Doctoral Dissertation Research: Converting Pastures to Grasslands: State Interventions into Pastoral Livelihoods and Grassland Ecosystems of Tibet

这项研究项目调查了2003年启动的一项重大政府项目-放牧清除项目，该项目呼吁在西藏大片牧场上取消放牧，以恢复据称退化的牧场。该项目的工作方式是创建栅栏区域，在这些区域内，每年禁止放牧几个月到十年。研究生Yundan Nima将在博士导师Emily Yeh博士的指导下，调查这个放牧清除项目的理由。具体地说，这项研究询问中国中央政府为什么在西藏牧区启动放牧取消项目，地方和地方政府在多大程度上按照中央政府的意图实施该项目；牧民如何接受、拒绝、修改或适应该项目，为什么？传统的草原管理制度形式和西藏牧民的当地知识在多大程度上与非平衡生态系统的预期相符，这对牧民对该项目的反应有何影响？将放牧清除项目作为国家干预进行分析的框架广泛地受到政治生态学的影响，政治生态学是一种分析环境问题及其建议的解决方案的方法，它在多个尺度上分析了政治-经济、社会和文化因素塑造环境问题的方式。实地研究将使用多种方法，包括详细的家庭调查、深入的半结构化访谈、口述历史、横断面走访和参与观察。接受采访的个人包括牧民和各级政府官员(从中央政府到村庄)。将在那曲的两个村庄进行深入的人种学研究。通过调查放牧清除项目的实地执行情况及其目标如何认同或拒绝放牧项目，该项目有助于了解国家发展和环境项目，包括其社会和环境后果以及它们可能产生新特性的方式。该项目通过对国家对牧民生计的干预是如何制定、转化为实施和竞争的多尺度分析，为政治生态做出贡献。该项目还对畜牧业的研究做出了重大贡献，有助于了解快速变化和政府干预如何影响发展中国家的牧场管理模式和生计。通过该项目，西藏牧民将有机会表达他们对政府环境和发展政策的经验和看法，以及他们对自己当前和未来生计状况的评估。

This research project investigates a major government program launched in 2003, the grazing removal project, which calls for the removal of grazing from large areas of rangeland in Tibet for the purpose of restoring purportedly degraded pastures. The project works by creating fenced zones in which grazing is to be banned for several months annually to ten years. Graduate student Yundan Nima, under the supervision of PhD advisor Dr. Emily Yeh, will investigate the rationales for this grazing removal project. Specifically, this research asks why has the Chinese central government initiated the grazing removal project in pastoral Tibet and to what extent is it being implemented by sub-national and local governments as intended by the central government?; how are pastoralists accepting, rejecting, modifying or adapting to the project, and why?; to what extent do traditional forms of grassland management system and Tibetan pastoralists' local knowledge articulate with what would be expected for non-equilibrium ecosystems and how does this affect pastoralists' response to the project? The framework for analyzing the grazing removal project as a state intervention is informed broadly by political ecology, an approach that analyzes the ways in which environmental problems and their proposed solutions are shaped by political-economic, social, and cultural factors, at multiple scales. Field research will use a mix of methods that include detailed household surveys, in-depth, semi-structured interviews, oral histories, transect walks, and participation observation. Individuals to be interviewed include herders and governmental officials at all levels (from central government down to village). Intensive ethnographic study will be conducted in two villages in Nagchu. By investigating the on-the-ground implementation of the grazing removal project and the ways in which its targets come to identify with or reject it, the project contributes to understandings of state development and environmental projects, including their social and environmental consequences as well as the ways in which they may produce new identities. This project contributes to political ecology through a multi-scalar analysis of how state interventions into pastoral livelihoods are formulated, translated into implementation, and contested. The project also makes a substantial contribution to studies of pastoralism, contributing knowledge about how rapid change and government interventions are affecting range management patterns and livelihoods in developing countries. Through the project Tibetan herders will have an opportunity to express their experiences with and perceptions of government environment and development policies, as well as their assessments of their own current and future livelihood conditions.