A Proposal for Conducting a Strategic Planning Session of the Working Group on Rural Alaskan Self-Reliance

阿拉斯加农村社区在可持续性、复原力、自力更生和适应气候变化、能源成本上升和获得野生食物方面面临着紧迫而艰巨的挑战。这是在美国联邦债务增加、阿拉斯加州石油收入下降、州和联邦预算缩减的情况下发生的。因此，阿拉斯加农村社区期望州和联邦机构充分解决他们面临的挑战似乎是不明智的。相反，它更符合阿拉斯加原住民的传统，以寻求解决方案，提供更大的社区自力更生。该项目将支助一个战略规划讲习班，以制定一个社区发起的自力更生框架。人们普遍认识到，阿拉斯加正面临着社区必须适应的巨大方向性变化。然而，目前还没有设计或实施这种调整的框架。拟议的研究将设计这样一个框架，并启动实施步骤。这构成了对社会生态转型过程的基础研究。拟议的规划讲习班提供了一个机会，将当地和本土的智慧和知识与西方科学（例如，阿拉斯加农村自力更生工作组（WGRAS）提议的研讨会将制定一项试点社区适应项目计划，阿拉斯加大学的资源将与阿拉斯加社区合作，通过整体，跨学科，有效，和可访问的进程。这为阿拉斯加农村社区的适应规划提供了一个框架，使他们能够制定和寻求在迅速变化的世界中实现自力更生的愿景。拟议的讲习班将为实施示范项目提供框架。

Rural Alaskan communities face pressing and daunting challenges in terms of their sustainability, resilience, self-reliance and adaptation in the face of climate changes, rising energy costs, and access to wild foods. This comes at a time of increasing U.S. federal debt, declining Alaska state oil revenues, and shrinking state and federal budgets. It therefore seems unwise for rural Alaskan communities to expect state and federal agencies to adequately address the challenges they face. Instead, it is more in keeping with Alaska Native traditions to seek solutions that provide greater community self-reliance. This project will support a strategic planning workshop to develop a framework for community-initiated self-reliance. It is widely recognized that Alaska is facing large directional changes to which communities must adapt. However, there is currently no framework for designing or implementing such adaptations. The proposed research will design such a framework and initiate steps toward its implementation. This constitutes fundamental research on the processes of social-ecological transformation. The proposed planning workshop provides an opportunity to integrate local and native wisdom and knowledge with western science (e.g., climate change projections) in the context of policies and institutions whose suitability to support adaptation is currently unclear.The workshop proposed by the Working Group on Rural Alaska Self-Reliance (WGRAS) will develop a plan for pilot community adaptation projects whereby University of Alaska resources are partnered with Alaskan communities to address locally identified challenges to self-reliance and sustainability through holistic, interdisciplinary, effective, and accessible processes. This provides a framework for adaptation planning by rural Alaskan communities that will enable them to develop and seek ways to implement their vision of self-reliance in a rapidly changing world. The proposed workshop will provide the framework by which that demonstration project could be implemented.