ENVIRONMENTAL
                           ANTHROPOLOGY
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Community Participation in Watershed Management
            If environmental problems were simply the result of technical failure,
            we could count on technological improvements to make human activities
            efficient, non-polluting, and sustainable. But environmental problems are
            more than technical problems. They reflect human choices made both in
         the past and present, by households and governments, nationally as well as
         globally. These choices are shaped by particular values.

         Environmental values reflect the varied ways people experience, understand,
         and care for the world around them. If community members feel that water
         protection projects reflect their values and address their concerns, they are
         more, likely to get involved with and provide much needed support for these
         projects.

         In recognition of the importance of stakeholder involvement to project
         sustainability, the United States Environmental Protection Agency has
         promoted community-based environmental protection and watershed protec-
         tion. This Review highlights some general guidelines for community participa-
         tion strategies, using examples from projects sponsored through a coopera-
         tive agreement between the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the
         Society for Applied Anthropology.
        What is a "Community"?

               Developing successful community participation strategies - strategies
               that have a positive effect on project outcomes - takes careful plan-
               ning and analysis. The first question concerns the meaning of "com-
        munity." Is this a community of place, based on life in a shared geographic
        setting? Or is this a community of interest, based on shared values?

        In either case, "community" implies shared action. Without this, community is
        reduced to a social category, a class of persons sharing certain attributes and
        interests. Community, strictly speaking, refers to persons who not only share
        place and interests, but who also act collectively to further those interests.

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ENVIRONMENTAL
ANTHROPOLOGY
    SfAA environmental
    anthropology internship
    projects emphasized a
    variety of techniques to
    give voice to local
    perspectives in watershed
    management planning
    and implementation.
>Morro Bay Estuary
 Community involvement in
 estuary planning £ management
          Chesapeake Bay^v
      Watershed mgmnt includes multiple -^
      perspectives Anacostja
        Community values & restoration
        planning
         Broad River
Watershed planning includes local
knowledge
                                Procedural Fairness

                                       Community participation efforts can influence whether environmental
                                       programs are perceived as fair. When people say that environmental
                                       management programs are unfair, they are really talking about two
                                different, often difficult to separate, dimensions of fairness. One dimension
                                involves outcomes - is the distribution of benefits and burdens "fair"?
                                Several different distribution principles may be applied: e.g., "equal" - where
                                every stakeholder receives exactly the same measure of benefit and burden,
                                regardless of size; or "proportional" where each stakeholder receives ben-
                                efits and burdens in proportion to their size, need, or other relevant factor
                                The other dimension involves procedure—is the process by which decisions
                                have been reached considered fair? A process is considered fair according
                                to some or all of the following attributes:
                                        • Accessibility to decision-making process
                                        • Diversity of views represented
                                        • Opportunities to participate meaningfully
                                        • Integration of concerns.

                                Accessibility to decision-making process!
                                Is the process open to all stakeholders, or just a limited few?
                                By what criteria are access and eligibility to participate limited,
                                either directly or indirectly?

                                In most cases, there are no explicit criteria that limit public participation.
                                However, outreach efforts tend to focus on stakeholders who are the most
                                vocal, the most organized, or who wield the most obvious influence in
                                promoting or blocking environmental protection. Unless other strategic
                                efforts are made, minority or low-income populations are not represented
                                among these groups.

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                                     Community Participation  in Watershed Management
 For example, in Alabama and Georgia, Environmental Anthropology
 Project intern Sandra Crismon attended county fairs and hosted
 information booths where she distributed outreach material on
 watershed planning efforts. She came into contact with a cross-
 section of the population and elicited their perceptions of watershed
 conditions and  needs. Through these and other methods, racial
 minority stakeholder groups and a wide range of other stakeholders
 were identified  who had been unrecognized in previous outreach
 efforts.

 Diversity of views represented: To what extent does
 stakeholder involvement identify and select participants who
 represent the  widest possible range of interests, positions,
 and values?

 The Broad River is one of the last free flowing rivers in Georgia and is
 critical to the health and economic well being of the region's popula-
 tion. As in most watershed protection efforts, the  challenge here was
 to determine how to get residents actively to support river conserva-
 tion efforts. In other words, what could transform  a "community of
 place" into a "community of joint action?"

 To help answer this question, Environmental Anthropology Project
 intern Stephanie Paladino collected data from residents of Madison
 County about environmental values, public knowledge, interests, and
 concerns involving land use management and river conservation. Not
 surprisingly,  real estate developers, business owners, wage laborers,
 farmers, and civil servants expressed a variety of priorities, ranging
from building roads and facilitating population growth to keeping the
 area rural and limiting housing  developments.

