RESEARCH Open Access

On the role of traditional ecological knowledge asa collaborative concept a philosophical studyKyle Powys Whyte

Abstract

Introduction The concept of traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) along with synonymous or closely relatedterms like indigenous knowledge and native science has some of its origins in literatures on internationaldevelopment and adaptive management There is a tendency to want to determine one definition for TEK that cansatisfy every stakeholder in every situation Yet a scan of environmental science and policy literatures reveals thereto be differences in definitions that make it difficult to form a consensus What should be explored instead is therole that the concept of TEK plays in facilitating or discouraging cross-cultural and cross-situational collaborationamong actors working for indigenous and non-indigenous institutions of environmental governance such as tribalnatural resources departments federal agencies working with tribes and co-management boards

Methods This is a philosophical paper that explores how the concept of TEK is defined in science and policyliteratures and what purpose it serves for improving cooperative environmental and natural resources stewardshipand management between indigenous and non-indigenous institutions The philosophical method applied here isone that outlines numerous possible meanings of a concept (TEK in this paper) and the implications of eachmeaning for science and policy

Results In science and policy literatures there are different definitions of TEK Controversy can brew over TEK whenpeople hold definitions that are based on different assumptions There are two kinds of assumptions about themeaning of TEK The first kind refers to assumptions about the mobilization of TEK or what I call knowledgemobilization The second kind involves assumptions about how to understand the relationship between TEK anddisciplines like ecology or biology or in other words the relation between TEK and science Different positions thatfall under the two kinds of assumptions (knowledge mobilization TEK and science) can generate disagreementsbecause they imply differences about ldquowhoserdquo definition of TEK gets privileged who is counted as having expertauthority over environmental governance issues and how TEK should be factored into policy processes that alreadyhave a role for disciplines like forestry or toxicology in them

Conclusions In light such disagreements I argue that the concept of TEK should be understood as a collaborativeconcept It serves to invite diverse populations to continually learn from one another about how each approachesthe very question of ldquoknowledgerdquo in the first place and how these different approaches can be blended to bettersteward natural resources and adapt to climate change The implication is that environmental scientists and policyprofessionals indigenous and non-indigenous should not be in the business of creating definitions of TEK Insteadthey should focus more on creating long term processes that allow the different implications of approaches toknowledge in relation to stewardship goals to be responsibly thought through

Correspondence kwhytemsueduDepartment of Philosophy Michigan State University 368 Farm Lane 503East Lansing MI 48824 USA

copy 2013 Whyte licensee Springer This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative CommonsAttribution License (httpcreativecommonsorglicensesby20) which permits unrestricted use distribution and reproductionin any medium provided the original work is properly cited

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

IntroductionThe concept of traditional ecological knowledge (TEK)comes up frequently in certain segments of environmentaland natural resources science and policy literatures (Houde2007) For some people the term has come to refer to indi-genous peoplesrsquoa legitimate systems of knowledge produc-tion Such systems have empirically tested (and testable)understandings of the relationships among living things andtheir environments though there may be notable differ-ences with scientific approaches characteristic of disciplineslike ecology or biology The English language articulation ofTEKmdashalong with synonymous or closely related terms likeindigenous knowledge (Brokensha et al 1980) and nativescience (Cajete 1999)mdashoriginates in literatures on inter-national development (Agrawal 1995 Warren et al 1995)and adaptive management (Berkes 1999) It continues toshow up regularly in science conferences like the 97th An-nual Meeting of the Ecological Society of America in 2012which featured approximately 13 papers on TEK It is alsofound increasingly in the plans and policies of governmentagencies such as the Northwest Forest Plan (Harris 2011)and the Natural Resources Conservation Service (Leonetti2010) in the US and international regimes such as theUnited Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP 1998)Examples of TEK in scientific and policy literatures are

diverse They range from historical practices like the cre-ation of forest islands for the production of fruit and at-traction of game (Gadgil et al 1993) to currently practicedskill-based traditions like deer cleaning techniques em-bodying community value systems (Reo and Whyte 2012)to practical applications for natural resource managementand climate change like burning practices (Kimmerer andLake 2001) and observations of changes in water levels seaice lake processes and the movements of animal popula-tions (Voggesser 2010 Wildcat 2009 Nakashima et al2012 Eisner et al 2009)Yet TEK is often invoked in ways that are controversial

There are three plausible reasons why this may be thecase (1) TEK often refers to knowledge production sys-tems whose value has been overlooked or disapproved ofby scientists and policy makers Ignorance and disap-proval are often tied to colonial imperial and other dis-criminatory attitudes and institutions of science towardldquonon-Westernrdquo knowledge systems (Harding 1998 2011Salmon 1996) (2) Definitions of TEK are often formu-lated by scholars or professionals who are not commu-nity members and hence have tendencies to privilegetheir own agendas for environmental and natural re-sources stewardship and management (McGregor 2008Ellen 2000 Nadasdy 1999 Huntington 2000) (3) TEK isperceived as being a competing authority with sciencecreating divisions between indigenous expert authoritiesand scientific expert authorities (Kofinas 2005 McGregor2008)

A good portion of this controversy revolves around atendency to want to determine one definition for TEK thatcan satisfy every stakeholder in every context Yet a scanof environmental science and policy literatures revealsthere to be sufficiently large differences in definitions ofTEK that may obstruct the possibility of moving toward aconsensus on the best definition These differences sug-gest an alternative direction for philosophical reflection onTEK Perhaps what is important is not only defining TEKrather what should be additionally explored is the rolethat the concept of TEK plays in facilitating or discour-aging cross-cultural and cross-situational collaborationbetween indigenous and non-indigenous institutions suchas tribal natural resources departments federal agenciesworking with tribes and co-management boardsI argue that the concept of TEK should be understood

as a collaborative concept It serves to invite diversepopulations to continually learn from one another abouthow each approaches the very question of ldquoknowledgerdquoin the first place and how these different approachescan work together to better steward and manage the en-vironment and natural resources Therefore any under-standing of the meaning of TEK is acceptable only solong as it plays the role of bringing different peopleworking for different institutions closer to a degree ofmutual respect for one anotherrsquos sources of knowledgeThe implication is that environmental scientists and pol-icy professionals indigenous and non-indigenous shouldfocus more on creating long term processes that allowfor the implications of different approaches to know-ledge in relation to stewardship and management prior-ities to be responsibly thought throughThe paper starts in the Methods section with a descrip-

tion of the philosophical method used to make the argu-ment just mentioned In the Results and Discussionsection I cover some of the different assumptions thatmake it hard for consensus to form on what TEK meansThe subsection ldquoTEK and knowledge mobilizationrdquo de-scribes assumptions about knowledge mobilization thesubsection ldquoThe relation between TEK and sciencerdquo de-scribes assumptions about the relation between TEK anddisciplines like ecology or biology The subsection ldquoTherole of TEK as a collaborative conceptrdquo shows why TEKshould be considered as a collaborative concept that brid-ges cross-cultural and cross-situational divides The ldquoCon-clusionsrdquo section ends the paper with thoughts on theimplications for cooperative environmental and natural re-sources stewardship and management From now on I willrefer to environmental and natural resource stewardshipand management as simply environmental governance

