Here are 100 books that Recent Approaches to Participatory Forest Resource Assessment fans have personally recommended if you like Recent Approaches to Participatory Forest Resource Assessment. Book DNA is a community of 13,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of Negotiated Learning: Collaborative Monitoring for Forest Resource Management

Carol J. Pierce Colfer Author Of Adaptive Collaborative Management in Forest Landscapes: Villagers, Bureaucrats and Civil Society

From my list on to bring people into forest management.

Why am I passionate about this?

This topic, adaptive collaborative management, has been dear to my heart for nearly a quarter of a century (indeed longer if one includes my involvement in farming systems research and development, a similar agricultural concept with less emphasis on the environment). I have long felt that deep involvement with local communities is crucial if we want to avoid ‘the sins of the past’ in conservation and development. My hope and that of my colleagues has been that by involving local people in a respectful, iterative, inclusive, learning, collaborative process, together we can steer policies and actions in a benign direction that may in fact endure (unlike most such projects). 

Carol's book list on to bring people into forest management

Carol J. Pierce Colfer Why Carol loves this book

The collection focuses on communities in the tropics – specifically in Bolivia, Brazil, Cameroon, Indonesia, Malawi, Nepal, Philippines, and Zimbabwe where the Adaptive Collaborative Management approach discussed in my own book was first used, in the early 2000s. The examples in this book focus on the centrality of learning in the ACM process. When we developed our version of ACM (at the Center for International Forestry Research), we imagined the monitoring would build on the literature on criteria and indicators in sustainable forest management (C&I). It did that, and more. This book shows the many ways that the program itself ‘walked the talk,’ using its emphasis on learning to expand our own approach beyond its beginnings—just as our own new book does.

By Irene Guijt (editor) ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Negotiated Learning as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The first book to critically examine how monitoring can be an effective tool in participatory resource management, Negotiated Learning draws on the first-hand experiences of researchers and development professionals in eleven countries in Africa, Asia, and South America. Collective monitoring shifts the emphasis of development and conservation professionals from externally defined programs to a locally relevant process. It focuses on community participation in the selection of the indicators to be monitored as well as community participation in the learning and application of knowledge from the data that is collected. As with other aspects of collaborative management, collaborative monitoring emphasizes building…


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Book cover of Aggressor

Aggressor by FX Holden,

It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.

The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…

Book cover of The Decentralization of Forest Governance: Politics, Economics and the Fight for Control of Forests in Indonesian Borneo

Carol J. Pierce Colfer Author Of Adaptive Collaborative Management in Forest Landscapes: Villagers, Bureaucrats and Civil Society

From my list on to bring people into forest management.

Why am I passionate about this?

This topic, adaptive collaborative management, has been dear to my heart for nearly a quarter of a century (indeed longer if one includes my involvement in farming systems research and development, a similar agricultural concept with less emphasis on the environment). I have long felt that deep involvement with local communities is crucial if we want to avoid ‘the sins of the past’ in conservation and development. My hope and that of my colleagues has been that by involving local people in a respectful, iterative, inclusive, learning, collaborative process, together we can steer policies and actions in a benign direction that may in fact endure (unlike most such projects). 

Carol's book list on to bring people into forest management

Carol J. Pierce Colfer Why Carol loves this book

The articles in this book provide a thorough understanding of the diversity of the local communities in this area of Borneo, their characteristics, and their conflictual interactions with government, industry, and other outside actors. The location is just north of the area of Borneo with which I myself have been periodically involved, research-wise, since 1979. Although the adaptive collaborative management program discussed in my own book initially intended to use this site as one of their own, the researchers involved chose a different path. Still, the book addresses issues of collaboration and adaptation, from a variety of perspectives; and I found the similarities and differences with the nearby area I know well fascinating. The book also documents a fascinating period in Indonesia’s recent history.

