Pastoral Management of Open Access: The Emergence of a Complex Adaptive System (CAREER)
Investigator(s)
Principal investigator:
Mark Moritz, Department of Anthropology, The Ohio State University, Columbus, USA
E-mail: moritz.42(at)osu.edu or mark.moritz(at)gmail.com
Abstract
This project examines how mobile pastoralists in the Logone floodplain in the Far North Region of Cameroon coordinate their movements to avoid conflict and overgrazing in a land tenure system that is commonly described as open access, a situation generally regarded as leading to a tragedy of the commons. The hypothesis is that this management system is best understood as a case of emerging complexity, in which individual decision-making, coordination of movements among pastoralists, and participation in an information sharing network result in the emergence of a complex adaptive system in which access to and use of grazing resources is managed. The hypothesis will be tested in a multidisciplinary study of pastoral mobility that integrates spatial and ethnographic analyses as well as multi-agent simulations and analytical modeling. Understanding how these emergent systems work is critical for the management of rangelands across West Africa, most of which have some form of open access.
URL
For more details please see: here