MethodsThis is a philosophical paper (written by an environmentalphilosopher) that explores how the concept of TEK is

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 2 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

defined in science and policy literatures and what purposeit serves for improving cooperative environmental andnatural resources stewardship and management betweenindigenous and non-indigenous institutions The philo-sophical method applied here is one that outlines numer-ous possible meanings of a concept (TEK in this paper)and the implications of each meaning for science and pol-icy The argument about TEK as a collaborative conceptintends to spur greater reflective discussion among therelevant audiences on the meaning of a concept that maybe controversial or simply taken for granted This paperattempts to complement the scientific papers in this spe-cial issue of Ecological Processes

Results and discussionIn science and policy literatures there are different defini-tions of TEK Controversy can brew over TEK whenpeople hold definitions that are based on different as-sumptions There are two kinds of assumptions about themeaning of TEK The first kind refers to assumptionsabout the mobilization of TEK or what I call knowledgemobilization Knowledge mobilization refers to assump-tions about what different types of knowledge can be usedfor and their adaptability to suit different contexts Thesecond kind involves assumptions about how to under-stand the relationship between TEK and disciplines likeecology or biology or in other words the relation be-tween TEK and science The two kinds of assumptions(knowledge mobilization TEK and science) can generatecontroversy because they imply differences about ldquowhoserdquodefinition of TEK gets privileged who is counted as hav-ing expert authority over environmental governance is-sues and how TEK should be factored into policyprocesses that already have a role for disciplines like for-estry or toxicology in them The section ldquoTEK and know-ledge mobilizationrdquo begins to discuss these assumptionsstarting with knowledge mobilization The section ldquoTherelation between TEK and sciencerdquo begins the discussionon the second kind of assumption (the relation betweenTEK and science)

TEK and knowledge mobilizationSome definitions see TEK as a basic body of knowledgeAccording to Nakashima et al TEK is ldquothe knowledgeof Native people about their natural environmentrdquo(Nakashima 1993 99) This basic body of knowledge isusually defined as having been gathered across genera-tions ldquoIndigenous or traditional knowledge refers tothe knowledge and know-how accumulated across gen-erations and renewed by each new generation whichguide human societies in their innumerable interactionswith their surrounding environmentrdquo (Nakashima et al2012 8) Definitions like this emphasize TEK as a sub-stantive body of knowledge that is created and stored

by human societies to aid in their flourishing in the faceof environmental and natural resources challenges Thetime scale of this knowledge is many generations Inthis sense TEK is taken as archival in nature It is astore of knowledge of the relationships between livingthings and their environmentA key assumption about knowledge mobilization in

this definition is that TEK is a supply of knowledgeready to hand to be used by people in different contextsIn the policy document Weathering Uncertainty Trad-itional Knowledge for Climate Change Assessment andAdaptation (United Nations) Nakashima et al write thatsuch ldquocommunity-based and local knowledge may offervaluable insights into environmental change due toclimate change and complement broader-scale scienti-fic research with local precision and nuancerdquo (20126) They go on to state as an example that ldquoIndigenousobservations and interpretations of meteorological phe-nomena have guided seasonal and inter-annual activitiesof local communities for millennia This knowledge con-tributes to climate science by offering observations andinterpretations at a much finer spatial scale with consid-erable temporal depth and by highlighting elements thatmay not be considered by climate scientistsrdquo (8) In thisexample TEK is a body of knowledge or archivewaiting to be picked up by climate science TEK is con-ceived as an archive that is continually updated or anarchive of a society that no longer exists yet biologistsor ecologists can nonetheless find the knowledge and in-corporate it into their researchThe assumption that TEK is a basic body of know-

ledge is often accompanied by the idea that elements ofa societyrsquos worldview are an intimate dimension of itsTEK system Berkes for example defines TEK as ldquoa cu-mulative body of knowledge practice and belief evolvingby adaptive processes and handed down through genera-tions by cultural transmission about the relationship ofliving things (including humans) with one another andwith their environmentrdquo (Berkes 1999 8 see also Gadgilet al 1993 151) This definition situates TEK as a bodyof ldquoknowledge practice and beliefrdquo inspired by a particu-lar worldview and bioregion It is interwoven with asocietyrsquos cultural fabric Here TEK is not just an archivebut a part of what members of a particular culture thinkbelieve and do It is situated knowledgeThe definition of TEK as a situated body of knowledge is

found in policy documents For example the Natural Re-sources Conservation Service (NRCS) published Indigen-ous Stewardship Methods and NRCS which aims to guideNRCS staff to work better with tribes TEK is seen asbound up with ldquoindigenous stewardship methodrdquo which isdefined as the ldquoecologically sustainable use of natural re-sources within their capacity to sustain natural processesrdquoIndigenous stewardship method (ISM) is possibly a

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 3 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

subset of Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK)in which indigenous peoples acquired the knowledgebase over hundreds of years through direct experienceand contact with the environment ISM is thephysical spiritual mental emotional and intuitiverelationship of indigenous peoples with all aspects andelements of their environment

These relationships include but are not limited to acombination of knowledge experience traditionplaces locality all living and nonliving things skillspractices theories social strategies momentsspirituality history heritage and more and may notbe fully embraced by people who fail to understand allthose dimensions (Leonetti 2010 13)