 In spite of these differences, residents shared a strong sense of
 community and attachment to the land they called home. Residents
 placed a high value on individual rights, but they also recognized the
 importance of collective rights and the necessity of laws to help keep
the balance between the two. Taking care of the environment was
associated with both collective  rights and the idea of being a good
neighbor.
                                                    Photo: Stephanie Paladino
                                                    Nearly everyone
                                                    cares about the
                                                    environment.
                                                    However, people
                                                    disagree enormously
                                                    about how best to
                                                    act for its protection.
 Environmental Justice

 Environmental justice has at its core the
 notion that environmental burdens and
 benefits should be evenly distributed, and
 that the process by which decisions are
 made should be fair. The Environmental
 Justice movement in the United States
 grew out of the 1960s Civil Rights
 movement as advocates argued that
 minority communities were not offered
 equal protection under the law for all
 environmental statutes and regulations.
 Activists generally point to three different
 kinds of inequity: Procedural - are
 governing rules, regulations, and
 evaluation criteria applied uniformly?
 Geographical - why do some neighbor-
 hoods, communities, and regions receive
 direct benefits, such as jobs and tax
 revenues, from industrial production while
 the costs, such as the burdens of waste
 disposal, are sent elsewhere? Social -
 environmental decisions  often mirror the
 power arrangements of the larger society
 and result in overloading minority and
 low-income communities with noxious
 facilities.

 In response to mounting  pressure from
 the Environmental Justice movement,
 President Clinton signed  Executive Order
 12898, directing all federal agencies to
 adopt strategies to pay special  attention
 to burdens placed on low-income and
 minority communities. The United States
 Environmental Protection Agency has
 responded by making environmental
 justice concerns key components of
 environmental impact statements
 prepared under the authority of the
 National Environmental Policy Act.
 Environmental justice should play a key
 role in the scoping analysis, that is, the
 identification and definition of the range of
 actions, alternatives,  and impacts that will
 be considered in an environmental impact
 statement.
 Environmental justice analysis must
 consider the cumulative impacts of
 multiple actions along with impacts from
 a single proposed project. For example,
 a project that will result in a permitted
 discharge to nearby surface waters may
 be of concern to populations who rely on
 fishing and who already get their drinking
 water through lead pipes; the cumulative
 effects of both the projected discharge
 and the existing lead pipes must be taken
 into account. Adequate public participa-
 tion is crucial to incorporating ehviron-
 rnental justice considerations into the
 United States environmental Protection
Agency's actions, both to enhance the
 quality of the analyses and to ensure that
 potential affected parties are not over-
 looked and excluded from the process.
 For additional information, see:  http://
www.eDa.gov/swerosps/ei

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      ENVIRONMENTAL
      ANTHROPOLOGY
        Environmental Values

        Environmental planners want their
        preservation, enhancement, and
        restoration plans to serve the
        public interest, and need long-term
        public support for their efforts.
        Anthropologists suggest that
        lasting environmental policy
        solutions are best grounded in
        public value orientations, not
        opinions. While opinions tend to
        be ever-shifting and subject to
        manipulation by marketing and
        advertising campaigns, value
        orientations tend to be more deep-
        seated, change more gradually,
        and are less susceptible to
        purposeful manipulation. In
        thinking about the role of values in
        environmental policy-making, the
        following three questions are
        Important:

        (1) How can we learn about
        public values? Ethnographic
        (qualitative) research is a
        productive complement to surveys
        as a systematic data collection
        method. Values are variable
        across a population, not mono-
        lithic, and surveys help us
        understand this variability.
        Qualitative research helps us
        understand the richly textured
        meanings of any particular
        position along a distribution of
        values.

        (2) What values matter, in the
        context of environmental
        planning and management?
        Rather than talk about attitudes
        and opinions - "How strongly do
        you feel about the environment?
        How much would you be willing to
        pay to keep salmon from extinc-
        tion?" -environmental planners
        and managers should consider a
        more encompassing set of values,
        having to do with "consent,"
        "liability," "equity," and "time."

