Increasing the Use of Community-based Mapping in the Russian Arctic and Mountainous Regions

该奖项是根据2009年美国复苏和再投资法案（公法111-5）资助的。这个项目是一个实验性的应用科学项目，PI David Gordon，太平洋环境，与俄罗斯西伯利亚的高海拔和高纬度土著社区合作，1)促进他们对绘制生态和文化环境的兴趣；2)为这些团体提供科学的专业知识和方法；3)协助他们让俄罗斯决策者和管理者参与土著家园土地和资源的决策过程；4)在西伯利亚土著人民之间传递知识和方法；5)评估太平洋环境组织的西伯利亚土著群体参与俄罗斯民事治理项目的有效性。太平洋环境（PE）是自苏联解体以来在俄罗斯运作的800- 1000多个环境非政府组织（ngo）之一（新区域环境中心统计）。PE的俄罗斯项目自上世纪90年代初开始运作，其重点是“加强以当地社区为基础的非政府组织和当地社区保护自然世界的能力”。PE为西伯利亚的主要土著组织和社区提供科学专业知识、培训、业务支持和组织，以促进他们对俄罗斯公民社会的了解、参与和支持。PE的理念是加强俄罗斯公民社会的声音，以保护环境。在这个项目中，PE与马加丹环境中心、俄罗斯北方土著人民协会（RAIPON）、不列颠哥伦比亚省席尔瓦森林基金会、堪察加半岛拉奇民族生态信息中心、阿尔泰可持续发展基金会以及其他组织合作，将西伯利亚南部社区与西伯利亚北部社区联系在一起，分享他们的经验、数据和方法。这个项目在地图和地理信息系统技术共享方面是实验性的，但在PE对社区明确需求的回应方面是实验性的；它不仅支持环境映射，也支持文化映射——承认自然世界有需要尊重的形而上学参照；南西伯利亚人和北西伯利亚人之间的方法、技术和知识的转移；以及对该研究的评价及其在资源政策辩论中的应用。阿尔泰社区和后来的北方社区找到PE，并要求他们帮助他们使用地理信息系统，地理和人类学科学，以帮助他们解决日益增长的担忧和需求，因为日益增长的发展和快速的环境变化，他们与景观的关系不断变化。这个项目是高风险/高回报的，研究团队正在探索新的领域，绘制文化和形而上学的空间，包括高度濒危语言的地名数据；它们正在促进土著人民在民间社会的声音；也许最重要的是，作为俄罗斯600多家争夺太空的环保非政府组织之一，他们想要反思自己的角色和效力。该项目结合了地理信息系统、民族志、人类学、人文地理学、政治学、传统知识和应用研究，以增进对西伯利亚文化和生态环境的了解，以及这种了解如何促进土著在政策和管理辩论中的声音。它将由土著社区向南向北转移知识，为土著社区服务，这将增加代表性不足的群体对科学的参与，并允许少数民族利用科学为他们的需求提供信息。此外，这项研究和拟议的讲习班将培训当地人民如何应用科学，以解决已确定的社区需要识别、绘制地图，并向政府当局登记其文化遗址，以便在有关土著土地和资源开发的更大讨论中给予他们发言权。通过该项目获得的知识将适用于社区测绘和了解他们因气候变化而经历的环境和文化变化。

This award is funded under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (Public Law 111-5).This project is an experimental applied science project, PI David Gordon, Pacific Environment, to collaborate with high altitude and high latitude indigenous communities in Siberia, Russia to 1) facilitate their interest in mapping their ecological and cultural environments; 2) to provide scientific expertise and methodology to these groups; 3) to assist them in engaging Russian policy makers and managers in the decision making process over lands and resources on indigenous homelands; 4) to transfer knowledge and methods between Siberian indigenous peoples; and 5) to evaluate the effectiveness of Pacific Environment's program to engage Siberian indigenous groups in civil governance in Russia.Pacific Environment (PE) is one of over 800-1,000 Environmental Non-GovernmentalOrganizations (NGOs) operating in Russia since the fall of the Soviet Union (NewRegional Environmental Center statistics). PE's Russia Program has been in operation since the early 1990's and its focus is on "strengthening the capacity of on-the-ground community-based NGOs and local communities to protect the natural world." PE provides scientific expertise, training, operational support, and organization to primarily indigenous led organizations and communities in Siberia in order to facilitate their knowledge, participation in, and support for civil society in Russia. PE's philosophy is to strengthen Russian voices in civil society in order to protect the environment.PE has partnered in this project with the Magadan Center for the Environment, the Russian Association of Indigenous Peoples of the North (RAIPON), Silva Forest Foundation British Columbia, Lach Ethno-ecological Information Center Kamchatka, Foundation for Sustainable Development of Altai, and others to bring the Southern Siberian communities together with the Northern Siberian communities to share their lessons, data, and methods. This project is experimental not so much in the mapping and GIS technology shared but in PE's response to an expressed need from the community; its support of not only environmental mapping but cultural mapping - the recognition that the natural world has metaphysical referents that need to be respected; the transfer of methods, techniques, and knowledge between southern and northern Siberian peoples; and the evaluation of the research and its application to the policy debates over resources. The Altai communities and later the Northern communities, approached PE and asked that they assist them with GIS, geographic, and anthropological science to help them address a growing concern and need they have over their changing relationships to their landscape because of increasing development and rapid environmental change.This project is high risk/high return, the research team is exploring new territory with the mapping of cultural and metaphysical space, including place name data for highly endangered languages; they are facilitating the voices of indigenous peoples in civil society; and perhaps most importantly they want to reflexively self-examine their role and efficacy, as one of the 600 plus environmental NGOs in Russia jockeying for space. The project combines GIS, ethnography, anthropology, human geography, political science, traditional knowledge, and applied research to increase understanding of the cultural and ecological environments in Siberia and how this understanding can facilitate the indigenous voice in policy and managementdebates. It will transfer of knowledge south to north by indigenous communities, for indigenous communities, which increases the participation of underrepresented groups in science and allows for minority peoples to co-opt science to inform their needs. In addition, the research and the proposed workshop will train local people in the application of science to address the identified community need to recognize, map, and register their cultural sites with governmental authorities in order to give them a voice in the larger discussion taking place about indigenous lands and resource development. The knowledge gained through this project will be applicable to communities mapping and understanding the environmental and cultural changes they are undergoing due to climate change.