By Moira Moeliono (editor) , Godwin Limberg (editor) , Eva Wollenberg (editor)

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Decentralization of Forest Governance as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The devolution of control over the world's forests from national or state and provincial level governments to local control is an ongoing global trend that deeply affects all aspects of forest management, conservation of biodiversity, control over resources, wealth distribution and livelihoods. This powerful new book from leading experts provides an in-depth account of how trends towards increased local governance are shifting control over natural resource management from the state to local societies, and the implications of this control for social justice and the environment. The book is based on ten years of work by a team of researchers in…


Book cover of A New Era for Collaborative Forest Management: Policy and Practice insights from the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program

Carol J. Pierce Colfer Author Of Adaptive Collaborative Management in Forest Landscapes: Villagers, Bureaucrats and Civil Society

From my list on to bring people into forest management.

Why am I passionate about this?

This topic, adaptive collaborative management, has been dear to my heart for nearly a quarter of a century (indeed longer if one includes my involvement in farming systems research and development, a similar agricultural concept with less emphasis on the environment). I have long felt that deep involvement with local communities is crucial if we want to avoid ‘the sins of the past’ in conservation and development. My hope and that of my colleagues has been that by involving local people in a respectful, iterative, inclusive, learning, collaborative process, together we can steer policies and actions in a benign direction that may in fact endure (unlike most such projects). 

Carol's book list on to bring people into forest management

Carol J. Pierce Colfer Why Carol loves this book

Butler and Shultz pull together authors who have worked on the American CFLRP, a broader scale attempt to implement a collaborative and adaptive approach in the US – with a different genesis, history, goal, and funding than my own work, entitled ACM. Yet, the similarities were fascinating, so much so that I wrote a paper comparing the two approaches. I was also fascinated to read this book, as I was in the process of gaining more understanding of the issue of forest restoration – especially as it relates to communities which this book addresses.

By William H. Butler (editor) , Courtney A. Schultz (editor) ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A New Era for Collaborative Forest Management as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This book assesses the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program (CFLRP) and identifies lessons learned for governance and policy through this new and innovative approach to collaborative forest management.

Unlike anything else in US public land management, the CFLRP is a nationwide program that requires collaboration throughout the life of national forest restoration projects, joining agency partners and local stakeholder groups in a kind of decade-long restoration marriage. This book provides a comprehensive assessment of the governance dynamics of the program, examining: questions about collaborative governance processes and the dynamics of trust, accountability and capacity; how scientific information is used in…


If you love Jane Carter...

Book cover of The Warhog Paladins

The Warhog Paladins by Jer Patch,

Mia Lark is running out of options. There is only one way to change the score: the fantasy planet Revivium. 

Armed with the powerful magic in the helm and the friendly AI, Hex that goes with it, Mia throws caution out the window. It’s time to find the main guildhall…

Book cover of Governing Africa's Forests in a Globalized World

Carol J. Pierce Colfer Author Of Adaptive Collaborative Management in Forest Landscapes: Villagers, Bureaucrats and Civil Society

From my list on to bring people into forest management.

Why am I passionate about this?

This topic, adaptive collaborative management, has been dear to my heart for nearly a quarter of a century (indeed longer if one includes my involvement in farming systems research and development, a similar agricultural concept with less emphasis on the environment). I have long felt that deep involvement with local communities is crucial if we want to avoid ‘the sins of the past’ in conservation and development. My hope and that of my colleagues has been that by involving local people in a respectful, iterative, inclusive, learning, collaborative process, together we can steer policies and actions in a benign direction that may in fact endure (unlike most such projects). 

Carol's book list on to bring people into forest management

Carol J. Pierce Colfer Why Carol loves this book

This book is the fourth in a series on forest decentralization globally, a series for which I edited the other three books. So I was gratified to see how this one turned out. I appreciate it because it provides some of the same contextual material on governance in Africa – an area I know less well that the book by Moeliono et al. provided for Borneo. Some of the authors and one editor had also been members of the original ACM teams in Africa (in the early 2000s), bringing some of their own related insights into the discussion. 

