Designed for accumulation by dispossession: an analysis of Tanzania's wildlife management areas through the case of Burunge
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Date
2020-12
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
wiley
Abstract
Unfortunately, adverse rather than positive local welfare outcomes of
community-based conservation initiatives are quite common. Through the case
of Burunge Wildlife Management Area (WMA) this study documents how
WMAs in Tanzania appear designed to facilitate accumulation by disposses-
sion in the name of decentralized wildlife management. Based on focus group
discussions, interviews, and policy-document analyses, we show that the pro-
cess of establishing the WMA was fraught with hidden agendas and lacked
legitimacy as well as transparency. Villagers and their local governments were
also oblivious to the fact that the village land they contributed to forming the
WMA would no longer be under village control even if they withdrew from
the WMA. Decentralized revenue streams were gradually recentralized, and
when the High Court ruled in favor of a Village Government that did not want
to be part of the WMA, higher levels of government scared it to stay and to
drop its legal as well as economic claims. We conclude that by mechanisms of
rule-through-law WMAs deliberately dispossess village communities by atten-
uating the authority of democratically elected village governments. Hence, the
wildlife policy needs urgent revision to democratize and thus promote positive
livelihood outcomes of the WMA concept.
Description
Keywords
Community wildlife management, Democratic decentralization, Dispossession, Legitimacy, Rule- through-law, Transparency