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Focusing on pastoralism, this article reflects on five diverse cases across Africa, Asia and Europe and asks: how have COVID-19 disease control measures affected mobility and production practices, marketing opportunities, land control, labour relations, local community support and socio-political relations with the state and other settled agrarian...
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Focusing on pastoralism, this article reflects on five diverse cases across Africa, Asia and Europe and asks: how have COVID-19 disease control measures affected mobility and production practices, marketing opportunities, land control, labour relations, local community support and socio-political relations with the state and other settled agrarian...
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... The spread of the unknown virus Sars-Cov-2 (Corona) and Covid-19 created a new form of uncertainty (Simula et al. 2020). In this article, we examine how the Covid-19 pandemic as a form of uncertainty was perceived and dealt with by people engaging in pastoralism in northern Benin. ...
... Scholars of pastoralism quickly reacted to the Covid-19 pandemic and studied its economic, social and political impact on pastoral groups in different regions (e.g. Simula et al. 2020, Elijan 2021, APESS /IDRC 2021, Egeru, Sintayehu and Siya 2020, Griffith et al. 2020, Hassell et al. 2020, Ilukor, Akello and Okiror 2022, Mtimet et al. 2021, Stammler and Ivanova 2020, Fisktjønmo and Naess 2022, Scoones and Nori 2021, but quantitative analyses are rare (Griffith et al 2021: 250). ...
... Some scholars looked into how pastoralists responded to the uncertainties caused by the pandemic (e.g. Scoones and Nori 2021, Fisktjønmo and Naess 2022, Stammler and Ivanova 2020, APESS/IDRC 2021, Simula et al. 2020. Simula et al. (2020), reporting on five countries, argue that pastoralists have been substantially affected by the measures taken against the pandemic: mobility restrictions and market closures were 'harshly felt in all sites' (2020: 3), especially by animal traders, e.g., in Uganda after the countrywide lockdown in 2020 (Ilukor et al. 2022), and in Somalia, where animals are sold to Saudi Arabia (Mtimet et al. 2021). ...
This article deals with pastoralists’ perceptions of and responses to the Covid-19 pandemic in northern Benin. Starting from the idea that pastoralists are well situated to respond successfully to the uncertainty that the pandemic has brought to the world, as their livelihood demands flexible responses to ever-changing situations, we examine how people living in pastoralism in this region perceive and manage the unprecedented event and thus aim to contribute to debates on pastoralism and uncertainty. Based on empirical data collected from August to October 2021, and between February and April 2022, we show that the characteristics of pastoral livelihoods in this region helped in managing at least, but by no means perfectly, or entirely overcoming, the challenges caused by the pandemic and related state measures.
This article was published open access under a CC BY-NC 4.0 licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ .
... These studies also engage with the notion of 'adaptive governance' 1 (Ang 2024;Olsson, Folke, and Hahn 2004), which involves understanding ecosystem dynamics, developing management practices combining different ecological knowledge systems, building adaptive capacity to address uncertainties and external drivers, and supporting flexible institutions and social networks in multi-level governance systems (Folke 2006;PASTRES 2019;Scoones 2023;Simula et al. 2020;Tsering 2023a). Moreover, research on everyday politics incorporates the practice of bricolage, which focuses on how evolutionary, relational processes can yield different patterns of social interaction (Cleaver 2002;De La Cruz S and Dessein 2021) and how resource users patch together dynamic institutions (i.e. ...
This paper argues that everyday politics are instrumental in negotiating development outcomes despite the pervasive influence of centralised state power. The paper highlights the fluidity and adaptability of Chinese policy formulation, emphasizing local learning and improvisation. This is especially important for pastoral communities in remote rangelands, where land appropriation and environmental exploitation are increasingly evident. The paper sheds light on the influential role of everyday political practices in shaping outcomes within the Chinese context, while simultaneously contesting simplistic portrayals of top-down state planning in China. By emphasizing the existence of manoeuvrability and opportunities for negotiation within this framework, the paper advocates for a nuanced understanding of governance dynamics and power relations in the Chinese context.
... As evidenced by the case study, pastoralists have adeptly incorporated religious institutions into their negotiating regarding rangeland governance (Tsering, 2019;Simula et al., 2020;Tsering, 2023). This practice becomes imperative due to the dynamic nature of state policies, which undergo constant changes. ...
... This practice becomes imperative due to the dynamic nature of state policies, which undergo constant changes. While empirical studies acknowledge certain constraints within this negotiation framework, the existence of hybrid governance is consistently noted (Tsering, 2023;Qi & Li, 2021;Simula et al., 2020;Tsering, 2019). ...
... Hybridity is always emerging with new elements, the roles of the monastery, local government and resource management bureaux are changing too, thereby determining the rules and space for negotiation (Simula et al., 2020;Tsering, 2023;Tsering, 2019). Thus, the connection between policies and practices arises only as a result of the recognition of hybridity generated by different practices of assemblage. ...
The governance of rangeland in Amdo, Tibet is characterised by constant negotiations and contestations, includ- ing resistance from below, and is shaped by various processes in the real-world context. Through the notion of assemblage, which involves bringing together an array of agents and objectives to intervene in social processes to produce desired outcomes and avert undesired ones, this paper adds to the existing body of research on land governance by examining how institutions are formed in the case of a hy- droelectric dam on the land of the pastoralists.
... Distance from essential services has undoubtedly driven outmigration. Like many other pastoral areas (Simula et al. 2021), Yangma is disconnected from health facilities. Accessing the nearest hospital in Taplejung District Headquarters requires four days of travel, including at least two on foot. ...
... As was the case for pastoralists in Kenya (Simula et al. 2021), Yangma's remoteness afforded the survival of 'normal' life despite curfews and lockdowns elsewhere in Nepal. However, pandemic restrictions, compounded by climate change, have gradually undermined the agropastoral system. ...
This paper profiles the ten-household settlement of Yangma, a yak-herding community in Taplejung District at the Nepal/China border, under the dual crises of Covid-19 and climate change. As livelihoods here depend entirely upon cross-border livestock trade with China, pandemic mobility restrictions have severed the village's sole income stream. Consequently, Yangma's yak herders have become holders of 'stranded assets': resources that lose value before their anticipated useful life due to market forces or legislation changes. During Covid-19, hundreds of livestock (worth $900 each) have become stranded in Yangma, remaining illiquid despite their significant monetary value. Herd sizes have increased with every breeding season, deepening pressure on limited pasture and fodder resources. Climate change has also caused declines in land and water quality, linked to repeated crop failures, and the further weakening of livestock. The community is poised to sell their herds and migrate once the border reopens. However, if new livestock trade restrictions follow in China's effort to control zoonotic diseases, herders might be prevented from liquidating their assets after borders reopen, becoming 'stranded' in Yangma themselves.
... However, none of these accounts emphasised the discourses and activities of ordinary Tibetans during the pandemic. Although Simula et al. (2020) analysed Tibetan pastoralists' reactions to the impacts of virus control policies, there are differences between people's direct responses to the disease and virus prevention policies such as quarantine. Barbara Gerke's study explored exiled Tibetans' responses to Covid-19 (2020), but the experiences and responses of Tibetans in Dharamsala, India, might vary from those of Tibetans in China. ...
The sudden outbreak of the novel coronavirus disease (Covid-19) caused an unprecedented catastrophe worldwide. Different communities adopted a wide range of preventive measures to halt transmission of the disease. This article examines how rural Tibetan communities in China’s eastern Tibet (Kham) have addressed this pandemic, including their popular discourses and practices concerning the ethics, etiology, and prevention of Covid-19. Through analysing the experiences, views, and responses of local Tibetans to Covid-19, this article reveals their underlying beliefs and values, and highlights the integration of their religious and medical practices. Analysis of ethnographic data shows that local Tibetans in Kham have not only relied on religious rituals and traditional Tibetan medicinal practices but have also adopted various modern public health measures to ensure effective prevention of the virus. Therefore, this study demonstrates not only a syncretic practice of religion and medicine in the landscape of Tibetan medical culture but also the practicality and adaptability of local Tibetans during crises.
... Many disasters emerge through the compounded, cascading effects of multiple factorslocust attacks, inter-ethnic conflict, economic downturns and so onand context-specific responses are required. In 2022-23, pastoralists in the Greater Horn of Africa had to deal with drought on the back of the major impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic (Simula et al., 2021). Pastoralists living in such settings are however well-practised in confronting droughts, as part of a suite of other uncertainties. ...