By Laura Anne German (editor) , Alain Karsenty (editor) , Anne Marie Tiani (editor)

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Governing Africa's Forests in a Globalized World as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Many countries around the world are engaged in decentralization processes, and most African countries face serious problems with forest governance, from benefits sharing to illegality and sustainable forest management. This book summarizes experiences to date on the extent and nature of decentralization and its outcomes - most of which suggest an underperformance of governance reforms - and explores the viability of different governance instruments in the context of weak governance and expanding commercial pressures over forests.

Findings are grouped into two thematic areas: decentralization, livelihoods and sustainable forest management; and international trade, finance and forest sector governance reforms. The authors…


Book cover of Ancient Woodland

Keith Kirby Author Of Europe's Changing Woods and Forests

From my list on woodland history and woodland conservation.

Why am I passionate about this?

I was brought up in a farming landscape; the little patches of woodland were exciting because they were different, full of birds and flowers not seen elsewhere. This led to me wanting to be a forester, and hence my undergraduate degree, post-graduate research, and subsequent career with the conservation agencies in Britain. I enjoyed working with colleagues on issues as varied as how to select and manage woodland reserves, to what the government should be doing in its reviews of national forest policy. Now retired, I still spend time following the changes in the woodland flora and trying to encourage others to conserve and expand our native woodland.

Keith's book list on woodland history and woodland conservation

Keith Kirby Why Keith loves this book

Rackham led me into the woods in England as they were 500 to 1000 years ago—part of village life, being cut for firewood or cartwheels, and perhaps occasionally to supply beams for the local church, manor house, or even a cathedral.

I look at the flowers growing, the shapes of trees, and the patterns of the forest floor differently now—a legacy of human activity as well as nature. Their conservation takes on a different dimension.

By Oliver Rackham ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Ancient Woodland as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.


Book cover of A Forest on the Sea: Environmental Expertise in Renaissance Venice

Eric H. Ash Author Of The Draining of the Fens: Projectors, Popular Politics, and State Building in Early Modern England

From my list on early modern environmental history.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a historian of early modern Europe, especially 16th- and 17th-century England, and my work pulls together threads from different historical disciplines, including political history, the history of science and technology, and environmental history. I am fascinated by the ways that human history is intimately linked with the environment, and I am most interested in how early modern European states and empires worked to understand, manage, and profit from the natural world, especially with respect to using and conserving natural resources such as water, wood, and wildlife. I have chosen books that explore these issues in innovative and exciting ways.

Eric's book list on early modern environmental history

Eric H. Ash Why Eric loves this book

I love this book because it does such a masterful job of demonstrating how peoples, states, and the natural environment are closely linked with one another.

The book is about early modern Venice and its mainland empire, its immense and constant need for wood, and the state’s efforts to ensure that need could be sustainably met in both the near and distant future. The Venetians came to understand nature through the careful conservation of a vital but fragile resource, and their government developed to meet that challenge.

Over four centuries Venice created a unique bureaucracy of forestry and forest management, staffed by experts and tasked with counting and maintaining all of the trees within its vast territories.

By Karl Appuhn ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A Forest on the Sea as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Wood was essential to the survival of the Venetian Republic. To build its great naval and merchant ships, maintain its extensive levee system, construct buildings, fuel industries, and heat homes, Venice needed access to large quantities of oak and beech timber. The island city itself was devoid of any forests, so the state turned to its mainland holdings for this vital resource. A Forest on the Sea explores the history of this enterprise and Venice's efforts to extend state control over its natural resources. Karl Appuhn explains how Venice went from an isolated city completely dependent on foreign suppliers for…


If you love Recent Approaches to Participatory Forest Resource Assessment...

Book cover of A Last Serenade for Billy Bonney

A Last Serenade for Billy Bonney by Mark Warren,

Winner of the 2024 New Mexico - Arizona Book Award.

In this deeply researched novel of America's most celebrated outlaw, Mark Warren sheds light on the human side of Billy the Kid and reveals the intimate stories of the lesser-known players in his legendary life of crime. Warren's fictional composer…

Book cover of The Fourth Circle: A Political Ecology of Sumatraas Rainforest Frontier

Carol J. Pierce Colfer Author Of The Longhouse of the Tarsier: Changing Landscapes, Gender and Well Being in Borneo

From my list on Indonesian life and policy.

