Knowledge Production and Policy in the Arctic: The Political Ecology of the Thick-billed Murre
Date
2022-04
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
In Greenland, and across the Arctic, subsistence hunting has always been a critical part of the survival of Indigenous groups and their complex moral economies. For many Inuit and Inughuit communities in Greenland, this critical relationship with hunted animals, like the seabird the thick-billed murre (Uria lomvia or “Appa/Appat” in Greenlandic), has remained an important aspect of life even after Danish colonization, Home Rule, and Self-Government have changed the political and economic landscape in the country over the last 200 years. Within the last three decades, however, the thick-billed murre population in Greenland has been facing a decline with some colonies being lost in Southwestern Greenland, which has become the focus of scientific research conducted by seabird biologists in Greenland. This research, and the recommendations made by scientists based upon it has led to stricter hunting regulations and quotas affecting the relationship between hunters and their environment. In this case study of the thick-billed murre and its relationship with humans in Greenland, I utilize a political ecology analytical framework to examine through texts how authority is constructed by scientists to influence hunting regulation policy decisions. Through both thematic analysis and critical discourse analysis, I examine scientific studies, international and national reports, and existing regulations and recommendations. I demonstrate how the thick-billed murre population decline in Greenland is framed as an international and regional problem, but the primary solution that is recommended as the most “actionable” is further regulated local hunting in Greenland. I argue that by using their authority as scientific knowledge producers, scientists and conservationists control the narrative surrounding the population decline in Greenland and characterize hunting as a dysfunctional Inuit-species relationship that requires stricter regulations. However, as they utilize their authority to assert this narrative and to create and push their recommendations to Greenlandic lawmakers and international organizations, they fail to fully interrogate other factors behind the decline and rely on an outdated framework that places scientific knowledge over other forms of knowledge at the expense of Indigenous communities in Greenland.
Description
Keywords
Political Ecology, Knowledge Production, Greenland, Regulation, Subsistence, Thick-billed Murre
Citation
Sine, M. (2022). Knowledge production and policy in the Arctic: the political ecology of the thick-billed murre (Master's thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca.