The ECOSENSUS Project: Co-Evolving Tools, Practices and Open Content for Participatory Natural Resource Management

ECOSENSUS (Electronic/Ecological Collaborative Sensemaking Support System)[www.ecosensus.info] is an ESRC e-Social Science pilot project, using a Participatory Action Research methodology to evolve tools and work practices for collaborative work in environmental and natural resource management between a European-based team, and stakeholders involved in the region of concern, the North Rupununi District of Guyana. To promote long term capacity building in the region and beyond, the project’s outputs will be disseminated as open source learning resources. Given the disparities in knowledge and power in such a project, central to our work are issues of stakeholder empowerment in the geographical modelling, interpretation and decision making practices that constitute environmental management. We argue that in e-Science, such factors have yet to receive much attention. This paper reports work accomplished to date: progress towards an environment which integrates GIS modelling with participatory deliberation about the implications of the models, and reactions from the indigenous Amerindians to this tool.