Join us as we welcome Elson Galang, a candidate for the Nelson Institute’s RISE-EARTH hiring initiative.
Galang is a PhD candidate at McGill University’s Department of Natural Resources. He recently completed participatory research in the Philippines and Canada, where he explored the social, cultural, and ecological implications of agroforestry in protected watersheds.
In his talk, Galang will discuss “Participatory Research in Highly Contested Social-Ecological Systems.”
Can’t attend in person? Join this seminar on Zoom
Abstract
Highly contested social-ecological systems are those in which actors have multiple or conflicting interests and values. Tensions and disputes that arise from such contentions affect sustainability, resilience, and equity in these systems. In this presentation, I will discuss two cases of participatory research I have conducted in contested social-ecological systems in the Philippines and Canada.
I will highlight how I engaged diverse actors, especially commonly marginalized groups, to co-explore:
- The ecosystem values of agroforestry production systems in a protected watershed
- The plausible futures of a culturally and agro-ecologically important tidal wetland-dykeland system
I will also discuss my novel methods and findings from the second case that shows how such a participatory futuring process resulted to improved systems thinking, trust for cooperation, and empathy among participating actors. To end, I will present my future research agenda and plans for this faculty position that build on my experiences of conducting these participatory research in contested social-ecological systems.