Uncertainty, where we do not know the likelihood of future events, dominates our world. This article examines how economics as a profession and discipline can address uncertainty. From Frank Knight to John Maynard Keynes to Friedrich von Hayek to George Shackle, economics has highlighted the importance of uncertain knowledge and distinguished this from calculable risk. In this article we show how such insights were lost through the rise of narrow neoclassical thinking and were excluded through the emergence of a dominant economics of control that rose to prominence during the twentieth century and especially in the neoliberal era. However, through a range of perspectives in economics that emphasise the importance of complexity, informality , positionality and narratives, uncertainty is once again being embraced within an increasingly heterodox economics. In many ways, this chimes with the work of Albert Hirschman who, starting from the mid-1960s, emphasised the importance of addressing uncertainty in development theory and practice. Through two examples on pastoral development and global financial governance, we highlight the continued relevance of Hirschman's thinking on the importance of adaptation, flexibility and learning-by-doing as responses to uncertainty and for the development of reliable, robust approaches to development policy and practice. In conclusion, we argue that economics theory, methodologies, professional practice and training need to change, recovering some of the insights from previous generations of economic thinkers and practitioners, in order to reinvent an economics appropriate for our uncertain world.
... In one community, for instance, respondents reported that the names of individuals listed to receive the relief was ignored in the final distributing. Our case studies do not include direct mentions of patronage politics, yet our analysis aligns with other studies that have documented the importance of political relations in coping, and how they are reflective of already existing rural differentiation dynamics (Simula et al., 2021;Tom, 2021). ...
This paper focuses on the impacts of COVID-19 on livelihoods, land access and governance in rural and peri-urban selected areas of Sub-Saharan Africa. Crises are usually expected to be worse for citizens in developing countries since most of their economic activities are in the informal sector, and access to the social protection programs is often limited and exclusionary. Those vulnerable and marginalized are often those who are hit the hardest and who struggle the most to recover after crises. The COVID-19 pandemic is no exception. Extended lockdowns have put livelihoods under stress, underlying patterns of fragile livelihoods and inequality. There are also particular vulnerabilities with regards to land access and livelihoods of vulnerable populations. Our case studies document how the pandemic has affected livelihoods through several mechanisms relating to land access, including distress sales due to economic hardships and exacerbating land conflicts due to increased pressure on land and increasing trends of urban-to-rural migration. We reflect on how households act and react when faced with shocks and how this affects not only their current access to livelihood assets but might undermine their options for the future. In addition, a range of other effects were identified in our case studies that we expect to negatively impact livelihood recovery.
... Research has been conducted from various angles to examine the moral economy, for example, examining ethnic distinctions in southern Sudan (Leonardi, 2011), the regulatory framework of rural water systems in Namibia (Schwieger et al., 2022), access to scarce resources in southern Malawi (Harrison, 2020), customary approaches for managing natural resource clashes in rural Mali (Calmon et al., 2021), the effects of COVID-19 on pastoralists globally (Simula et al., 2021), and elite holding of resources related to diversification (Marty et al., 2023). Studies exploring the moral economy of agrarian conflict-related issues that relate specifically to farmers or pastoralists are dated (e.g., Anderson, 1986;Neumann, 1998) and need to be updated with ongoing conversations. ...
The Agatu “Massacre” is a conflict between pastoralists and farmers in the Agatu area of Benue State, Nigeria. The conflict is significant because of the event’s gravity, but no scholarly inquiry that involves thoughtful and reflective methodological and theoretical approaches has been made. This paper investigates how the farmer-herder relations in Agatu became a violent crisis and situates it within relevant literature to fill gaps in farmer-herder conflicts literature in Africa. Existing literature demonstrates the pertinence of moral economies for resource use, spatial pattern, and manifestations of conflicts in developing and developed worlds. However, studies have yet to use the moral economy concept to explore the African farmer-herder conflicts from a political ecology perspective. This paper demonstrates that the Agatu crisis emerged due to reterritorializations in the moral economy of farmers and herders, disrupting their social ties. It further illustrates that the violence in Agatu was caused by the deviation from the traditional approach to addressing the damage done to crops by herding livestock. Nevertheless, the paper argues that this deviation is the consequence of modifications in the moral economy of farmers and herders driven by the aspiration for financial gain rather than the subsistence of agro-pastoral relations. The paper argues that changes in moral economies can disrupt social relations and lead to farmer-herder conflicts, leading to the exclusion of pastoralists from resource access through policy and legislation.
