Science and Power in Reforms of State Forest Organizations in Eastern Europe

• Applicant: Dr.-Ing. Mirjana Zavodja
• Subject Area: Forestry ; Political Science
• Term: since 2021
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 468426222

Since 1989 the forestry reforms in Eastern Europe changed the State Forest Organizations substantially. In spite of the far reaching reform claims, the question remains how much were novel, scientific solutions able to contribute to the concept solutions of national and international reform actors and to what extent these science-based concept solutions were implemented in praxis. While linking the 3 Layer Model for the evaluation of State Forest Organizations with the Research-Integration-Utilization Model of knowledge transfer, we formulate three leading hypotheses: (i) the concept solutions and their implementation in praxis substantiate only selected scientific information (from the broader pool of scientific solutions); (ii) this selection is driven by reform actors, who follow their interests and apply their power means; and (iii) actors merge selected scientific information with their existing knowledge and experience while creating concept solutions. For testing our hypotheses, we select five case countries of former Yugoslavia, due to their huge variety of refined reform models and the activities of national and international reform actors. In addition, we have an excellent access to the field and data, which will be supported by the five national case researchers. The quantitative criteria and indicators approach will be applied for the evaluation of concept solutions and their implementation in renewed State Forest Organizations. The actor-centered power approach will rely on qualitative interviews and document analysis for analyzing the interests, knowledge and power of reform actors. The principal investigator has strong empirical experience in forest policy and forest organizations in former Yugoslavia and Eastern Europe and builds on her key theoretical contributions to the 3 Layer Model and the Research-Integration-Utilization Model. These advanced competences are necessary for testing the hypotheses, based on reliable empirical evidence. Project results will on the one hand contribute to the science-based policy support for the reforms of State Forest Organizations. Explaining the knowledge transfer, by linking scientific information with actors, their knowledge and their power capabilities, will on the other hand contribute to develop embedded models of knowledge transfer further.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants