Doctoral Dissertation Research: Citizen-based Sea Turtle Conservation Across the First World-Third World Divide

本研究比较了美国和墨西哥公民参与海龟保护的案例研究，以分析不同的参与框架如何影响公民参与科学和资源管理。为了探讨这些不同框架对公民保护科学贡献的影响，本研究比较了美国北卡罗来纳州和墨西哥下加利福尼亚南部海龟保护计划的案例研究。这一比较将考察两个项目中的公民以相似或不同的方式共同产生海龟科学的方式，并考虑话语结构如何改变与科学及其机构的接触，以及参与资源管理。这一主要研究目标将通过三个具体问题来探讨：(1)公民如何参与海龟保护监测？(2)公民参与海龟科学的程度如何？(3)公民通过参与科学可以通过哪些方式获得权力？为了回答这些问题，数据收集将通过参与观察，文件分析和深入访谈进行。分析由基于理论的方法驱动，将数据编码和分类为主题，并将在整个研究中进行。总的来说，这项研究试图更好地理解：参与的重要性，例如参与将保护开放给地方控制和知识的程度，以及通过参与科学赋予公民权力的可能性；科学民主化的可能性，以及这一过程如何改进科学和保护模式；第一世界和第三世界分裂的本质，以及这种分裂的产生如何与权力的行使和知识的创造联系在一起。认识到参与性保护影响结果的不同框架对于理解保护可以实现的目标和实现公民参与的全部好处非常重要。

This research compares case studies of citizen participation in sea turtle conservation in the US and Mexico to analyze how different frameworks for participation impact citizen engagements with science and resource management. To explore the impacts of these different frameworks on citizen contributions to conservation science, this research compares case studies of sea turtle conservation programs in North Carolina, USA and Baja California Sur, Mexico. This comparison will examine the ways in which citizens in both projects may co-produce sea turtle science in similar and different manners, and consider how discursive constructions change engagements with science and its institutions, and with participation in resource management.This primary research objective will be explored through three specific questions: (1) How do citizens participate in sea turtle conservation monitoring? (2) To what degree do citizens co-produce sea turtle science? (3) In what ways might citizens be empowered through participating in science?To answer these questions, data collection will proceed through participant observation, document analysis, and in-depth interviewing. Analysis is driven by a grounded-theory approach, coding and categorizing data into themes and will be undertaken throughout the research. Overall, the research seeks to better understand: the significance of participation, such as the degree to which participation opens conservation to local control and knowledge as well as the potential empowerment of citizens through participating in science; the possibilities for democratizing science and how this process may improve models of science and conservation; the nature of the First-World/Third-World divide, and how the production of this divide is bound up with the exercise of power and the creation of knowledge. Recognizing how different frameworks for participatory conservation impact outcomes is important for understanding what conservation can achieve and for realizing the full benefits of citizen participation.