Why am I passionate about this?

I worked in Indonesia much of the time between 1979 and 2009, with people living in forests. As an anthropologist, my work was initially ethnographic in nature, later linking such insights to policies relating to forests and people – as I worked at the Center for International Forestry Research in Bogor (1995 – the present). Although later in my career, I worked in forests all over the tropics, my real love remains with Indonesia, where I worked the longest and learned the most. My most recent research was in 2019, when I returned to the first community I studied ethnographically in 1979-80.

Carol's book list on Indonesian life and policy

Carol J. Pierce Colfer Why Carol loves this book

I share with John McCarthy an interest in how power operates in Indonesian communities and forests and this book provides a view of this as it plays out in northern Sumatra, ‘up close and personal.’ For me, it provided glimpses of very different ethnographic realities than what I had seen myself in other areas of Sumatra (West Sumatra, Riau) where I had lived for four years and supervised others’ research (in Jambi) as well. The recency of the 2004 tsunami and the separatist movement underway when the book was published lent urgency and excitement to McCarthy’s observations.

By John F. McCarthy ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Fourth Circle as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This book addresses the politics of environmental change in one of the richest areas of tropical rainforest in Indonesia. Based on field studies conducted in three agricultural communities in rural Aceh, this work considers a number of questions: How do customary (adat) village and state institutions work? What roles do they play in managing local resources? How have they evolved over time? Are villagers, state policies, or corrupt local networks responsible for the loss of tropical rainforest? Will better outcomes emerge from revitalizing customary management, from changing state policies, or from transforming the way the state works? And why do…


Book cover of Natural Woodland

Keith Kirby Author Of Europe's Changing Woods and Forests

From my list on woodland history and woodland conservation.

Why am I passionate about this?

I was brought up in a farming landscape; the little patches of woodland were exciting because they were different, full of birds and flowers not seen elsewhere. This led to me wanting to be a forester, and hence my undergraduate degree, post-graduate research, and subsequent career with the conservation agencies in Britain. I enjoyed working with colleagues on issues as varied as how to select and manage woodland reserves, to what the government should be doing in its reviews of national forest policy. Now retired, I still spend time following the changes in the woodland flora and trying to encourage others to conserve and expand our native woodland.

Keith's book list on woodland history and woodland conservation

Keith Kirby Why Keith loves this book

The idea of the "wildwood," the prehistoric forests that might once have covered the landscape, has appealed to me since I was a child, but Peterken eloquently describes one version of what that idea might have meant in different places and times.

I can follow how a patch of trees might have grown and matured, to then be battered by gales, consumed by fire, or succumb to fungal or beetle attack. But even as the dead logs decay, new saplings shoot up around them. We have lost the wildwood in Britain, but perhaps we can allow some areas to start to recover at least part of their wildness. 

By George F. Peterken ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Natural Woodland as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Natural Woodland describes how woodlands grow, die and regenerate in the absence of human influence, and the structures and range of habitats found in natural woods. The underlying theme is that natural woodlands should form a basis for forest management, policies and practices. George Peterken compares the ecology of both North American and European forests, to produce a fascinating account of woodland natural history for all those concerned with woodland management and ecology.


Book cover of Forty Years a Forester

Adam M. Sowards Author Of Making America's Public Lands: The Contested History of Conservation on Federal Lands

From my list on bringing the public into the public lands.

Why am I passionate about this?

I started studying public lands by accident in the 1990s for a class project before I really knew what they even were. Since then, I've published hundreds of thousands of words about them, including my latest book Making America’s Public Lands where I’ve brought together much of what I’ve learned. I’m convinced the national forests, parks, rangelands, and refuges are among the most interesting and important experiments in democracy we have. I'm a writer, historian, and former college professor who now calls the Skagit Valley of Washington home. As much as I enjoy studying the public lands, I've appreciated hiking, sleeping, teaching, and noticing things in them even more.

