THE EPISTEMOLOGY OF SUSTAINABLE RESOURCE USE - MANAGING FOREST PRODUCTS, SWIDDENS, AND HIGH-YIELDING VARIETY CROPS

This study examines the moral ecology of resource use through a compar ison of the ideological bases of three systems of resource use in Sout heast Asia: gathering forest products (viz., forest fruit), swidden ag riculture, and the cultivation of high-yielding variety, green revolut ion crops. A trade-off between the magnitude of return and the frequen cy of return is accepted in the first two systems, but this is denied in the third system in which there is, instead, insistence on continuo us, high-magnitude returns. In the fruit- gathering and swidden cultiv ation systems there is recognition of linkages to the wider temporal a nd spatial processes in which they are embedded, but in the green revo lution system there is only a very narrow view of these linkages. Wher eas the necessity of reciprocal exchange with their wider social and n atural environments is accepted in the first two systems, such exchang es are minimized in the green revolution system. This study contribute s to current debates about sustainable resource use, the conception of nature and culture, and the epistemology of science and the contempor ary role of anthropology.