Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
goodwill, and benefit from the strength of a unified community. As simple as this sounded, it was
profoundly different from how outsiders—from Kinshasa or from the developed world—generally
dealt with these communities.
Albert explained that to get the initial community accords to protect bonobos and set aside cer-
tain parts of the forest, he brought together all the traditional village chiefs.
“
Nous sommes arriérés
,” he told them, “We are behind. I, your brother, am, too. But we have
this forest. I can't bring you anything that will help you for a long time. But we have a resource that
can be found behind our house. It's this forest here. I have gone to university. I know the value of
the forest. I know what the forest can bring to our lives. And I have friends who can help us manage
this forest for our own good. I ask you to have confidence in me so that we can create a reserve here
where we live.”
This was Albert's approach from 2002 to 2004, when he and Sally established the first accords:
agreements of intent outlining how the people of Kokolopori would try out this approach to conser-
vation and see how the communities would benefit in exchange for limiting hunting and farming.
But the accords weren't easy to get, and he opted for an approach that proceeded one step at a time.
He knew not to push too hard, and that people would need to see benefits in exchange, as well as
proof that he wasn't there to exploit their resources and goodwill. So he broke it down, doing one
accord at a time, for each step in the process.
“The first thing to say was, 'Listen. We can manage this forest. The limits aren't our concerns at
the moment. What we should do is accept that the resources are important to us, and that we should
sign an accord based on this principle.' The discourse needs to be wed to the context. Once people
accept the basic premise, you can move to the next step. 'We want to make this reserve, but it is true
that we can't protect the entire forest because it will suffocate us. We need to find the animals that
we need to protect. So I ask you to sign an accord to do an inventory of the animals. And because
men and animals live together, the next step is to study and find what people need. Not to mock
you, but to understand your needs.'”
Albert's words startled me—his notion of mocking people. Again I could see the importance of
local leadership. It is easy to forget how people might feel about foreigners looking in on their needs
and struggles. One NGO study in the area around Djolu determined that the vast majority of people
possessed only one pair of pants. It hadn't occurred to me until then how easily such a project could
humiliate the people. For decades, I had run across reproductions of Walker Evans's photographs
of rural Alabama families in the Great Depression—evocative portraits of people living in squalor.
But years after having seen them for the first time, I read that many of the children in them later re-
fused to be associated with the images. The memory of that time was too painful. They had gone on
to live normal American lives and were eager to leave behind those years of brutal hardship, when
they were barefoot and clothed in rags, living in shacks.
This is a common oversight in humanitarian and development work, and with the creation of re-
serves in desperately poor areas. The people there are conscious of everything they own, every de-
tail of their environment that keeps them alive, and they are extremely conscious of what they don't
have, of feeling diminished by those who hope to help them. Albert knew how to walk this fine line,
not judging or imposing rules, but eliciting involvement and support. He explained that the next
step in the process, once the inventories were finished and there was a better sense of the forests,
was to discuss what could be eaten. This, too, was delicate. You could not condescend to people
or make them feel controlled, Albert told me. As an example, he gave the critically endangered
