Qualifier Seminar by Mr Remi Chandran
Department of Urban and Regional Planning and Geo-information Management
"If WEMS is the solution, what is the problem?"
Analyzing the co-evolution of the political challenges and solutions in the implementation of a geo-spatial information system for monitoring enforcement and compliance to the CITES convention
In late 2005, a group of researchers from United Nations University and its Asian civil society partners claimed that their Geographical Information System, the Wildlife Enforcement Monitoring System (WEMS) on monitoring enforcement and compliance of CITES convention, could address the current challenges in information sharing on wildlife crime. Their idea was a transboundary geospatial model to track seizures in several countries through a network of civil society members in Asia. Before the team could realize their dream, a far more serious attack on the science of its usage brought a stumbling block to the myth of participation of civil society in addressing the issues which concerns United Nations and its multilateral environmental agreements. The WEMS project went through substantial criticism and it was later decided that governments will remain the custodian of the technology. Up to date, however, even after restructuring WEMS in consultation with the WEMS stakeholders in Asia, the CITES decision makers in Asia have still not adopted WEMS. The core research question is: why not? This question has even become more pressing, as WEMS is now planned to be implemented though the governing council of Lusaka Agreement which has given approval for its adoption in Africa.
In my PhD research I tackle the core research question by first considering the problems in WEMS as unstructured (wicked or messy) policy problems. This allows me to investigate the political interplay (puzzling and powering) between the actors, artifacts and beliefs within the wildlife trade policy subsystem. In addition, I will show in which type of governance setting the technology was created and interpreted by the various stakeholders. Based on these descriptive findings I will devise a theoretical model using the Advocacy Coalition framework, Cultural theory and the concept of boundary work. Reconciling these theories with the empirical findings should support the derivation of a general explanation and prescription why, when and how GIS systems should be co-constructed with their policy context.
The new model will be then be validated using WEMS as a case study in Africa through the Lusaka Agreement which will then result in policy recommendations for implementing a geo-spatial transboundary information system for monitoring enforcement and compliance of multilateral environmental agreements.
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| Event starts: | Wednesday 02 February 2011 at 16:00 |
| Venue: | ITC, room 3-008 |
| City where event takes place: | Enschede |
| Country where event takes place: | Netherlands |