Participatory Analysis in Natural Resource Management: Legitimacy, Learning and the Production of Actionable Science

Participatory analysis, a type of multi-stakeholder participatory process using analytical techniques and tools such as spatial decision support and collaborative mapping to integrate diverse knowledge into deliberation, planning, and decision making, is increasingly being used as a way to address complex, landscape scale environmental issues. While participatory analysis and other joint knowledge production techniques for problem solving and planning are often championed, little is known about the outcomes and effectiveness of these techniques, such as under what circumstances they work best, what factors predict successful outcomes and even agreement on what should be considered a successful outcome. The purpose of this research was to 1) explore the current state of knowledge of the outcomes of participatory analysis through review of empirical literature and 2) carry out an applied study of the impact of participation on stakeholders' perceptions of collaboratively developed data products for the Greater Grand Canyon Landscape Assessment (GGCLA). In Chapter 2, I review the reported outcomes of nineteen empirical studies of participatory analysis for natural resource management across disciplines and evaluative frameworks. While all empirical studies reviewed reported some beneficial outcomes of participatory analysis, problematic outcomes were grouped primarily around data acceptability, efficiency and quality of agreements. Furthermore, the practical project design and research methods use varying epistemic lenses to address the issue that differ on the role that science is assumed to play in the processes. The results are used to identify key concepts for process design of participatory analysis and suggest research approaches to further develop empirical studies of participatory analysis. In Chapter 3, I apply the issue of outcomes by developing a longitudinal evaluation of the GGCLA, and explore the impact of participating in the process on stakeholders' perceptions of data products. The GGCLA is an effort to assess the condition of natural and cultural resources across a 5 million acre analysis area and to prioritize areas for management using spatial analysis and stakeholder participation. Stakeholders' perceptions of data credibility and salience were high. Perception of the data's legitimacy, or fairness and respectfulness of stakeholder values, varied with type of participation. This can be explained by the many factors to which stakeholders ascribed legitimacy, including procedural and substantive legitimacy, as well as legitimacy derived from actor interactions such as previous experiences and reflexivity. Overall, this work contributes to a small body of empirical research on the outcomes of participatory analysis, and offers design implications for future participatory analytical processes.