Evaluating Community-Based Collaboration on Federal Lands and Resources

As we enter the 21st century, the idea of collaboration is rapidly becoming one of the dominant ideas in natural resources policy and politics (Kemmis 2001; Bricket et al 2001; Keiter 2003; McKinney and Harmon 2004). This trend has provoked both enthusiasm and skepticism.

The proponents of collaboration claim, inpart, that it allows participation by all interested and affected parties; takes less time and costs less than more conventional public participation and public dispute resolution processes; results in more informed, creative, and adaptive solutions; builds individual and social capacity to prevent and resolve public disputes in the future; and improves environmental outcomes (Susskind et al. 1999). The skeptics claim, among other things, that collaboration delegitimizes conflict; co-opts environmental advocates; excludes or disempowers national, urban, and other interest groups; and leads to compromise and lowest common denominator solutions (Kenney 2000).

The objective of this article is to shed light on some of these claims by presenting evidence on the merits of CBC on federal lands and resources in the Rocky Mountain West. It also presents a low-cost, yet comprehensive and robust, method to evaluate the relative successor progress of any collaborative process and its outcomes.

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Kemmis, D. 2001. This sovereign land: A new vision for governing the West. Washington, DC: Island Press.

Brick, P., D. Snow, and S. V. de Wetering, eds. 2001. Across the great divide: Explorations in collaborative conservation and the American West. Washington, DC: Island Press.

Keiter, R. B. 2003. Keeping faith with nature: Ecosystems, democracy, and America’s public lands. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

McKinney, M. and W. Harmon. 2004. The Western confluence: A guide to governing natural resources. Washington, DC: Island Press.

Susskind, L., S. McKearnan, and J. Thomas-Larmer, eds. 1999. The consensus building handbook: A comprehensive guide to reaching agreement. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Kenney, D. S. 2000. Arguing about consensus: Examining the case against Western watershed initiatives and other collaborative groups active in natural resources management. Boulder, CO: Natural Resources Law Center, University of Colorado School of Law.