Title: Social exchange and structuralist-constructivism approaches for enhanced ecotourism and food security in wildlife-agrarian mosaic landscapes: insights from eastern Zambia

Authors: Vincent R. Nyirenda; Christopher Kaoma; Sinyala Nyirongo; Chisala A. Lwali; Chansa Chomba

Addresses: Department of Zoology and Aquatic Sciences, School of Natural Resources, Copperbelt University, Jambo drive, Riverside, P.O. Box 21692, Kitwe, Zambia ' Department of National Parks and Wildlife, Private Bag 1, Chilanga, Zambia ' Department of National Parks and Wildlife, P.O. Box 18, Mfuwe, Chipata, Zambia ' Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences, School of Natural Resources, Copperbelt University, Jambo drive, Riverside, P.O. Box 21692, Kitwe, Zambia ' Disaster Management Training Centre, Mulungushi University, P.O. Box 80415, Kabwe, Zambia

Abstract: Adaptive capacities of local communities and other stakeholders such as wildlife managers and tour operators to counteract environmental stressors such as poaching and over-hunting that affect the quality of ecotourism in the African protected area systems are rarely studied. We investigated local structures such as informal and formal rules, norms, challenges and institutional organs that govern community operations in the context of social-ecological systems, and how strategies rooting from the theoretical constructs would help confront conflicts associated with contemporary ecotourism. Systemic appraisals by use of semi-structured questionnaires were employed and administered to 131 respondents, with the help of trained field assistants. The study revealed that poverty and weak institutional governance in ever-growing human-population landscapes underlie escalation of the conflicting multiple land uses and degrade the ecotourism potential. Low levels of social capital networking and cohesions, reflecting fallible local social exchange, constrained local adaptive capacities for ecotourism.

Keywords: adaptive capacities; competing claims; human-wildlife conflicts; HWCs; relational social capital; social-ecological systems; Africa.

DOI: 10.1504/IJTP.2017.085293

International Journal of Tourism Policy, 2017 Vol.7 No.2, pp.93 - 109

Received: 07 Sep 2015
Accepted: 18 May 2016

Published online: 21 Jul 2017 *

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