Network Structure and Collaborative Management in Natural Resource and Environmental Management: A Literature Review

Introduction

In the 1960s and 1970s, the demands for resource management were seen in developing countries as interwoven with environmental quality and growth limits at a time of severe pressure by developing countries for economic growth, better facilities and education and health conditions (Ojungu & Omara, 1992). Consequently, in developing countries, governments have generally paid lip service only to call for better management of their resources. Poorly developed mass media and monopolies on natural resources by government and international agencies prevented rapid diffusion of the news to the grassroots. In response to the criticism regarding the orientation of eco-development, other directions in natural resource and environmental management began to emerge. Dietz et al. (2003) regarded them more as an environmental movement, calling them the eco-fascism and eco-populism movements. Eco-fascism is an environmental movement that advocates environmental issues for the environment itself. Whatever the risk, the environment needs to be protected. As for eco-populism, it is an environmental movement that supports the interests of the people: protecting the environment for the welfare of the people.

In the case of eco-fascism, they are of the opinion that if necessary local inhabitants should be evicted for the sake of the environment or natural resources. The environment should be sterilized, including from communities that have lived and thrived in the area for centuries. In contrast, those in the eco-populism group, in fact, have begun to think critically regarding who bears rights over the environment and natural resources. Who should gain benefit from the preservation of nature in the area? These questions have quickly become their immediate agenda. Based on these questions, the environmental movements have gradually but surely transformed themselves into political movements.

Nevertheless, the eco-development approach that makes use of the sustainable development concept receives a lot of criticism, particularly because this approach is deemed to be overly anthropocentric, making humans as the central theme and establishing economic growth as the main indicator of successful development and the dominance of the state as actors. This is not unlike the concept of sustainable development, with criticism from Mitchel et al. (2010), who stated that there are two key questions unanswerable by the Brundtland Commission in its implementation, namely: first, how should the needs of the poor in developing countries be addressed; second, how should limitations in technology and capacity of social organizations in managing the environment and natural resources be addressed to fulfill the needs of the present and future generations.

Additionally, along with mounting criticism towards the eco-development approach, the network structure based co-management approach has also emerged, and it is being discussed in natural resource and environmental management (Bixler et al., 2016). Aside from its emergence instigated by the problem of ecological scarcity and degradation, it is also linked to the behavior of actors utilizing resources, the form and means used by managing institutions as well as the norms and regulations, up to issues of political economy (relations of political power, who determines the regulations, who acquires what, who is involved in the regulatory process, when and how is it managed). Network structure based co-management is one of the approaches considered to be capable of overcoming the challenges in sustainable natural resource and environmental management. This approach can also be defined as working with resource users or managers inside economic, political, and environmental structures that influence decision-making (Chaffin et al., 2016; Berkes & Folke 1998). This article will elaborate on the conceptual framework and discuss the network structure based collaborative management approach in natural resources and environmental management. A study on management of Lake Tempe, Indonesia, has been conducted as an example of a collaborative management approach.