All that glitters is not gold; Power and participation in processes and structures of implementing REDD+ in Kondoa, Tanzania

Mary Nantongo, Arild Vatn and Paul Vedeld

Forest Policy and Economics, 2019, vol. 100, issue C, 44-54

Abstract: Proponents argue that REDD+ (reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation) has the capacity to empower and benefit the poor through increased participation in community-based conservation. REDD+ is however, initiated from outside these communities and often enters a landscape characterized by power asymmetries. This paper documents a case-study from Kondoa, Tanzania and finds that even when local people seem to be generally in control of decision making, one may seriously question if there is true empowerment and real citizen control. The paper explores local participation in the various stages of establishing REDD+; i.e., deciding whether to participate, demarcating land and formalizing ownership, deciding on land use plans/by-laws and on the benefit sharing mechanisms. Results reveal that participation may not lead to empowerment and genuine control if the structures and processes of participation reinforce the underlying power differentials among the actors. The study further shows how the broader governance structure spanning from the international to the local level influences REDD+ processes at the local level, and recommends that global and national policy should account for the various forms of power of the actors operating at different levels.

Keywords: Africa; Land use planning; Participation; Payments; Power; REDD+ policy; Tanzania (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1389934117304720
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:forpol:v:100:y:2019:i:c:p:44-54

DOI: 10.1016/j.forpol.2018.10.011

Access Statistics for this article

Forest Policy and Economics is currently edited by M. Krott

More articles in Forest Policy and Economics from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().