Welcome,
my name is James Wellstead and this is a blog that I've created to help me organize and better understand my masters thesis project at the University of Ottawa in Ottawa, Canada.
I don't really expect anyone to look or comment on this. Instead it's more just a place for me to come and collect and store data, articles/readings, or ideas that I have. However, along the way I will probably drop in some day to day commentary of my life during this experience. Specifically pictures, recipes and shout-outs, as the kids say.
The nuts and bolts of the project are to study some of the environmental governance reforms taking place with respect to extractive resource industries based in East Kalimantan on the island of Borneo. The crux of the research is to determine what kind of livelihood strategies are evolving and how the governance projects are influencing these new strategies.
I am going to the site of an Indonesian firm (Kaltim Prima Coal) to attempt to see the impact the open-pit coal mine is having upon the people of the area. I want to look specifically at how different actors (government, civil society, the firm itself, etc.) attempt to influence these impacts through governance schemes within the area and how that governance process is shaping/informing/guiding livelihood strategies (how people earn a living/feed themselves) in villages around the mine. The idea is to get a sense of how access to resources (be they physical goods like trees, rivers, fruit, etc. OR intangibles like education, finance, etc.) is changing and in what ways. I believe that this might put me in a place to understand some of the social dynamics that arise out of the increased economic/environmental/cultural/political interconnection that defines our era and maybe directions we can take to make it as beneficial as possible for everyone involved.
If any of this strikes a chord with anyone out there, I'd be more than happy to hear your comments, suggestions or whatever else you may have to offer someone who is about to embark upon their first 3-4 month field research project on the other side of the world.
Thanks and hope to hear from you!
James