In this definition TEK is considered a knowledge ldquobaserdquoor body of knowledge though one embedded within mul-tiple relationships among living beings non-living thingsand the environment The passage above also raises aquestion concerning the degree that outsiders will be ableto respect or comprehend a TEK system But the purposeof the NRCS guide is to advance a set of best practicesand principles so that NRCS staff can begin to work withcommunities for whom TEK forms a significant dimen-sion of their lifewaysAn implication of definitions based on the assumption

that TEK is a body of knowledge is that TEK can be pickedup and used by scientists or agency staff Each of the policydocuments just cited involves the idea that TEK can begleaned from the communities who have it either throughhistorical research or working with actual communitiesand can then be incorporated into the environmental gov-ernance of non-indigenous institutions like those of theUnited Nations or US Department of Agriculture So theassumption about knowledge mobilization is that TEK nomatter what the society is ldquosomethingrdquo that can be seen asarchival With some effort it can be interpreted for use indifferent contexts especially science policy contexts thatis contexts where there is a given role for scientific infor-mation in environmental governanceSome indigenous scientists in particular have offered

definitions of TEK that resist the assumption that it ismainly a body of knowledge McGregor for example ar-gues that TEK involves the relationships between ldquoknow-ledge people and all Creation (the lsquonaturalrsquo world aswell as the spiritual) TEK is viewed as the process ofparticipating (a verb) fully and responsibly in such rela-tionships rather than specifically as the knowledgegained from such experiences For Aboriginal peopleTEK is not just about understanding relationships it isthe relationship with Creation TEK is something onedoesrdquo (McGregor 2004ab 2008 145) For McGregorTEK refers to the activities that people in indigenous

societies are doing as part of their stewardship It is notarchival or body-like To speak of a societyrsquos TEK is tospeak of ongoing activities expressive of responsibilitiesThe ideas of ldquofullyrdquo and ldquoresponsiblyrdquo suggest what in

the field of philosophy is often called moral character orjust character Character refers to the idea that acting re-sponsibly (and hence ethically) is a matter of possessingembodied traits like courage or respect that enable oneto know the right thing to do in particular situations andto act in ways that maintain relations of balance withinonersquos society People who possess the character traitsalso possess the internal motivation to do what is rightWithin a societyrsquos system of responsibilities characterrefers to the particular traits that people acquire overmany years (since childhood) in order to express respon-sibilities and balanced relationships in all that they doDefinitions like McGregorrsquos see TEK systems as systemsof responsibilities that cannot be detached from thecharacter traits required to fulfill the moral demands ofthese systemsOther native scholars have also emphasized the re-

sponsibilities and character dimensions of TEK Pierottiand Wildcat see TEK as

based in the knowledge that native societies existedunder conditions of constant pressure on the resourcesupon which they depended and that a means had to befound to convince communities and families toeconomize with regard to their use of naturalresources The connections that are a crucial aspectof TEK are based on a mixture of extraction eganimals are taken as prey combined with recognitionof the inherent value and good of non-human livesTraditional knowledge is based on the premise thathumans should not view themselves as responsible fornature ie we are not stewards of the nature world butinstead that we are a part of that world no greater thanany other part In this way TEK deals largely withmotivating humans to show respect for nonhumans(Pierotti and Wildcat 2000 1336)

Pierotti and Wildcat see motivation an important as-pect of character as a key component of TEK Theyeven suggest that terms like stewardship are not suffi-cient for describing the actual intimacies involved in re-lationships among living beings and non-living things onwhich TEK systems are based As with McGregor TEKis a doing a full participation in a system of responsibil-ities needed for a societyrsquos flourishing For both Pierottiand Wildcat and McGregor great emphasis is placed onthe idea that TEK is not knowledge about relationshipsbut is the complete participation in the responsibilitiesSimilar definitions are found in the work of other indi-genous scholars (Reo and Whyte 2012 Cajete 1999)

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 4 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

TEK systems then are systems of responsibilities thatarise from particular cosmological beliefs about the rela-tionships between living beings and non-living things orhumans and the natural world There is an important im-plication for knowledge mobilization TEK cannot bereadily transferred to different contexts unless the peoplein the new context also learn the systems of responsibil-ities and character traits Such learning entails completecultural immersion Thus it could be problematic on thesystem of responsibility assumption to see TEK as some-thing that could be incorporated by for example climatescience For climate science may not be used in a policycontext that seeks to integrate the system of responsibil-ities of a particular indigenous people into its strategiesfor environmental governanceThe body of knowledge assumption and the system of

responsibility assumption are different in important waysto the degree that they underlie various definitions of TEKIn terms of the former TEK can be extracted from its soci-ety and fit into policy-relevant science The gist goes some-thing like this climate science for example already fitswithin a particular policy context This fit is not deter-mined by indigenous peoples That is indigenous peoplesare not active participants in the majority of decisions ofgovernments universities and organizations about whatfunding programs to create for climate science and forselecting who should be on review panels Moreover TEKis not taken to be tied in any important ways to particularstewardship or management strategies Insofar as climatescience in sticking with the last example fits into a par-ticular kind of understanding of management or adapta-tion TEK is seen to contribute to that by being pluggedinto structures of scientific inquiry But definitions basedon the assumption that TEK is a system of responsibilitiessuggest that for TEK to be genuinely included the peoplewho participate fully in it must be at the table equally withnon-indigenous scientists and policy makers TEK is not apiece broken off of one of these strategies and applied toanother TEK just is the living environmental governanceof indigenous peoples stemming directly from their cos-mologies in relation to the environmental challenges theyhave faced over many generationsThe difference between the two assumptions can en-

gender some difficulties in forming a consensus on thedefinition of TEK in terms of knowledge mobilizationOne assumption seeks to fit TEK within established sci-ence policy decision-making frameworks whereas theother seeks to change this framework in favor of greaterparticipation by indigenous peoples

The relation between TEK and scienceTEK is also defined in ways that are based on assumptionsabout its relation to disciplines like forestry or climatologyThe kind of assumption active in these definitions involves

how TEK can be compared or contrasted to scientific dis-ciplines (ie science) There are three assumptions cov-ered in this subsection (1) TEK and science should beseen as separate knowledge production systems Thisdistinction should never be collapsed (2) TEK and scienceshould be seen as twins or two knowledge-bearingperspectives on the world that complement each other(3) There is no basis for distinguishing TEK or Indigen-ous knowledge from science and the term TEK or itssynonyms should not be used In all three of these viewsthere is a lot riding on how TEK and science are seen asrelated to each other because there are implications forwhat sorts of empirical authorities are deemed relevantfor environmental governanceThe first version of this kind of assumption is that