Adam's book list on bringing the public into the public lands

Adam M. Sowards Why Adam loves this book

What was it like to work as a forester with the US Forest Service was young? This is a memoir by Elers Koch who worked as a federal forester from 1903 to 1943 in the Northern Rockies. Forty Years a Forester gives an inside account of how rangers built the national forest system in its earliest years, which is fascinating enough. But what makes Koch even more interesting is how he bucked conventional wisdom on quandaries like forest fires (with which he had ample firsthand experience and shared here) and wilderness long before views like his became common. Government bureaucrats rarely write good memoirs, but this one invites you in and provides real insight—and even some inspiration.

By Elers Koch ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Forty Years a Forester as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Elers Koch, a key figure in the early days of the U.S. Forest Service, was among the first American-trained silviculturists, a pioneering forest manager, and a master firefighter. By horse and on foot, he helped establish the boundaries of most of our national forests in the West, designed new fire-control strategies and equipment, and served during the formative years of the agency. Forty Years a Forester, Koch's entertaining and illuminating memoir, reveals one remarkable man's contributions to the incipient science of forest management and his role in building the human relationships and policies that helped make the U.S. Forest Service,…


If you love Jane Carter...

Book cover of Ramón Ramirez's Dog: Reflections on Then and Now

Ramón Ramirez's Dog by David J. Dunford,

Ramon Ramirez’s Dog is a collection of essays written over the years about the adventures and misadventures, mostly outside but occasionally inside the diplomatic career of a U.S. ambassador. Common threads weaving the stories together are a desire for a life well-lived, balancing career with family and friends, keeping physically…

Book cover of The Other Forest

Catherine V. Wolf Author Of The Drum Tree

From my list on eco-fantasy books with forests and gardens.

Why am I passionate about this?

I love our planet. That’s the long and short of it. I have stretched belly-down upon the earth and hugged this whole world as if it is an extension of myself, or I am an extension of it. We are one, as I think we all are, with this world that is our home. After receiving my Master's in Nature Study and Environmental Education, I taught grade school for many years, spending as much time outside with the students as I could. At the same time, I have been writing stories and loving nature, loving our world, and working on stewardship. Eco-fantasy is a genre that just seems natural to this mission. 

Catherine's book list on eco-fantasy books with forests and gardens

Catherine V. Wolf Why Catherine loves this book

What a fun ride it is to enter the world of The Other Forest, created by Danielle Koehler and written for middle readers, in which a young girl happens upon an alternative forest where she finds a community of animals that live there.

I am right with her as she and her animal friends strive to find the burning rot at the center of the forest, caused by the careless humans of the outer world. For the two forests to rejoin and be healed, the animal and human characters must solve the mystery and heal the wound.

Set in rural Chile, Koehler creates my hero, a brave girl named Olivia, who, with her human friend Diego and their animal cohorts, creates something new and truly beautiful in the world. 

By Danielle Koehler ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Other Forest as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 8, 9, 10, and 11.

What is this book about?

When twelve-year-old Olivia is forced to move to her mother's birthplace of Bottom-of-the-Globe, Nowheresville, in southern Chile, she fully expects to be miserable and friendless. Her only comfort is her dog, Max, more an inseparable brother than an ordinary pet. So when Max disappears in the nearby forest, Olivia doesn't hesitate to chase after him, ignoring the rumors of strange Patagonian demons infesting the forest. Before she knows it, Olivia has slipped into a strange, other forest where animals can talk and her emotions affect the world around her in spectacular yet terrifying ways. Things go from bad to worse…


Book cover of Negotiated Learning: Collaborative Monitoring for Forest Resource Management
Book cover of The Decentralization of Forest Governance: Politics, Economics and the Fight for Control of Forests in Indonesian Borneo
Book cover of A New Era for Collaborative Forest Management: Policy and Practice insights from the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program

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Interested in forest management, forests, and the Tropics?

Forests 66 books
The Tropics 9 books