... Th ese diverse moral economies are never part of a timeless cultural tradition but are highly diff erentiated and always changing (Shariff 2020). New forms of solidarity thus emerge as challenges are faced, whether those associated with the COVID-19 pandemic or particular issues around production, herding, land management or marketing Simula et al 2020). Recognising these forms of moral economy and local ways of generating reliability can be essential when designing social assistance and humanitarian responses that go beyond a standardised, risk-based plan (Caravani et al 2021). ...
Pastoralists must continuously confront uncertainties, responding to high levels of variability and volatility where the future is unknown. Yet mainstream modernising development in pastoral areas aims to create stability through control, enacted through restrictive plans and policies. Through a series of case studies, this article explores pastoralists’ own sensitive, flexible and caring responses, attuned to the instabilities of pastoral settings. The cases show how uncertainties can be seen as intersecting constructions of knowledge, materiality, experience, embodiment and practice, where flexible, often collective, caring approaches are central to pastoralists’ lives. These insights have wider implications for other contexts where people inhabit uncertain worlds, and so suggest a fundamental challenge to the controlling approaches of conventional development.
Résumé : Les éleveurs doivent constamment faire face aux incertitudes de l’à-venir et répondre à de haut niveaux de variabilité et de volatilité. Cependant, la tendance au développement moderne dans les zones pastorales vise à créer une stabilité par la mise en œuvre de stratégies de contrôle et de politiques restrictives. En s’appuyant sur une série de cas, cet article analyse les réponses plus sensibles, flexible et attentionnées des pasteurs, en phase avec l’instabilité de la condition pastorale. Les cas montrent comment les incertitudes peuvent être vues comme des constructions de savoir entrecroisant expérience matérielle, incorporation de compétences et de pratiques. Ces approches bienveillantes, flexibles et souvent collectives sont centrales dans la vie des pasteurs. Ces exemples ont des implications plus larges dans d’autres contextes où des populations vivent dans des environnements incertains. Les approches conventionnelles du développement fondées sur le contrôle sont fondamentalement remises en question.
... The end of the cultural revolution and the blossoming of 'Great West Open Up' in the 1980 s had revitalised Tibetan Buddhist monasteries and monastic institutions to become powerful forces in the local government's pursuit of its social-political and economic policies (Hillman, 2005;Yü, 2012;Jansen, 2018;Heller, 2020). Nevertheless, the role of monastery is not confined to macro-level policymaking and implementation, but also in the realm of everyday decision-making of pastoralists on rangeland governance and control (Tsering, 2019;Simula et al., 2020). Moreover, the role of the monastic elite, such as the Tulku, explains that when local elite are capable and acknowledged by the pastoralist communities and the government, and more importantly, when local religious elite, such as the Tulku expresses willingness to support the benefits of the mass, then there is room for these elite to become bricoleurs; that is, they customise the interrelationship with the pastoral community, the role as intermediator between government and local community to influence arrangements for rangeland utilisation (Tsering, 2019). ...
... In the case of summer pastures in Lumu, rules toward accessing pastures are changing due to both internal and external variables, such as soil conditions, caterpillar fungus market, discrete perceptions toward grazing, and China's Covid-19 pandemic measurements. For example, the right to benefit from leasing pasture in Lumu has been redesigned by the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, where local monasteries and governments banned pasture-leasing and non-local harvesters from access due to the formal lockdown and concerns toward the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic (Simula et al., 2020). ...
The conventional understanding of governance highlights the state's coercive and formal mechanisms. However, the everyday political control of the state is informal and ambiguous, and powerful civil societies strengthen resource governance through interactions between civil society, social organisations, and governments. In the case of pastoral Golok, China, the role of the local state is highly mediated by the power of the monastery and the monastic organisation, and much of the opportunities for compromise, negotiation and resistance on rangeland utilisation emerge from the ambiguities of land control, and different overlapping claims can be made through competing discourses on development and conservation. This paper applies a governance lens through the notion of assemblage to explore the roles of monasteries in rangeland governance. Multi cases were collected through in-depth interviews, focus groups, and participant observation as part of long-term ethnographic studies in 2020-2021. The study finds that monasteries in pastoral Golok provide room for manovre, shape the values and directions of resource governance, and the existence of monastic network and mediation is essential for negotiation-based rangeland management and land policy. These findings provide a nuanced foundation for rangeland management, policy, and politics in the Tibetan-Chinese context.