TEK and science are sufficiently different to warrantmaintaining separate definitions Proponents of this viewbelieve that there are definite differences in the valuesand aspirations of science and those of TEK systemsEl-Hani and Souza de Ferreira Bandeira exemplify thisview They use the term ldquoindigenous knowledgerdquo insteadof TEK though their use of this term is synonymouswith TEK because they are talking about indigenous peo-plesrsquo knowledge of the natural world and the relation-ships between living things and the environmentb Theysee Western modern science as ldquothe most powerful wayof producing naturalistic explanations of natural phe-nomenardquo Yet it is also the case that ldquothere are plenty ofdifferent accounts of the world [ie indigenous know-ledge] which are also powerful in their own waysrdquo (2008756) They see indigenous knowledge as part of this lat-ter grouping these other accounts ldquoare producing expla-nations about supernatural (or maybe non-natural is abetter term) beings and phenomena that are useful toseveral human cultures And in the face of natural phe-nomena they are producing explanations that appeal tospiritual domains going beyond naturalistic chains ornetworks of eventsrdquo (2008 756) The key to this differ-ence then is that indigenous knowledge usually involvessome account of non-natural beings whereas science al-ways excludes these non-natural beings This reflectssome of the ideas of the previous section where TEK istied to spiritualityTo call something science then for El-Hani and Souza

de Ferreira Bandeira certain standards must be met Forexample science embodies values and skills such asldquotechnical precision control creative genius and ex-planatory power rdquo Quoting Siegel they argue that sci-ence and indigenous knowledge could only be the samething ldquoif it could be cogently argued that some particularlsquoethnicrsquo science offered compelling theoriespredic-tionsexplanations of natural phenomena Could an ani-mistic ethnic theory of volcanic activity and lavaflow provide the sort of explanation prediction grasp

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 5 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

of relations among unobservables and between observ-ables and unobservables and depth of scientific under-standing provided by Western sciencerdquo (El-Hani et al2008 757 Siegel 1997 100) According to this under-standing there are definite values and knowledge-bearing capabilities of science that cannot be attributedto indigenous knowledge of the environmentIndigenous knowledge while it may produce important

knowledge does not do so in the ways that scientific disci-plines do This is according to the authors not a form ofdiscrimination ldquoNotice that we are not saying that theway this community builds knowledge the knowledgebuilt or the criteria employed to appraise cognitive state-ments are epistemically superior to any other body of ap-proaches ideas statements criteria We are just sayingthat they are different and should be kept different forthe sake of clarity about the nature of knowledge and thenature of sciencerdquo (El-Hani and Souza de FerreiraBandeira 2008 758) In this assumption about indigenousknowledge (or TEK) and science there are definite cri-teria values skills and so on that science and TEK havebut there is not a lot of crossover So TEKrsquos supernaturaland social aspects respectfully so exclude the possibilityof the kind of rationality associated with science More-over societies without computing capacities built intotheir TEK systems cannot value quantitative research inthe same way that it is valued in natural sciences disci-plines nor can they engage in the same kind of researchThis first assumption that TEK and science are funda-

mentally different differs from the second assumptionwhich sees the former and the latter as two complemen-tary perspectives on the environment that stem fromcomplementary views on the world The views are com-plementary because there is both crossover as well asgap filling Kimmerer argues that

Traditional ecological knowledge refers to theknowledge practice and belief concerning therelationships of living beings to one another and tothe physical environment which is held by peoples inrelatively nontechnical societies with a directdependence upon local resources It is born of longintimacy and attentiveness to a homeland and canarise wherever people are materially and spirituallyintegrated within their landscape TEK is rational andreliable knowledge that has been developed throughgenerations of intimate contact by native peoples withtheir lands (Kimmerer 2002 431)

TEK and science for Kimmerer can be seen as having acomplementary relation to each other Indeed TEK can beseen as the ldquointellectual twin to sciencerdquo a term she bor-rows from Deloria (433) Kimmerer claims that TEK existsldquoin parallel to Western sciencerdquo (433) She claims that ldquoBoth

knowledge systems yield detailed empirical information ofnatural phenomena and relationships among ecosystemcomponentsrdquo This can include ldquopredictive powerrdquo overlap-ping biological information ldquodetailed empirical knowledgeof population biology resource assessment and monitoringsuccessional dynamics patterns of fluctuation in climateand resources species interactions ethnotaxonomy sus-tainable harvesting and adaptive management and ma-nipulation of disturbance regimes rdquo (Kimmerer 2002433) Yet TEK differs from science for Kimmerer in import-ant ways

TEK observations tend to be qualitative and theycreate a diachronic database that is a record ofobservations from a single locale over a long timeperiod The National Science Foundation in itssupport of the Long-Term Ecological Researchprogram has validated the importance of suchcontinuous data In TEK the observers tend to be theresource users themselves for example huntersfishers and gatherers whose harvesting success isinextricably linked to the quality and reliability oftheir ecological observations In contrast scientificobservations made by a small group of professionalstend to be quantitative and often represent synchronicdata or simultaneous observations from a wide rangeof sites which frequently lack the long-termperspective of TEK Western science is conductedin academic culture in which nature is viewed strictlyobjectively TEK is woven into and is inseparablefrom the social and spiritual contexts of the culture TEK may also extend its explanatory power beyondthe strictly empirical where science cannot go Inindigenous science nature is subject not object Embraced as an equal partner to the power ofWestern science TEK offers not only importantbiological insights but a cultural framework forenvironmental problem solving that incorporateshuman values (Kimmerer 2002 433ndash434)

Here then for Kimmerer TEK and science are two paral-lel complementary perspectives on the environment andnatural resources They go hand in hand Different fromthe first assumption Kimmerer has no problem using con-cepts like ldquopredictionrdquo or ldquorationalrdquo with respect to TEKnor stating straightforwardly that techniques in TEK sys-tems fit well with and are valued by science She also showsthat the influence of culture in TEK systems could be con-sidered beneficial to science Though she admits differ-ences they are not the stark differences that are maintainedin the first assumption For Kimmerer then knowledgeproduction that fails to incorporate both TEK systems andthe relevant sciences would be missing key perspectives onthe world Instead of saying that they are valuable in their

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 6 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

own ways (as in the first assumption) Kimmerer is sayingthat they are valuable together Both knowledge productionsystems can learn a great deal from each otherA third assumption diverges in general from the first

two by desiring to dispense altogether with the pursuitof defining differences and complementarities betweenTEK systems and science That is in this assumptionthere is really no use in even talking theoretically abouta distinction between TEK and science because at theend of the day they are faces of the same phenomenathe pursuit of usable knowledge by human societiesAgrawal for example argues that

The attempt to create distinctions in terms ofindigenous and western is potentially ridiculous Itmakes much more sense to talk about multipledomains and types of knowledges with differinglogics and epistemologies Somewhat contradictorilybut inescapably so the same knowledge can beclassified one way or the other depending on theinterests it serves the purposes for which it isharnessed or the manner in which it is generated [A]nchored unavoidably in institutional origins andmoorings knowledge can only be useful But it isuseful to particular peoples Specific strategies forprotecting systematizing and disseminatingknowledge will differentially benefit different socialgroups and individuals The recognition of this simpletruism is obscured by the confounding labels ofindigenous and western It is only when we moveaway from the sterile dichotomy between indigenousand western when we begin to recognize intra-groupdifferentiation and when we seek out bridges acrossthe constructed chasm between the traditional andthe scientific that we will initiate a productivedialogue to safeguard the interests of those who aredisadvantaged (Agrawal 1995 433)

