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Coutinho-Sledge, Piper

Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources

M.S.

The term community-based forestry (CBF) refers to a wide variety of forest management strategies. Broadly, CBF is a form of community development based on forest resources which incorporates goals of ecological health, social well being, and economic viability, with an emphasis on participatory process and equity. Conceptual descriptions of CBF define it as an alternative to conventional, scientific forestry and state control of forest resources which emphasizes local, social processes in forest management and utilization. In developing countries, the role of gender has been used as an analytical lens to scrutinize CBF's social objectives, primarily in the context of women's participation. This attention to gender and other social relations has played a minimal role in CBF research in the United States. Additionally, research on CBF in the United States tends to focus primarily on the economic and environmental issues of the western United States. Thus, this study revolves around three related questions. What is CBF in Vermont and what does it mean to participants? How do issues of gender impact and inform the experience of CBF in the context of Vermont? To what extent is CBF gendered? The results of this research are presented in the form of three, interconnected articles. In the first, interview data is interpreted phenomenologically to identify the types of CBF present in Vermont and the meanings that participants ascribe to these initiatives. In the second article, the same interview data is viewed through the lens of gender in order to analyze the extent to which gender impacts CBF in Vermont. In the final article, I draw on feminist theory to construct an argument for the study of CBF as a gendered social movement. The remaining two articles are the result of a two part analysis of interviews conducted with foresters and facilitators actively involved in CBF in Vermont. Combined, these three articles discuss the importance of integrating analyses of the social structure of gender into the study of CBF.