts to render North-South foreign direct investment more environmentally sound. In particular, the study asks whether the policies and programs of the International Finance Corporation may be fairly seen to accommodate liberal justice precepts. Culling the existing literature, and employing evidence gleaned from documentary analysis and in-person interviews, the study asks whether the International Finance Corporation is durably engaged in advancing international environmental justice in financed projects. Through a deconstruction of International Finance Corporation documents and case studies of a purposive sample of recently-financed projects the study asks whether there is more going on at the International Finance Corporation than mere environmental window-dressing. The analysis shows that a social liberal international environmental justice is being advanced, but not evenly. The study concludes that a stronger implementation of international environmental justice is possible within the social liberal model, but that improvements are needed.Item Open Access Managing resources in a dynamic landscape: analysis of institutions, society and the environment of elk management in northern Colorado(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2013) Childress, Amber N., author; Ojima, Dennis S., advisor; Baron, Jill, committee member; Galvin, Kathleen, committee memberWhen developing strategies to manage natural resources, it is important that actions are taken at the appropriate scale, particularly those that are mobile or cover and extensive area. This is complicated when there is a patchwork of institutions managing the resources. A complete understanding of the ecological and social systems and processes that drive change in the systems facilitates development of optimal management strategies. My goal is to understand how natural resources are managed at a landscape scale when there are multiple land management institutions and stakeholders. To answer this question, my research utilizes a qualitative case study approach to analyze elk management in Northern Colorado. In this case study, I assessed the capacity of formal institutions to perform inter-jurisdictional elk management in Northern Colorado. Drawing from climate vulnerability literature, I determined that this capacity to manage elk across the landscape, "Institutional Capacity", is measured as: the ability of multiple land management institutions to conceptualize or formulate policies, implement them, engage and build consensus among stakeholders, mobilize information, and monitor and evaluate. Through analysis of the missions, objectives, and priorities of each institution; the extent to which their jurisdiction is actually impacted by elk and their abilities to adapt management plans; and access to quality scientific information needed to develop elk management plans, I determine that the effectiveness of elk management is not a result of capacity of each individual institution, but is a result of collective management across many jurisdictions. Two features emerge as key elements that significantly contribute to successful elk management: diversity in the elk management structure and extensive coordination between institutions to manage elk and their habitat. This case study provides useful insights that extend to broader landscape scale management. Resources that are mobile or extend across multiple management jurisdictions cannot be effectively managed by a single institution but are best managed by multiple agencies at different scales because this creates diversity the types of management actions undertaken. However, the coordination required for this type of complex governance involves collaboration of many agencies that is facilitated by organizations that connect others.Item Open Access Prospects for sustainable intensification of smallholder farming systems in Ethiopian highlands(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2017) Mutyasira, Vine, author; Hoag, Dana L. K., advisor; Pendell, Dustin, advisor; Manning, Dale, committee member; Galvin, Kathleen, committee memberThis dissertation examines the prospects of sustainable agricultural intensification by rural farming households in Ethiopia. Although widely accepted as the new paradigm for agricultural development in sub-Saharan Africa, several research and empirical questions still surround the concept of sustainable intensification, particularly its operationalization. Efforts to promote, measure and monitor progress towards sustainable intensification are hampered by the lack of quantifiable indicators at the farm level, as well as the uncertainty over the relationship between intensification and sustainability. This dissertation contributes to this knowledge gap by examining the relationship between agricultural intensification and sustainability, with a view to determine if sustainable paths of agricultural intensification are possible within the smallholder farming systems of Ethiopian highlands. To help better execute the research inquiry, and achieve the main goal of this study, the themes of this dissertation are addressed through three separate but interrelated essays, on top of the introductory and conclusion chapters. The first essay, presented in chapter two, examines the drivers and processes shaping agricultural intensification by smallholder farmers. This chapter contributes to the literature by providing evidence of how agricultural intensification depends on a wide range of factors, whose complex interactions give rise to different intensification pathways. The implication is that, even in a region that is undergoing the process of agricultural intensification, households are likely to respond differently to intensification incentives and production constraints, and thus pursue different paths of agricultural intensification. The second essay, chapter three, develops a methodological framework for defining elements of sustainability based on observed, context-specific priorities and technologies. Farm-level indicators of agricultural sustainability are developed using insights drawn from literature, and adapted to the Ethiopian context through consultations with agricultural experts and key stakeholders in the agricultural sector. A Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) framework is applied to synthesize the selected indicators into a relative farm sustainability index, thus reducing subjectivity in the sustainability index. A generalized linear regression model applied on the computed sustainability scores shows that farm size, market access, access to off farm income, agricultural loans, access to agricultural extension and demonstration plots are key drivers of agricultural sustainability at the farm level. Despite being applied to the Ethiopian context; the methodology has broader policy implications and can be