This third view then suggests that to use terms like in-digenous knowledge or TEK or Western science obscuresseveral important points First TEK and science are allvalue-laden knowledge systems The literature in socialstudies of science shows multiple ways in which science isguided by particular values and even associated with spir-ituality (Biagioli 1999 Turnbull 2000) Second there is noreason why the criteria and values attributed to varioussciences cannot also be those of various TEK systemsMoreover by ldquointra-grouprdquo differentiation Agrawal pointsout that there are few indigenous people who rely on asingle homogenous TEK system rather their knowledgesystem has changed and they likely also rely on differentscientific disciplines as well Examples of this abound likeGuptarsquos 1998 study of how rural farmers in India engagein hybrid agricultural practices that mix Western scientific

and traditional knowledge systems (Gupta 1998) OrWatson-Verran and Turnbull discuss how Western sci-ence is composed of heterogeneous elements (Watson-Verran and Turnbull 1995)Agrawalrsquos position is based on the idea that every society

has some sort of knowledge system which may be a patch-work of systems with multiple origins (eg European indi-genous) There is no such thing as a knowledge systemthat is not guided by peoplersquos interpretations of the chal-lenges that they face And interpretations are influenced byworldviews There is no such thing as a knowledge systemthat is more neutral than any other In the case of scientificdisciplines values of objectivity are based on cosmologicalassumptions about there being subjects and objects in theworld and which beings entities and phenomena fallunder one or the other A science based on such assump-tions may be of limited use to a society that does not carveup reality in this way But on the other hand such a societymay have great use for this kind of information Context iskey Agrawalrsquos assumption speaks to the situation thatmany indigenous peoples encounter in the world Theyneed reliable information for the environmental govern-ance challenges they face And they are likely in the pos-ition to draw from many sources of knowledge Whatknowledge they can use depends on how suitable differentforms of knowledge are for their purposes Whether formsof knowledge are indigenous or not does not really matterin the end Some indigenous peoples may be served per-fectly well by disciplines like biology as the basis of theirenvironmental governance strategies So the implication isthat terms like TEK or indigenous knowledge are not veryuseful and may even waste our time We should focusmore on figuring out what knowledge systems best servethe needs of particular communities and how to realizethem in practiceAs with knowledge mobilization the distinction be-

tween TEK and science does not generate many easy op-tions for consensus on how to define the two in relationto each other First the view that TEK and science mustbe labeled as such and kept distinct misses the realities ofindigenous environmental governance today There is noreason why any so-called TEK system cannot embracesimilar empirical values that are found commonly in vari-ous scientific disciplines One who adopts this assumptionwould perhaps have to consider dropping it were one toconcede that certain values and criteria are not exclusiveto science So it would be tricky for one to accept certainparts of both the first and second assumptions Moreovercontemporary tribal environmental governance involvesexamples of institutions that are guided by TEK but thatuse technologies and methods that originate from non-tribal scientific disciplines (Woodard 2005) Even exam-ples of practices like hunting show that TEK systems areadaptive in their adoption of technologies (Reo and Whyte

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 7 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

2012) In these cases it is hard to imagine a rigid separ-ation between TEK and science and technology becauseTEK systems can incorporate scientific techniques Advo-cates of the third assumption of course would find itfairly difficult to accept the first two assumptions becausethey invoke a distinction between TEK and science tooreadily Agrawalrsquos conclusion is that the term TEK mustbe dispensed with altogether as must particularly loadedconceptions of science So the first assumption seeks tomaintain a rigid separation in definitions the second as-sumption seeks a definition that reveals complementaritythe third assumption can be seen as desiring to dispensewith the business of the first two assumptions altogetherIt is somewhat hard to see people who hold any of these

three assumptions coming to a consensus definition Com-bined with differences regarding knowledge mobilizationit is even harder to see there ever being a single definitionacceptable to all stakeholders But I want to offer anotherfruitful approach to coming to an understanding of TEKthat can advance environmental governance even as wediscuss and disagree on the assumptions underlying vari-ous definitions My approach is different from Agrawalrsquosinsofar as I do not see the need to dispense with the termTEK While Agrawal comes close to my understanding ofthe difficulties in defining TEK he does not draw the onlypossible conclusion from accepting the reality of these dif-ficulties The fact that a term is defined in ways that areproblematic and subject to deep differences does not entailthat it has no use Rather this fact motivates us to considerwhether the term given all its potential definitions andconfusing dimensions has a proper role to play in advan-cing collaborative environmental governance I turn to thistopic in the next subsection

The role of TEK as a collaborative conceptThis subsection shows why TEK should be considered asa collaborative concept that bridges cross-cultural andcross-situational divides To make this case the initialpages of this section focus on the environmental govern-ance situations in which many tribes are embedded and Iuse the term co-management as an example of this I thenmove on to define what a collaborative concept is andhow this relates to the discussion of TEK I have beenbuilding so far in this paper In this sense the initial pagesof this section take a slight detour before returning to theconcept of TEKRegardless of how TEK can be defined what is the role

of the concept of TEK in the first place in the world ofenvironmental governance The world of environmentalgovernance here involves relations between environmen-tal governance institutions associated with and responsibleto indigenous peoples like tribal natural resources depart-ments and those regulating indigenous hunting practicesand governance institutions associated with states and

subnational units like the US Forest Service and Environ-ment Canada All of these institutions have evolved waysof doing things out of histories in which the very idea ofindigenous environmental governance was overtly andsubtly marginalized Times are changing and greater re-spect is accorded to indigenous peoples through inter-national federal and local law and policy These changescreate opportunities for indigenous peoples to work col-laboratively with non-indigenous peoples instead ofagainst them or in secrecy from them (covertly) Indigen-ous peoples can begin to build institutions of environmen-tal governance that are integrated with non-indigenousinstitutions in ways that benefit indigenous communitiesand respect the stewardship goals of their worldviewsBut institution building of this kind is always a work in

