ENVIRONMENTAL SHOCKS, CHANGES IN HUMAN-ENVIRONMENT INTERACTIONS: THEIR IMPACT ON SOCIAL RELATIONS, A NIGER CASE STUDY

Property rights institutions are often identified as having the major characteristic of mediating the human-environment interactions. The purpose of this presentation is to illustrate that any changes in human institutions (e.g. property rights institutions) not only changes the human-environment interactions but changes the social relations as well. The case study presented here analyses the evolution of the relationship between pastoral and agropastoral populations in the Sahel.

Through their long term interactions with a highly variable climatic environment, populations in the West African Sahel have adapted their property rights institutions in order to allow for ex-post adaptation to bad rainfall realization. Nevertheless, this fairly successful institutional arrangement is currently under stress because of several factors within the political, the economic, the social and the environmental spheres. The purpose of this presentation is to demonstrate how shifts in property rights institutions can be traced back to major climatic shocks (droughts).

The results are based on the analysis of local oral history which is contextualized using available meteorological time series. Fieldwork has been conducted in four villages in South-West Niger’s agro-pastoral zone. Local history (1890’s – 1996) has been gathered through interviews with village elders. Historical land use changes have been mapped through extensive field survey. These local historical data where thereafter compared with available meteorological time series. This comparison shows that each and every important change in land use patterns can be traced back to a major drought. Furthermore, it shows that post drought years are clearly marked by a decreasing access to pastoral space for pastoral populations. Therefore, any changes in the human environment interactions can lead to a major redefinition of the social relations.

This case study illustrates the fact that adaptation to environmental changes to come (i.e. changes in the way human interact with the environment) may not be designed without taking into account the potential impacts on social relations (i.e., the changes in the way human interact with human).