Abstract
Environmental science is shaped by the socio-political context in which it is produced. Environmental problems and explanations are context specific, and this article contributes to a critical political ecology by illustrating the changing relationship between conceptualisation of environmental problems and explanations of them, and the socio-political context in contemporary Thailand. During the 'development epoch' from the 1950s, both natural and social sciences became compartmentalised and the epistemology of environmental science became dominated by the demands of a growth economy and utilitarian values. The resulting impasse of conventional knowledge of natural resource management coincided with a socio-political and bureaucratic reform process pushed by various democratic movements. Together with a request for decentralisation and devolution of state power, these movements are also fighting for sustainable utilisation of natural resources, and sustainable agricultural practices. A precondition, however, for sustainable utilisation of natural resources is a change in conceptualisation and knowledge creation for resource management. The Sustainable Land Use and Natural Resource Management (SLUSE) collaboration offers alternative ways of creating knowledge for sustainable utilisation of natural resources, that aim to support the present socio-political reform process in Thailand.Key Words: Thailand, natural resource management, transdisciplinarity
Highlights
Dominance of compartmentalised scientific knowledge in the 20th centuryThe existing knowledge explaining how natural resources in Thailand have been degraded is clustered around two approaches
Transdisciplinary approach to knowledge creation that is more akin to the current thinking on resource management offered by critical political ecologists
A process of political reform in Thailand began in the mid-1980s, and it is still far from complete
Summary
The existing knowledge explaining how natural resources in Thailand have been degraded is clustered around two approaches. While Thailand has experienced rapid economic growth in Bangkok and other urban areas it has seen worsening income inequality, more landless people, further agricultural expansion at the expense of forests, and localised land degradation For political economists, it is the linkage between the Thai state and the forces of capital that underlie these problems. The following section illustrates how such a holistic, interdisciplinary and participatory approach to understanding the relationship between environmental changes and socio-economic development could be applied to the problem of creating more sustainable agricultural practices in Thailand
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