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One island, two worlds: A comparative political ecology of deforestation disparity causes in Haiti and the Dominican Republic

Marzelius, Milla LU (2020) STVK02 20201
Department of Political Science
Abstract
On the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, two countries share the same environmental and climatic pre-conditions, but show monumental differences in current forest-cover. While tropical forests are covering almost half of the Dominican Republic, Haiti is down to just a few percent. In this thesis, political ecology and earlier research is combined to formulate four hypotheses: colonial history, human development and demography, local institutional context, and energy.
The hypotheses are tested against a timeframe compiled from temporal data on Hispaniolan forest-cover and compared in a dynamic case-study approach design. The approach was inspired by Mill’s logic of inference, causal case-study criteria, process-tracing and the... (More)
On the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, two countries share the same environmental and climatic pre-conditions, but show monumental differences in current forest-cover. While tropical forests are covering almost half of the Dominican Republic, Haiti is down to just a few percent. In this thesis, political ecology and earlier research is combined to formulate four hypotheses: colonial history, human development and demography, local institutional context, and energy.
The hypotheses are tested against a timeframe compiled from temporal data on Hispaniolan forest-cover and compared in a dynamic case-study approach design. The approach was inspired by Mill’s logic of inference, causal case-study criteria, process-tracing and the dynamic-comparative case study method.
By asking what factors that explain the difference in forest-cover in the Dominican Republic and Haiti, and how they affect the countries’ forest-cover, the thesis aims to contribute to the general understanding of deforestation and the interaction between society and nature.
The study finds that the current forest-cover disparities stems from a development in the 1980-90’s, and that the policy, project approaches and norm changes within the local institutional context matches and precedes the development of the forest-cover. Economic incentives and participatory approaches in reforestation projects are shown to have a positive effect. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
Marzelius, Milla LU
supervisor
organization
course
STVK02 20201
year
type
M2 - Bachelor Degree
subject
keywords
Political ecology, deforestation, dynamic case-study approach, Haiti, Dominican Republic, Hispaniola, soil degradation
language
English
id
9026439
date added to LUP
2020-09-21 15:44:18
date last changed
2020-09-21 15:44:18
@misc{9026439,
  abstract     = {{On the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, two countries share the same environmental and climatic pre-conditions, but show monumental differences in current forest-cover. While tropical forests are covering almost half of the Dominican Republic, Haiti is down to just a few percent. In this thesis, political ecology and earlier research is combined to formulate four hypotheses: colonial history, human development and demography, local institutional context, and energy. 
The hypotheses are tested against a timeframe compiled from temporal data on Hispaniolan forest-cover and compared in a dynamic case-study approach design. The approach was inspired by Mill’s logic of inference, causal case-study criteria, process-tracing and the dynamic-comparative case study method.
By asking what factors that explain the difference in forest-cover in the Dominican Republic and Haiti, and how they affect the countries’ forest-cover, the thesis aims to contribute to the general understanding of deforestation and the interaction between society and nature.
The study finds that the current forest-cover disparities stems from a development in the 1980-90’s, and that the policy, project approaches and norm changes within the local institutional context matches and precedes the development of the forest-cover. Economic incentives and participatory approaches in reforestation projects are shown to have a positive effect.}},
  author       = {{Marzelius, Milla}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Student Paper}},
  title        = {{One island, two worlds: A comparative political ecology of deforestation disparity causes in Haiti and the Dominican Republic}},
  year         = {{2020}},
}