progress because of cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides Cross-cultural divides are simply the differences inworldview language lifestyle and so on that obtain be-tween indigenous and non-indigenous populations Forexample an indigenous people may see the goal of restor-ing a native fish species as rekindling the relationship be-tween that species and humans living in the regionwhereas a non-indigenous population may see restorationof the same species as a matter of achieving certain popu-lation numbers conducive to a recreational outcome likeincreasing tourism in the region Cross-cultural dividescan also have an intra-group dimension to them as theremay be differences in beliefs about building relationshipswith a species in an indigenous community and territoryfor example Cross-situational divides are differences incapacities for environmental governance For example anindigenous people may have access to fewer financial re-sources than the neighboring state or province have lim-ited political control over the entire region where itsmembers live and have less representation in nationaldecision-making than representatives of the neighboringstate or province Cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides make collaboration challenging It may be hard forfederal institutions to incorporate indigenous peoplersquosgoals within their policy frameworks It may be frustratingto work across institutions with different bureaucraticcapabilitiesSince the possibility of meaningful collaboration is a rela-

tively recent turn of events there is yet to be perfect guid-ance about how collaboration that bridges cross-culturaland cross-situational divides ought to be done There arecases of success and cases of failure And there is still a lotto be learned regarding whether the lessons from cases ofsuccess can simply be transferred over to other contextsCaught in this predicament there are a host of conceptsthat are being debated as concepts that facilitate or dis-courage genuine collaboration For example the conceptof co-management has been used to suggest a possibleroute to cooperative environmental and natural resources

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 8 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

governance (Goetze 2005)c Co-management invokes theidea of joint political relationships between indigenous andnon-indigenous institutions that work together accordingto standards of fairness to govern particular areas andbkresources Standards of fairness include norms like equalrepresentation and voting rights The concept of co-management is the basis of actual co-management boardsand committees that are composed of indigenous and non-indigenous participants and that are responsible for man-aging a fishery or forested area or particular species like acaribou population Indigenous and non-indigenous insti-tutions often rely on the term co-management as part of ashared language for bridging cross-cultural and cross-situation divides However there is also dialogue on howthe concept of co-management can be taken the wrongway and provide insufficient guidance for collaboration Itis often argued that the concept co-management impliesthat the nation-statersquos (eg Canada US) vision for envir-onmental governance is used to evaluate the collaborativeefforts between indigenous and non-indigenous institu-tions This is because the term ldquomanagementrdquo can connotea non-indigenous view of the appropriate relationshipamong humans other living beings and the environmentThis term can slant the meaning of co-management so thatnon-indigenous participants in a co-management boardfor example come in with expectations that their assump-tions about ldquomanagementrdquo should be prioritized and maynot listen to their indigenous colleagues The term thencan have the effect of silencing genuine negotiation ofcross-cultural and cross-situational differencesInstead the concept of co-existence is offered (McGregor

2004b) which suggests the importance of balancing indi-genous and non-indigenous aspirations of governance intothe evaluation of collaboration In this case one might beinclined to think cynically that it is all about labels Butthere is much more going on than preferences about labelsWe need to consider the role played by concepts likeco-management and co-existence in facilitating or discour-aging collaboration People who reject the concept of co-management based on the contexts they are familiar withsee in it problematic assumptions about how indigenousand non-indigenous institutions should work togetherNon-indigenous people may not see how the concept ofco-management might encourage these assumptions eventhough perhaps co-management is the preferred conceptin some contexts Those who reject the concept of co-management and wish to replace it with the concept of co-existence are inviting non-indigenous people to learn moreabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides This isthe role that concepts like co-management and co-existence play The concept of co-existence does not in it-self contain enough meaning for non-indigenous personsto suggest in advance exactly how a collaborative processshould play out What proponents of co-existence are

saying is that there is much learning to do The concept ofco-existence suggests a very different possibility for collab-oration than what non-indigenous peoples may be used toWork on co-existence expresses an invitation to learnabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides so as toachieve better collaborations in particular contextsThere are two important points here regarding the role

of these concepts First co-management and co-existenceare invoked for better or worse by many different institu-tions in contexts where they are trying to collaborateacross cross-cultural and cross-situational divides Secondthe example of co-existence I gave is an example of howsome people seek to use concepts to improve collaborationby inviting people to consider alternatives that may nothave been on their conceptual radar before The conceptof TEK and its synonyms plays a somewhat analogous roleto the term co-existence As in the first point various defi-nitions of TEK are used in collaborative contexts for betteror worse As in the second point those who bring new def-initions of TEK into dialogue are inviting others to con-sider new possibilities for thinking about the function ofknowledge systems in environmental governanceHowever we need to be precise about what this meansmdash

because I am not arguing that there is a single definition ofTEK that can count for all This is impossible TEK nomatter how it is defined is not adequate for any indigenouscommunity The English articulation TEK is not an indi-genous word or concept and it is likely not used withinvery many communities unto themselves The terms trad-itional and ecological are awkward Traditional can havethe effect of putting knowledge in the past whereas TEK isoften supposed to mean contemporary knowledge Eco-logical aligns TEK with a particular discipline whereas TEKrefers to knowledge that does not stem from that disciplineTerms like indigenous knowledge and native science aresimilarly awkward when we unpack what associations anddissociations they may imply Moreover there may be manycontexts where an indigenous people does see the conceptas referring to accumulated observations for example orcontexts where TEK is viewed as a Western construct ir-relevant to environmental governance There are likelyother contexts where TEK needs to refer to systems of re-sponsibilities There are multiple possible scenarios Theconcept of TEK cannot possibly do justice to the know-ledge systems and articulations of knowledge systems be-longing to the thousands of indigenous peoples TEK is alsonot a concept that was an integral part of the education ofmost ecologists or foresters nor is it a concept that hasexisted for a long time in the federal policies of a nation-state This does not mean though that the concept shouldbe dispensed with Non-indigenous peoples may be equallyuncomfortable with referring to something they are not fa-miliar with as science or linked with a particular scientificdiscipline It may be no easier for them to change out terms

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 9 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

like TEK with even more general terms like Agrawalrsquos ldquous-able knowledgerdquod