        Consent; What sort of collective
        agreement forms the basis of
        management decisions? Does
        support for a decision have to be
        unanimous, or does a principle of
        majority rule apply? Does
        agreement have to be explicitly
        spelled out in a formal, legally
        binding document, or is business
        done more informally, "by a
        handshake."
In this project, the data collection activities themselves supported outreach
and education efforts, and stimulated broader participation in public hearings
and planning processes. The research findings helped project planners think
more broadly about ways to frame outreach efforts so as to focus on the
commonalities that would support watershed protection efforts rather than
highlight differences among individual perspectives.
Opportunities to participate meaningfully:
Does the process allow participants to tell their stories clearly and fully
or represent their viewpoints in ways that are meaningful to them? Is
there evidence that their interests and concerns have registered?
Public documentation is important so that when participants offer their
views, something is not lost in translation.

Developing appropriate public outreach messages  is an important means of
letting community members know they've been heard. On the other hand,
trying to engage the public with images that do not ring true, or emphasizing
priorities that are not shared by local communities can alienate or even
antagonize much needed collaborators.

The importance of registering participant viewpoints is well-illustrated by
Environmental Anthropology Project intern Michael Kronthal's work with
residents in three different neighborhoods located east of the Anacostia
River, in Washington, DC.  Kronthal attended community meetings and
public events, interviewed local residents to document use patterns associ-
ated with current river conditions, and identified varied interests and views
concerning watershed improvement projects.

Most residents voiced negative sentiments concerning the river, its condition,
and restoration plans. They thought of the river in terms of the surrounding
overgrown lots, high grass, trees, and underbrush that provided opportuni-
ties for drug dealing and other criminal activity that threatened their personal
safety. Residents were also concerned that the river was polluted and an
environmental health risk.

While some informants reported  calming  feelings when visiting or observing
the river, they also noted disappointment, sadness, and anger at the river's
decline, and the loss of a perceived time  when the river was not polluted and
their neighborhoods were relatively safe.

Community perceptions of river space as a setting for negative social
experience contrasted with the values and visions  of project planners, who
viewed the natural features of river habitat as a social good. To encourage
broader community support for river restoration efforts, outreach messages
needed to acknowledge these negative realities. Restoration plans needed
to include  steps to transform a local hazard into a setting that encouraged
healthy, pleasurable experiences. Without acknowledging and addressing
neighborhood resident concerns associated with the river, outreach efforts
would have little chance of success.
4

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                                   Community Participation in  Watershed Management
Photo: Monica Hunter
Volunteers assist with estuary habitat assessment in Morro Bay.

Integration of concerns:
To what extent do the ultimate decision-making authorities
report back to participants on how decisions are responsive
to interests and concerns,  or why they have not been?

In Morro Bay, California, a coalition of community groups and residents
documented the unique characteristics of a local estuary, monitored
conditions, developed the means to fund conservation efforts, and
developed the political support to secure State and National Estuary
Program (NEP) status.

However, once national program status was achieved, conflict erupted.
Bird hunters and bird watchers, economic development interests and
anti-growth advocates, habitat preservationists and recreational tourism
proponents, citizen activists and environmental professionals: all had
their own ideas of how the estuary should be managed.  This was
especially problematic since the long-term plans for monitoring and
implementing habitat protection depended on broad-based support of
community volunteers.
Environmental Values continued...

Liability: Who is considered
responsible for environmental
problems? When the salmon
population declines precipitously, do
all people in the watershed see
themselves as partly responsible, or
do they feel it is somebody else's
fault? Do they assign themselves
responsibility for making the
changes necessary to restore the
habitat that supports the fishery, or
do they see this as someone else's
obligation?

Equity. Consider the different
principles of fairness that might be
at work, including both distributive
(outcome) fairness and procedural
fairness discussed earlier.

Time: There are social and cultural
variations  in ideas about how far
into the future today's actions have
important consequences.

(3) Under what conditions do
values change, and why? As we
try to involve the potentially affected
public - to gain insights about their
values - we are bound to hear
people voice concerns about
threats to  traditional values. While
we know that values are more
stable than opinions, we also know
that long-held values do change.
They change as a result of
commodification (a market being
created for goods and services that
formerly were not for buying and
selling) and as a result of globaliza-
tion (a demand for local goods and
services from distant places). Value
changes tend to occur rapidly
through immigration and contact
between different ethnic groups and
social classes, and via incorporation
into regional/global markets.

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ENVIRONMENTAL
ANTHROPOLOGY
                                    After analyzing the history of community involvement in the estuary
                                    project, environmental anthropologist Monica Hunter discovered that
                                    one underlying source of the conflict was that community members felt
                                    disenfranchised by the decision-making authorities. Community-based
                                    volunteers who had been  essential research partners in the formative
                                    planning stages of the national estuary now felt relegated to the more
                                    passive role of the informed "public."

