A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF LANDSLIDES AND GEOHAZARD ...

(MEET) may use the information to rehabilitate the Ntchenachena hills and the
Mvai/Livilivi catchments. This could result in the shift of NGOs focus from providing food
handouts to implementing environmental protection and management.
1.6 Theoretical Basis of the Study
Understanding the complexity of the occurrence of landslides requires the use of
integrated methodologies, involving measurement of biophysical parameters and
social studies. Both scientific and local knowledge that provides a more holistic
understanding of slope stability problems needs to be documented and integrated.
This research follows a political ecology approach and core theory (Bartley and
Bergesen, 1977; Blaikie, 1985; Worgu, 2000; and Kema, 2005). This approach emphasises
a multi-scale approach to environmental-development analyses, considering scales of
analysis from local land user to global institutions (Blaikie, 1985). It also focuses on
cultural construction of the environment, and treats the environmental problems as a
social problem, requiring negotiation of values and knowledge (Peets and Watts, 1996;
and Blaikie, 1985).
Natural scientists have been criticised for viewing environmental degradation as solely
an environmental and not a social problem (Blaikie, 1985). This has stimulated interest in
the development of a social ecological perspective to enable a more informed
understanding of the causes of environmental degradation. Essentially, physical and
socio/economic systems have to be analytically integrated in slope stability analysis
(Msilimba, 2002). The socio-economic system is important and ignoring it leads to
technocratic and physical examination of slope stability problems. An explanatory
model developed by Blaikie (1987) isolates several social issues that are being
investigated in this study, including characteristics of land users, land tenure and
attributes of land users. The model recognises land users as decision makers that can
relate use of the physical environment to wider attributes of production and survival
strategies. The importance of integrating scientific and local knowledge, and gender
and the environment is discussed in detail in Sections 3.9 and 3.10.
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