Indigenous Peoples and Conservation Organizations

The Ju/’hoan in Namibia 123
racy. At the same time, the LIFE advisor knew
that experience in many community development
efforts had shown that building on existing structures
is more effective than creating new ones
(Brown and Wyckoff-Baird 1992). The Ju/’hoan
could not afford to forfeit their indigenous values
and culture, and they did not wish to do so. The
challenge was to find out how the indigenous
social organization could accommodate itself to a
new political process that required streamlined
decision making to be effective.
The LIFE technical advisor for community-based
natural resource management (CBNRM) helped
the community draft an action proposal, and the
NNFC received its first direct grant from LIFE in
September 1994. During the next 21 months, the
technical advisor visited Nyae Nyae almost one
week per month, working closely with other staff
the NNFC hired. It was agreed that the NNFC
and the advisor would jointly set objectives for
each visit. A primary goal would be to facilitate
independent assessments of activities and provide
feedback to the community. A process would be
designed to help the community identify its own
needs and priorities, and begin to develop its own
solutions. A wildlife management committee
(the NNWMC) was also established that brought
together NNFC leaders and community rangers
with MET staff to build trust, reduce suspicions,
and discuss how community-based natural
resource management might be undertaken.
How that proposal fared will be the subject of the
next two sections. But to understand what eventually
happened, it is first necessary to take a step
back and see how LIFE was interacting at the
national policy level with MET to make community
ownership of natural resource management
viable. The idea of establishing conservancies
had gained a foothold within MET. Although it
was not directly involved in drafting policy or the
political process of changing it, the LIFE
Program supported the idea of conservancies and
helped provide outreach, materials development,
and training to identify what was needed to make
it work. LIFE Program funds supported the
University of Namibia in undertaking a broad
review of legislation that influenced wildlife
management and conservancies. LIFE staff also
worked with MET personnel and the staffs of
partner NGOs, such as the Legal Assistance
Center, to help develop an NGO position paper
on land reform as part of a national government
consultation process. LIFE also supported training
for CBNRM in the MET, led by the Rossing
Foundation, a local NGO.
By 1995 MET’s leadership was convinced, and it
adopted a new working policy to prepare the way
for development of conservancies. In 1996
Parliament passed conservancy legislation that
contained an unusual idea. It would allow local
people to develop their own wildlife management
bodies, rather than mandating how they should
be organized and work. The stage was set for the
community of Nyae Nyae to speak and act on its
own behalf.
3.2 Building Institutional Capacity and
Mobilizing Community Resources
(1994–1996)
Although Nyae Nyae wanted to take the stage on
its own behalf, it would take time to be able to
do so. As the last section indicated, the NNDFN
handed over most of its responsibilities to the
NNFC in mid-1994. While the NGO would continue
to provide administrative and institutional
support, the CBO for the first time would control
the program and budget. If the transfer of power
was to be real, however, the NNFC had to be
revamped. To be effective it could not simply
claim to speak for the community, it had to find
ways to let the community’s voice be heard and
heeded. New structures had to be devised that
met a fourfold agenda. An effective community
organization must 1) communicate with its members
and involve all groups in decision making,
2) reconcile internal differences and individual
interests, 3) articulate views and positions effectively
with external stakeholders, and 4) be recognized
as legitimate by both community
members and outsiders (Murphree 1994). The
new structures would also need to build upon the
community’s cultural values, beliefs, and social
organization if they were going to have some
chance of success (Larson et. al. 1998). Given
the Ju/’hoan culture, decision making would have
to be by consensus, with no individuals accruing
undue power or authority. The structures would
need to facilitate informed and direct decision
making by the community, and men and women
of all age groups would need to be involved.
To help the community develop such structures,
the NNDFN and LIFE worked together during