Thus whenever the concept of TEK is invoked the rolethat it plays is to suggest that indigenous communitiesmay approach the very question of the nature of know-ledge and how it relates to environmental and natural re-source governance rather differently than disciplines likeecology or biology and the policy contexts in which theyare used By ldquorather differentlyrdquo I do not mean in somesense that applies to all communities For example theremay be some indigenous communities that invoke TEK tomean a radically different cultural paradigm one in whichit is not appropriate to speak of knowledge as distinct frompractice or belief But other indigenous communities wholive in different regions because of historical removal mayinvoke TEK to stand for the values that they believe disci-plines like ecology should serve even if they lack intimateexperiences with the environment they currently inhabitYet other communities might use TEK to suggest differentways in which multiple empirical techniques for gatheringknowledge from huntersrsquo observations to scientific fieldmethods can be used in harmony TEK could also refer toideas about how elders should be involved in the designand peer review of research in tribal environmental de-partments that collect their own data about the environ-ment and the condition of natural resources There aremany more scenarios of course These scenarios indicatethe diversity of how people at a philosophical level thinkabout the meaning of knowledge in relation to their livesAnd their thinking arises from multiple cultural historicalglobal social and personal sourcesThe significance of this point is that when the concept

of TEK is used it really points to the possibility thatthere are cross-cultural and cross-situational divides thatmake it so that non-indigenous parties cannot expecttheir own assumptions to apply to indigenous contextsThe concept of TEK should be invoked to invite non-indigenous parties to learn more about how particularindigenous communities approach fundamental ques-tions of the nature of knowledge and how it fits intotheir visions of environmental governance This invita-tion is not one that promises easy answers Rather it isan invitation to become a part of a long term processwhereby cross-cultural and cross-situation divides arebetter bridged through mutual respect and learning andrelationships among collaborators are given the oppor-tunity to mature Examples of long term processes in-clude ldquothe way of peacerdquo used among indigenous andnon-indigenous participants in the Ontario Model Forest(Holmes et al 2002 Story and Lickers 1997) There aremany other examples We need not only be concernedwith striking the right definition of TEK Rather we needto cultivate attitudes of awareness that the concept ofTEK plays a role as a collaborative concept which is

what I call a concept that invites people to engage in aprocess of respectful learning about significant differ-encese

ConclusionsTEK and its synonyms indigenous knowledge and nativescience have been defined mainly based on two kinds ofassumptions how knowledge is to be mobilized and whatTEKrsquos relation to science is The different assumptionsmake it tricky to come to a consensus definition that satis-fies all stakeholders This makes us interrogate what therole of TEK is in a world of relationships among differentinstitutions of environmental governance for whom TEKis an issue TEK must play the role of inviting cross-cultural and cross-situational learning for indigenous andnon-indigenous policy makers natural resource managersscientists activists elders and youthAn important implication of this is that science and

policy literatures that invoke TEK should discuss it as acollaborative concept That is care must be taken toshow that the concept invites participation to a longterm process of mutually respectful learning And moreeffort needs to be taken to understand what these pro-cesses should look like Already of course there is workthat exemplifies this interpretation of TEK (Barnhardt2005 Ross et al 2010) Yet the point has not beenbrought out that TEK is playing the role of a collabora-tive concept in this work This point should figure morein natural resources and policy literatures Differencesover the meaning of TEK should be seen as invitationsto learn more in circumstances where the possibility ofgenuine collaboration is a relatively recent development

EndnotesaIndigenous peoples refer to the pre-invasion inhabi-

tants of lands now dominated by others examples beingthe Maori in New Zealand or the Anishinaabe in theUnited States and Canada (Anaya 2004)

bI will use the term indigenous knowledge specificallywhen I refer to the work of these authors and shift backto the term TEK for my own analysis My analysis ofAgrawal later on in the same section will also use indi-genous knowledge when referring specifically to hiswork and TEK when referring to my own analysis

cOther collaborative literature includes Fortmann 2008and Colwell-Chanthaphonh and Ferguson 2008

dAgrawal too has considered the role of the concept ofTEK in cross-cultural and cross-situational collabor-ation He argues that

it is possibly the case that advocates of indigenousknowledge find in the term a particularly potent wayto summarize and invoke many of their concerns andhopes about peoples livelihoods life styles and

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 10 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

resource systems they view as disappearing Thephrase evokes embattled ways of living-in-the-worldthat real economic social and political pressures arenudging and frog-marching toward furthermarginalization and oblivion Because the indigenousscientific division of knowledge effectively representsdurable underlying social confrontations the studyand defense of indigenous knowledge continues toattract attention Indeed even as one questions theneed to contrast indigenous and scientificknowledges one underscores this contrastmdashin thevery use of the contrasting adjectives Indigenousknowledge is here to stay even if what it represents isforever and always disappearing (Agrawal 2009 158)

I hope to articulate in this paper that there are farmore reasons why people invoke concepts like TEK orindigenous knowledge than what Agrawal states

eCollaborative concepts also differ from boundary ob-jects (Star and Griesemer 1989) Boundary objects arecommonly shared by diverse stakeholders and serve tocoordinate their actions despite different interests Col-laborative concepts are invitations to learn more whichsuggest the need for a long term process of mutually re-spectful learning

Competing interestsThe author declares that there are no competing interests

AcknowledgmentsI wish to thank Kristie Dotson Michael ORourke Nicholas Reo and theanonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on this paper

Received 11 December 2012 Accepted 17 January 2013Published 5 April 2013

ReferencesAgrawal A (1995) Dismantling the divide between indigenous and scientific

knowledge Dev Change 26(3)413ndash439Agrawal A (2009) Why ldquoindigenousrdquo knowledge J R Soc N Z 39(4)157ndash158Anaya SJ (2004) Indigenous peoples in international law 2nd edition Oxford

University Press New YorkBarnhardt R (2005) Indigenous knowledge systems and Alaska Native ways of

knowing Anthropol Ed Q 36(1)8ndash23Berkes F (1999) Sacred ecology traditional ecological knowledge and resource

management Taylor amp Francis PhiladelphiaBiagioli M (1999) The science studies reader Routledge New YorkBrokensha DW Warren DM Werner O (1980) Indigenous knowledge systems and

development University Press of America Washington DCCajete G (1999) Native science natural laws of interdependence Clear Light

Books Santa Fe NMColwell-Chanthaphonh JS Ferguson TJ (2008) Collaboration in archaeological

practice engaging descendant communities AltaMira Lanham MDEisner WR Cuomo CJ Hinkel KM Jones BM Brower S Ronald H (2009)

Advancing Landscape Change Research through the Incorporation ofIntildeupiaq Knowledge Arctic 62(4)429ndash442

El-Hani C de Ferreira S Bandeira F (2008) Valuing indigenous knowledge to callit ldquosciencerdquo will not help Cult Stud Sci Educ 3(3)751ndash779 doi101007s11422-008-9129-6

Ellen R (2000) Indigenous environmental knowledge and its transformationscritical anthropological perspectives vol 5 Routledge New York

Fortmann L (2008) Participatory research in conservation and rural livelihoodsDoing science together vol 3 Wiley-Blackwell Hoboken