                                    To counter this effect, and to strengthen volunteer participation during
                                    the transitional period, Hunter worked with a coalition of groups and
                                    residents to publish an estuary newsletter.  This project brought volun-
                                    teers and NEP staff together to identify and work with diverse stakehold-
                                    ers. The newsletter also created a public arena for local voices and
                                    sustained community interest as the roles and duties of community
                                    volunteers evolved from activist/advocate to stewards of the estuary.

                                    The importance of integrating community knowledge and concerns into
                                    the project design is highlighted in a study  of community responses to
                                    Pfiesteria, a toxic microorganism responsible for fish kills in Chesapeake
                                    Bay. As part of a project sponsored by the Environmental Protection
                                    Agency, the Society for Applied Anthropology and the Pocomoke River
                                    Alliance, environmental anthropologist Shawn Maloney conducted
                                    participant observation with Pocomoke  River watershed residents,
                                    scientists, and policy makers.

                                    One of the project's objectives was to communicate local interests and
                                    concerns about nutrient management, environmental protection/restora-
                                    tion, and Pfiesteria to state and federal  decision-making bodies, in order
                                    to strengthen the role of local resource users in preventing further
                                    outbreaks of Pfiesteria.

                                    The project succeeded in documenting  local knowledge and concerns,
                                    strengthened local awareness  of the issues, and increased involvement
                                    in community-based organizations. However, efforts to include the local
                                    community voice at the level of regional politics were less successful.
                                    In terms of procedural fairness, participants devoted time and  energy to
                                    sharing their viewpoints and  concerns, but saw no evidence that their
                                    efforts had any impact.

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                                     Community Participation  in Watershed  Management
Summing Up

      To be successful in achieving environmental goals, public participa-
      tion strategies must begin with a clear definition of "community"
      and inclusive identification of stakeholders. Projects must then
adhere to the steps of procedural fairness outlined above.
Photo: Ed Liebow
Widely promoting community participation without a strategic plan grounded in local realities, or without
attention to procedural fairness, leads to community burn out. Repeated calls for public participation
results in apathetic or distrustful responses to outreach efforts if community members believe their work
is in vain.
For community participation to contribute to the success of environmental
goals, environmental planners must depart from scripted notions of what
participation entails. Meaningful community participation implies giving
local people the opportunity to help define the problems, develop and
prioritize remedies, and implement changes in ways that they perceive
as being beneficial and that will contribute to equitable and sustainable
environmental practices.
For additional information:

Community Based Environmental
Protection
http://www.epa.gov
ecocommunity/

Crismon's report on Participation
and Environmental Justice Issues
in EPA Region 4 Watershed
Projects
http://www.sfaa.net/eap/
crismon.html

Paladino's report on Perceptions
of a Changing Environment in
Madison County
http://www.sfaa.net/eap/paladino/
paladino.html

Kronthal's report on Local
Residents, the Anacostia River
and "Community"
http://www.sfaa.net/eap/kronthal/
kronthal.pdf

Hunter's report on community
participation and Friends of the
Morro Bay Estuary
http://www.sfaa.net/eap/hunter/
hunter.pdf

Maloney's report on the Pfiesteria
project in the Chesapeake Bay
http://www.sfaa.net/eap/maloney/
malonevfinal.pdf and
http://www.sfaa.net/eap/malonev/
maionev.html

For more information about the
Pfiesteria controversy in the
Chesapeake Bay, please see the
article by: Michael Paolisso and
Erve Chambers (2001), Culture,
Politics, and Toxic Dinoflagellate
Blooms: The Anthropology of
Pfiesteria. Human Organization:

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Colunnlia Plateau ^* Clark Fork
         * Umatilla River
                                                                                    - The Society for Applied Anthropology
                                                    Niagara Fails ^^Tuscarora
                                                                 Nation
 * Morro Bay Estuary
                                                   Pocomoke River A
                                        Bloomimjton *  ^*
                                         Hamilton County
                    *Zunl Pueblo ~~\
                          Cherokee Nation
        Environmental Anthropology Projects focused on community-based
           approaches to environmental protection throughout the U.S.
     Environmental anthropologists analyze and resolve human
      and ecological problems posed by energy extraction and
        use; agriculture, forestry, fisheries, mining, and other

       resource development; pesticide exposure, toxic waste
          disposal, and other environmental health issues;
          environmental restoration; tourism, public lands,
         and cultural resource management; the protection
        of traditional knowledge, values, and resource rights;
                    and environmental education
      The Society for Applied Anthropology
      was incorporated in 1941, with the mission
      of promoting the scientific investigation of
"the principles controlling the relations of human
beings to one another" and the wide application of
those principles to practical problems."

