Scholar-participated governance as an alternative solution to the problem of collective action in social–ecological systems

Seven design principles for promoting scholars' participation in combating desertification

“…Scholars can be entrepreneurs for farmers, local communities, businesses, and other social actors (Olson 1971;Yang 2007a;Yang and Wu 2009). This study found that although both local scholars and outside scholars may be able to help, it is only local scholars who can be most effective.…”

“…Although scholars also play an important role in resolving collective action dilemmas in various fields, including combating desertification (Yang 2007a(Yang , 2007bYang and Wu 2009), the functions of scholars as a group of independent social actors and the mechanisms of scholars' participation have received little attention in the mainstream discourse concerning contemporary desertification control. Addressing these problems is particularly crucial for sustainable development in arid and semiarid regions around the world, which is the primary goal of our study.…”

Knowledge-driven institutional change: An empirical study on combating desertification in northern china from 1949 to 2004

“…Additionally, the businesses' participation in combating desertification in the secondary action group has recently become increasing important, though citizens' participation and government support were also crucial to the success of institutional change. Furthermore, in addition to the aforementioned scholar-groups, governments, citizens, and firms, many case study researchers (Hukkinen, 1998;Yang, 2007aYang, , 2007bYang, , 2009Yang, , 2010Yang and Wu, 2009;Lan, 2010a, 2010b) have emphasized the importance of households, clans, religious groups, NGOs, media and international organizations in combating desertification and environmental management.…”

“…This was determined based on the combination of our field data and the meta-analysis of existing data in the literature on the use of both indigenous and scientific knowledge (indigenous knowledge refers to the longstanding culture, traditions, wisdom, teaching, and practices in local communities, which are mainly orally passed for generations from person to person; while scientific knowledge are often generated by scholars or experts from universities, research institutions and private firms) and the participation of scholars. For instance, we defined scholars as those who had comparative advantages in knowledge over other social actors (e.g., farmers and government officials), including professors, scientists, researchers, experts, local technicians and any stakeholders who possess learned knowledge (Yang and Wu, 2009), >50% of the survey respondents in the seven counties indicated that scholarly participation in combating desertification was important (Table 2a). Whether scholarly participation was beneficial or not to desertification control, scholars and their knowledge indeed played a significant role in the institutional change related to combating desertification.…”

“…Thus, we refer to them as knowledge-based or scholar entrepreneurs (Yang, 2007b;Yang and Wu, 2009). As stated above, >50% of the survey respondents in the seven counties indicated that scholars play a significant role in combating desertification (Yang and Wu, 2009) (Table 2a). Due to the Confucian tradition, this role has especially been played by Chinese scholars for several thousand years (Yang, 2009(Yang, , 2010.…”