[(Local Forest Management : The Impacts of Devolution Policies)] [Edited by David Edmunds ] published on

by R. David Edmunds

Built around careful and illuminating case studies of the effects of devolution policies on the management of forests in several Asian countries, the studies demonstrate that, contrary to the aim of such policies, they increased governmental control over the management of local resources, and at lower cost. They also show that if genuine control is to be exercised by local resource users for their livelihoods, more has to be done to take their needs into account and to diversify the range of interests represented and the opportunities for creating livelihoods from the local resources.

Hardcover

First published August 29, 2003

About the author

A specialist in the history of Native American people and the American West, R. David Edmunds is Professor Emeritus of American History at the University of Texas in Dallas. The author or editor of ten books and over one hundred essays, articles, and other shorter publications, Edmunds' major works have been awarded the Francis Parkman Prize, the Ohioana Prize for Biography, and the Alfred Heggoy Prize of the French Colonial Historical Society. Edmunds has written extensively upon Native American-White relations in the 18th and 19th centuries, and has served as a consultant in the production of over a dozen films or documentaries produced for PBS, the History Channel and commercial television. Edmunds has held advisory positions with numerous museums and federal agencies, and has served as an advisor to the Smithsonian Institution, The Ford Foundation, the Social Science Research Council, the National Park Service, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the ACT and LSAT testing services and The Newberry Library. During 1990-91 he served as the Acting Director of the D'Arcy McNickle Center for the History of the American Indian at the Newberry Library. He has taught at the University of Wyoming, Texas Christian University, The University of California at Berkeley, U.C.L.A. and Indiana University.

Edmunds is the past-president of both the American Society of Ethnohistory (2002-03) and the Western History Association (2006-07). In 1998, he received the Award of Merit from the American Indian Historians Association, and in 2007 he received the Jeff Dykes Award for contributions to Western History from Westerners International. Edmunds serves as a "Distinguished Lecturer" for the Organization of American Historians. His current research focuses upon the history of Native American identity, Native Americans on the Great Plains and Native American biography.