Actividades grupales de los adolescentes

The importance of sociocultural factors in community development, including CBNRM, is increasingly being recognised (Berkes & Folke, 1994; Ostrom, 1994; Ray, 1998; Ruttan, 1998; Jenkins, 2000; Katz, 2000; Landes, 2000; Rao & Walton, 2004). Sociocultural factors are useful for this research for understanding informal institutions that shape access of the poor to the resource governed under a CBNRM regime (Robbins, 2000; Meinzen-Dick et al., 2001; Cleaver, 2004; Plummer & FitzGibbon, 2006). The implementation of CBNRM regimes is generally in rural communities with their own sociocultural aspects, in developing countries. In these situations, how the property rights regimes guide resource governance in relation to access of the poor is dependent upon sociocultural factors.

People are not simply individuals. They live socially, and their views, values, and beliefs, as well as their abilities, are formed and sustained within social groupings, families and communities (Bliss, 1993; Gerring & Barresi, 2003). Culture is about the relationships among individuals within groups and among groups. Culture can be characterised by caste, ethnicity, ritual, heritage, norms, and beliefs. It shapes and is shaped by the social and economic aspects of people’s interactions (Rao & Walton, 2004). People use cultural, social and symbolic resources in order to enhance their social position. According to Bourdieu (1987), people of different social groups may have different levels of such power, and this may lead to different levels of influence of their participation in resource decisions. Uphoff (2000) describes social relationships from two perspectives: structural and cognitive. The structural perspective focuses on the numbers and types of social networks, while sociocultural norms and trust that characterise the functions of social networks are the focus of the cognitive perspective.

Social networks are networks of social exchanges through which groups of people keep in contact with each other (Uphoff, 2000; Ostrom & Ahn, 2003). They are mechanisms that connect individuals to society, reflecting social structures and providing patterns of social interactions (Granovetter, 1985; Coleman, 1990). Sociocultural norms prescribe some behaviour or thought regarding the proper or right things for individuals to do or think, according to some principles or set of values in the society (Coleman, 1987; March & Olsen, 1989; Cleaver, 2000). They reflect complex social constructions with cultural meaning (Cleaver, 2000). Sociocultural norms are informal institutions that guide decisions and behaviour of individuals (Platteau, 2000).

There is an increasing acknowledgement in the CBNRM and CPR literature that researchers who aim to identify institutional factors influencing the resource access of the poor must focus on sociocultural aspects, since institutions are embedded in the culture (Klooster, 2000; Jentoft, 2004). Drawing from Newman and Dale (2005), Bodin et al. (2006) and Smith et al. (2006), the key sociocultural factors are: (i) types and levels of social networks, and (ii) sociocultural norms.

Types and levels of social networks

Different types of social networks have different structural and functional characteristics, which can have differing influences on resource governance with respect to resource access (Newman & Dale, 2005; Bodin et al., 2006). Social networks provide people with

trust, reciprocity, cooperation, unity, and information, which can facilitate their collective action in governing a resource in relation to resource access (Bodin et al., 2006). Levels (or the extent) of social networks that people can utilise for their resource access vary with their economic status (Bourdieu, 1985; Swartz, 2000).

Rose (2000) distinguishes between formal and informal social networks. A lot of literature in the resource management and development fields focusses on membership of formal groups and the networks between such groups, often neglecting informal social networks (De-Silva et al., 2005; Plummer & FitzGibbon, 2006). Narayan and Pritchett (1996) found, in their study in rural Tanzania, that people with memberships in many groups often have higher incomes than people with fewer memberships. Crona and Bodin (2006) reported, in their study with fishermen in Kenya, that multiple group membership facilitates information exchange, trust and social ties for successful implementation of community-based management. Gibson et al. (2000) proposed that creating several types of membership within a resource user group provides potential to address diverse needs of different users, including those of the poor users. Rose (2000) described informal networks as face-to-face relationships among a limited number of individuals who know each other and are bound together by kinship, friendship, or propinquity.

A few studies have shown that poor people with small land holdings and women are often excluded from formal social networks, constraining their resource access (Agarwal, 2001; Malla et al., 2003). Dasgupta (2000) reported that in India the high castes of ‘Hindu’ (who are usually big landowners) could utilise formal networks provided through the common property regimes in obtaining resource benefits while the low castes could not. The reasons why the low castes were unable to utilise such networks and obtain resource access, however, were not explained. Theory suggests that membership of formal groups can extend people's access to, and influence over other organisations; however, little empirical research has been done on this (Cleaver, 2000; Gonzalez & Healey, 2005; Savage et al., 2005; Westermann et al., 2005).

Putnam (2000) and Woolcock (2001) categorise social networks into bonding and bridging networks. Bonding social networks are social relationships among people who are similar to each other. Social relations among family members, friends and neighbours in closely connected networks are examples of bonding networks. Social relationships among people who are different from each other are referred to as bridging networks. People can gain access to a far wider range of resources and opportunities than are available within

the community through bridging networks (Granovetter, 1973; Putnam, 2000; Woolcock, 2001), and this can facilitate their access to resources.