applied in many contexts. The third essay, chapter four, examines the relationship between agricultural intensification and relative farm sustainability, and identifies four clusters of farmers depending on their relative levels of intensification and sustainability. The main thrust of this essay is to examine whether farmers who are highly productive are also sustainable, and whether systems that are relatively more sustainable are mostly on the highly productive farms. The results show that of the farms that are relatively most intensive, in terms of the gross value of crop output per hectare, only 27 percent are relatively more sustainable. Of the farms that are relatively most sustainable, about 60 percent are more intensive. Overall, only 10 percent of the farms were both highly intensive and relatively more sustainable. In order to understand the typology of farmers that are likely to embark on sustainable paths of agricultural intensification, multivariate methods of Principal Components Analysis (PCA) and Cluster Analysis (CA) were used to cluster farmers according to their common characteristics. Multinomial Logit (MNL) regression models were used to model the probability of cluster membership as well as the likelihood of farmers embarking on different intensification trajectories. is used to analyze the odds of embarking on a sustainable intensification path. The results suggest that increasing farmers' access to technical information through demonstration plots and government extension services, addressing farm liquidity constraints, improving market access, as well fostering crop-livestock interactions, significantly increases the likelihood of sustainable intensification.Item Open Access Social outcomes of community-based rangeland management in post-socialist Mongolia: influential factors and favorable institutional designs(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2015) Ulambayar, Tungalag, author; Fernandez-Gimenez, Maria, advisor; Galvin, Kathleen, committee member; Vaske, Jerry, committee member; Reid, Robin, committee memberCommunity-based rangeland management (CBRM) has been proposed as a promising option to reduce rural poverty and resource degradation in post-socialist Mongolia. To date, research on CBRM in Mongolia has been limited to small samples and case studies within one or two ecological zones. Results have been mixed, with some studies showing favorable outcomes and others no effect or negative impacts of CBRM. Few studies have directly compared the outcomes of formally organized CBRM with management by traditional herder neighborhood groupings, or attempted to identify the causal mechanisms that explain variations in CBRM outcomes. Using data from 142 pastoral groups and 706 member households across 36 counties (soum) in four ecological zones, I assessed social outcomes of CBRM organizations in comparison with non-CBRM groups, explored causal mechanisms underlying these social outcomes, and examined the effects of external facilitation on institutional design of formal CBRM organizations. I found that formal groups had more information sources, stronger leadership, greater knowledge exchange, cooperation and more rules. Members of formal groups were more proactive in addressing resource management issues and used more rangeland practices than traditional neighborhoods. However, the two types of groups did not differ on most livelihood measures and had a weak difference in social capital. Four factors, access to diverse information sources, leadership, knowledge exchange and resource management rules, significantly facilitated the effect of formal organization on pastoralists’ traditional and innovative rangeland practices, proactive behavior and social networks. Importantly, information diversity had a triggering effect on other three mediating variables creating a sequential chain of information diversity → leadership → knowledge exchange → rules. This ordered chain of four mediators explains the mechanisms through which formal organization leads to comparatively greater social outcomes. I also found that these mediated effects on members’ proactive behavior and social networking varied among ecological zones. Donor facilitation approach significantly influenced CBRM group attributes and external environments, but did not affect institutional arrangements. Small group size, homogeneous interests, and heterogeneity of well-being predicted higher levels of intermediate outcomes including information diversity, leadership, and income diversity. Institutional arrangements such as the presence of sanctions, group-devised rules, frequent meetings, and recording documents increased cooperation, rules and information diversity. Similarly, access to training and local government support provided a favorable external environment for achieving intermediate outcomes. Regarding ultimate social outcomes, group characteristics such as dependence on livestock, homogeneity of interests and leader legitimacy were critical for increasing social capital, livelihoods, rangeland practices, and proactive behavior. Frequent meetings of group leaders had the greatest influence on ultimate social outcomes. Local government support and ongoing donor support were associated with increased trust and norms of reciprocity, rangeland management practices, proactiveness, and per capita livestock holdings. Overall, group attributes and external environment had a greater influence on social outcomes of pastoral CBRMs in Mongolia than institutional arrangements. I found strong evidence that formal CBRM is leading to increased social outcomes across Mongolia. Many CBRM facilitation strategies were shown to be adequate for fostering social outcomes of the pastoral groups. Early achievements of individual household level variables such as rangeland practices and behavior appeared to be “fast” variables that respond quickly to new institutions. In contrast, building social capital and reaching livelihood improvement may be “slow” variables that require time and larger scale changes. Globally, the promising case of CBRM in Mongolia may encourage mobile pastoral communities elsewhere to cooperate on the sustainable management of their resources. However, as this study showed, careful facilitation is needed to achieve intermediate outcomes, and consideration of the distinct dynamics of local resource systems is a necessary prerequisite for achieving increased social outcomes.Item Open Access Using poppy oil for energy in Afghanistan: a life cycle assessment and diffusion of innovations approach toward sustainable livelihood development(Colorado State University. Libraries, 2014) Mourning-Star, Phoenix, author; Reardon, Kenneth F., advisor; Baron, Jill, advisor; Galvin, Kathleen, committee member; Peek, Lori, committee memberTo view the abstract, please see the full text of the document.