240197 SE From Bushman Land to Community-based natural resource management in Namibia (P3, P4) (2013W)

In Namibia indigenous peoples have been legally defined by others and ethnically associated with Bushman Land. They were denied the fundamental human right of self-determination in the process, and locked out from resources needed for material survival as well as democratic participation. Lately they entered the arena of human rights in the international institutions from the 1960s onwards. After independence in 1990 many San communities that had been involved in the independence war with South Africa fled the country and resettled in army camps (such as Driftsmith) in South Africa. The remaining populations have now embarked on different forms of self-organization around the newly developed concepts of Community-based natural resource management (CBNRM). The object is that they achieve a self-determined future, based on their regained control over natural resources.

Specific provisions for indigenous ownership of land may be a prerequisite to the practice of further rights of self-determination and responsible natural resource management. The depiction of indigenous peoples as ‘natural environmental protectors’ is a myth in the line of thought of the ‘Noble Savage’, and may be readily dismissed by a reference to contrary empirical examples. But there can also be little doubt that a high percentage of so-called indigenous communities have contributed successfully to the preservation of their living environment. The actual outcomes of new resource management structures obviously depend on the reasonableness of the decision-making process, that is, the openness of the democratic process to the rational force of best practice arguments. Whereas community-based management arrangements including land restitution and self-determination over land use are no sufficient guarantees for the achievement of the intricate aims of empowerment, environmental protection and sustainable development, they may be questioned as a necessary and promising first step in the right direction. The proposed seminar will look into the existing literature to reconstruct the recent history of Namibia’s transformation policies and to probe into the shortcomings and potential benefits of CBNRM projects and initiatives. It therefore plans to provide the basis for further research in those areas in the course of the field practice in January 2014.