Different types of social networks are useful for collective action in CBNRM and sustainable livelihoods. Bonding networks are seen in the literature as useful for establishing and maintaining the trust needed for collective action in CBNRM (Bebbington & Perreault, 1999; Bodin et al., 2006). De Silva et al. (2005) in their study in Peru found that bonding social networks, through informal connections with family, friends or neighbours, were very useful for sustaining the livelihoods of the majority of poor people. They highlighted a system of reciprocal work called peonada as an example of a bonding network. In peonada, residents help each other in work that cannot be performed alone, usually agricultural and construction work. De Silva et al. (2005) also described similar examples such as the traditional system of reciprocal exchange, 'gotong-royong', in Indonesia, and the patterns of work in Scottish crofting communities. The bonding networks were more useful than bridging networks in enabling poor people to survive in rural areas of Peru. Likewise, informal networks were more important than formal networks in developing a deeper level of trust and social harmony in a rural community (De Silva et al.,2005). Anderson (2000) reported in Peru that good access to markets and roads has decreased the usefulness of informal social networks, weakening trust and social harmony among people. However, the mechanisms by which this happened were not described. Bebbington et al. (2006) reported that in Indonesia, bonding social networks were useful for the poor and the elites for different reasons. The poor utilised bonding social networks in securing their livelihood, while the elites utilised them in increasing the economic basis of their power and controlling the village government.

Thin and Gardingen (2004) also describe linking network as a type of social network between people or organisations that are unequal and are located in different areas. For example, networks between forest users and forestry professionals are linking networks. These networks are different from bridging networks that refer to networks between social groups within or outside the community.

Putnam (1993) differentiates between horizontal and vertical networks within groups of people. Horizontal networks bring together groups of individuals or organisations of relatively equivalent status and power (e.g. networks among local groups of forest users). Vertical networks link groups (or organisations) of unequal individuals or organisations in asymmetric relations of hierarchy and dependence (e.g. networks of local groups with district-level organisations). Vertical networks are often established formally. Thin and

Gardingen (2004) reported that in India the horizontal networks of a forest user group with other local groups (such as saving groups, cooperatives, etc.) facilitated forest conservation. Crona and Bodin (2006) found that such networks facilitated the exchange of information and knowledge for successful management of the natural resource. The vertical networks of forest user groups with 'national federation of users' enhanced groups’ capacities for continuing community forest management in India, Indonesia and Nepal (Sarin et al., 2003).

Crona and Bodin (2006) in their studies in Kenya described the influence of centralised and decentralised networks in co-management of the natural resources. A centralised network is an intra-stakeholder network that includes a small cluster of actors, who are centrally positioned in the network, leaving others in the periphery. A decentralised network is an inter-stakeholder network that involves collaboration among stakeholder groups. Crona and Bodin (2006) found that in Kenya the centralising networks facilitated coordination and collective action for coastal resource management during the initiation phase. Decentralising networks, on the other hand, provided access to the diversity of information from different groups, which was required for their resource access in the long term.

Sociocultural norms

Sociocultural norms can also modify ways in which formal rules (i.e. community-based forestry policies) function in practice, shaping the resource access of the poor (Smith et al., 2006; Thanh & Sikor, 2006). Sociocultural norms are shaped by a complex of physical and social conditions (Platteau, 2000). Norms based on caste, ethnicity, gender, class and religion have a significant influence in shaping the social relationships in a community (Coleman, 1990; Moser, 1993; Williams, 2004).

Saigal (2000) and Sarin et al. (2003) identified the fact that power ascribed to people in India is based on norms of caste, ethnicity, class, or gender, which influence the benefits they are able to obtain from a resource. De Jong et al.(2006) and Nguyen (2006), in their studies in Bolivia and Vietnam respectively, highlighted the fact that power ascribed to people based on norms of class (wealth) positively correlates with benefits they obtain from a resource. Lupton (1992) and Chakravarti (2006) suggested that sociocultural norms associated with social inequalities based on class, gender, and caste create the potential for unequal access of people to resource benefits. NSCFP (1997) and

Mustalahiti (2006) suggest that unequal participation of people of different social status in the decision-making processes of forest protection committees is due to discriminatory sociocultural norms. The influence of discriminatory social norms on the implementation of community-based forestry regimes limits women’s membership in forest user groups, and limits their participation in group meetings even if they have membership (Campbell & Denholm, 1992; Dahal, 1996; Ghimire, 2000; Ohler, 2000). Which sociocultural norms lead to unequal participation in decision-making processes, however, is not well described in the literature.

Collective action theory suggests that small size groups, having better trust and cooperation among members, organise better than large size groups (Ostrom, 1994; Agrawal & Goyal, 2001; Poteete & Ostrom, 2004). Empirical studies have shown mixed results. Gautum (2004) found in his study in Nepal that smaller user groups conserved forests better than did larger user groups. However, Agrawal (1994) and Meinzen-Dick et al., (2002) reported that larger groups organised better and mobilised resources better than did smaller groups for the management of natural resources (such as water) in India.