In 1996 the Society established the Environmental
Anthropology Project, funded through a five-year
cooperative agreement with the U.S.  Environmen-
tal Protection Agency. The aims of the project
were to provide technical support for community-
based approaches  to environmental protection
and to improve the understanding of how cultural
values and social behavior affect environmental
management decisions.

Theresa Trainor served as EPA's project officer
from the project's inception. Barbara Rose
Johnston directed the project for its first four
years'; Robert Winthrop served as director for the
final year of the project. The Review series was
produced by Barbara Rose Johnston, and
Gabrielle O'Malley  and Edward Liebow of the
Environmental Health and Social Policy Center.
The Reviews solely reflect the views of their
authors, not those of the Environmental Protection
Agency. Society officers (including Jean Schensul,
John Young, Linda  Bennett, and Noel Chrisman)
and a project advisory group provided oversight
during the course of the agreement. Many Society
members served as mentors for the project's
interns and fellows, and as reviewers for its
reports and publications.

The Society for Applied Anthropology is grateful
for the financial support and professional coopera-
tion of the Environmental Protection Agency and
its staff. For more information on the Society and
the Environmental Anthropology Project,
please see our web site: www.sfaa.net.
   Society for Applied Anthropology
   PO Box 2436   .
   Oklahoma City, OK 73101-2436
                 Non Profit Organization
                       US Postage
                          PAID
                   Oklahoma City, OK
                    Permit No. 1010
   © 2001 Society for Applied Anthropology. This Review has been prepared by the Society for Applied Anthropology, and does not imply any
   official EPA endorsement of or responsibility for the opinions, ideas, data or products presented in the Review.

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                     The Society for Applied Anthropology
President
  NOEL J. CHRISMAN

Past-President
  LINDA A. BENNETT

Secretary
  WILLIE L. BASER

Treasurer
  THOMAS A. ARCURY

Editor, HO
  DONALD D. STULL

Editor, PA
  ALEXANDER M. ERVIN

Editor, Newsletter
  MICHAEL WHITEFORD

20.02 Annual Meeting
Program Chair
  BENJAMIN BLOUNT

Board Of Directors
  SUSAN L. ANDREATTA
  E. PAUL DURRENBEROER
  , SUE ESTROFF
  STANLEY E. HYLAND
  EDWARD B. LIEBOW
  KRISTIN V. LUNDBERG
  NANCY J. PAREZO

SFAA Office
  P.O. Box 2436
  OKLAHOMA CITY, OK 73101-2436
  (405)843-5113
  (405)843-8'553-FAX
  ; E-MAIL:
  INFO@SFAA.NET
  WEB PAGE:
  WWW.SFAA.NET

Publications
  HUMAN ORGANIZATION
  PRACTICING ANTHROPOLOGY
  SpAA NEWSLETTER
                         Dear SfAA Colleagues:
                                                                            AUG 2 3  2002
In 1996 the Environmental Protection Agency and the Society for Applied
Anthropology entered into a five-year cooperative agreement establishing the
Environmental Anthropology Project. Its aim: to increase the access of
communities and policy makers to anthropological expertise in the solution of
environmental problems.
In all, thirty fellows and interns received funding under this agreement. While
working with EPA staff and community organizations, they applied their
anthropological skills and insights to a wide range of environmental
challenges, from minimizing the human costs of ecological restoration in south
Florida, and analyzing the implications of a habitat conservation program for
Washington state farmers, to mapping the perceptions of risk in communities
surrounding a nuclear power plant in Michigan. More information about the
Environmental Anthropology Project is available on the SfAA web site:
http ://www. sfaa.net/eap/abouteap.html.
Many SfAA members contributed to the project's success as director, members
of its advisory committee, mentors for project interns, and editors for the
project's reports and publications.  Enclosed is a final product of the
Environmental Anthropology Project, a series of five Reviews highlighting
themes and issues in  environmental anthropology, primarily illustrated by
work conducted under this project. These include: (I) Human Dimensions of
Environmental Policy; (2) Community Participation in Watershed
Management, (3) Restoring the Florida Everglades: Social Impacts; (4)
Environmental Stewardship in Indian Country; and (5) Making a Difference in
the World: Applied Anthropology' Internships.  The five Reviews are available
as a set for classroom use at a modest cost from the Society office.
With warm regards,
Noel Chrisman
SfAA President
Theresa Trainor
EPA Project Officer
Rob Winthrop
Director, Environmental
Anthropology Project

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