Gadgil M Berkes F Folke C (1993) Indigenous knowledge for biodiversityconservation Ambio 22(23)151ndash156

Goetze TC (2005) Empowered co-management towards power-sharing andindigenous rights in Clayoquot Sound BC Anthropologica 47(2)247ndash265

Gupta A (1998) Postcolonial developments agriculture in the making of modernIndia Duke University Press Durham NC

Harding S (1998) Is science multicultural postcolonialisms feminisms andepistemologies Indiana University Press Bloomington

Harding S (2011) The postcolonial science and technology studies reader DukeUniversity Press Durham NC

Harris G (ed) (2011) Northwest Forest Planmdashthe first 15 years [1994ndash2008]effectiveness of the federal-tribal relationship Tech Paper R6-RPM-TP-01-2011 US Department of Agriculture Forest Service Pacific NorthwestRegion Portland

Holmes E Lickers H Barkley B (2002) A critical assessment of ten years of on-the-ground sustainable forestry in eastern Ontariorsquos settled landscape For Chron78(5)643ndash647

Houde N (2007) The six faces of traditional ecological knowledge challenges andopportunities for Canadian co-management arrangements Ecol Soc 12(2)34

Huntington H (2000) Using traditional ecological knowledge in science methodsand applications Ecol Appl 10(5)1270ndash1274

Kimmerer R (2002) Weaving traditional ecological knowledge into biologicaleducation7 a call to action Bioscience 52(5)432ndash438 doi1016410006-3568(2002)052[0432WTEKIB]20CO2

Kimmerer R Lake F (2001) The role of indigenous burning in land managementJ For 99(11)36ndash41

Kofinas GP (2005) Caribou hunters and researchers at the co-managementinterface emergent dilemmas and the dynamics of legitimacy in powersharing Anthropologica 47(2)179ndash196

Leonetti C (2010) Indigenous stewardship methods and NRCS conservationpractices United States Department of Agriculture Natural ResourcesConservation Service Anchorage

McGregor D (2004a) Coming full circle indigenous knowledge environment andour future Am Indian Q 28(3amp4)385ndash410

McGregor D (2004b) Traditional ecological knowledge and sustainabledevelopment towards coexistence In Blaser M Feit HA McRae G (ed) In theway of development indigenous peoples life projects and globalizationZedIDRC Ottawa

McGregor D (2008) Linking traditional ecological knowledge and westernscience aboriginal perspectives from the 2000 State of the Lakes EcosystemConference Can J Nativ Stud XXVIII(1)139ndash158

Nadasdy P (1999) The politics of TEK power and the integration of knowledgeArct Anthropol 36(1ndash2)1ndash18

Nakashima DJ (1993) Astute observers on the sea ice edge Inuit knowledge as abasis for arctic co-management In Inglis J (ed) Traditional ecologicalknoweldge concepts and cases International Program on TraditionalEcological Knowledge and International Development Research CentreOttawa pp 99ndash110

Nakashima DJ Galloway McLean K Thulstrup HD Ramos Castillo A Rubis JT(2012) Weathering uncertainty traditional knowledge for climate changeassessment and adaptation UNESCO and Darwin UNU Paris

Pierotti R Wildcat D (2000) Traditional ecological knowledge the thirdalternative Ecol Appl 10(5)1333ndash1340

Reo N Whyte K (2012) Hunting and morality as elements of traditional ecologicalknowledge Hum Ecol 40(1)15ndash27 doi101007s10745-011-9448-1

Ross A Sherman R Snodgrass JG Delcore HD (2010) Indigenous peoples and thecollaborative stewardship of nature knowledge binds and institutionalconflicts Left Coast Press Walnut Creek CA

Salmon E (1996) Decolonizing our voices Winds Change 11(3)70ndash72Siegel H (1997) Science education multicultural and universal Interchange 28

(2)97ndash108Star SL Griesemer JR (1989) Institutional ecology Translations and boundary

objects amateurs and professionals in Berkeleys museum of vertebratezoology 1907ndash39 Soc Stud Sci 19(3)387ndash420

Story P Lickers F (1997) Partnership building for sustainable development a FirstNations perspective from Ontario J Sustain For 4(3ndash4)149ndash162

Turnbull D (2000) Masons tricksters and cartographers comparative studies inthe sociology of scientific and indigenous knowledge Taylor amp FrancisPhiladelphia

UNEP (1998) Report of the fourth meeting of the parties to the convention onbiodiversity UNEPCBDCOP Nairobi Kenya

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 11 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

defined in science and policy literatures and what purposeit serves for improving cooperative environmental andnatural resources stewardship and management betweenindigenous and non-indigenous institutions The philo-sophical method applied here is one that outlines numer-ous possible meanings of a concept (TEK in this paper)and the implications of each meaning for science and pol-icy The argument about TEK as a collaborative conceptintends to spur greater reflective discussion among therelevant audiences on the meaning of a concept that maybe controversial or simply taken for granted This paperattempts to complement the scientific papers in this spe-cial issue of Ecological Processes

Results and discussionIn science and policy literatures there are different defini-tions of TEK Controversy can brew over TEK whenpeople hold definitions that are based on different as-sumptions There are two kinds of assumptions about themeaning of TEK The first kind refers to assumptionsabout the mobilization of TEK or what I call knowledgemobilization Knowledge mobilization refers to assump-tions about what different types of knowledge can be usedfor and their adaptability to suit different contexts Thesecond kind involves assumptions about how to under-stand the relationship between TEK and disciplines likeecology or biology or in other words the relation be-tween TEK and science The two kinds of assumptions(knowledge mobilization TEK and science) can generatecontroversy because they imply differences about ldquowhoserdquodefinition of TEK gets privileged who is counted as hav-ing expert authority over environmental governance is-sues and how TEK should be factored into policyprocesses that already have a role for disciplines like for-estry or toxicology in them The section ldquoTEK and know-ledge mobilizationrdquo begins to discuss these assumptionsstarting with knowledge mobilization The section ldquoTherelation between TEK and sciencerdquo begins the discussionon the second kind of assumption (the relation betweenTEK and science)

TEK and knowledge mobilizationSome definitions see TEK as a basic body of knowledgeAccording to Nakashima et al TEK is ldquothe knowledgeof Native people about their natural environmentrdquo(Nakashima 1993 99) This basic body of knowledge isusually defined as having been gathered across genera-tions ldquoIndigenous or traditional knowledge refers tothe knowledge and know-how accumulated across gen-erations and renewed by each new generation whichguide human societies in their innumerable interactionswith their surrounding environmentrdquo (Nakashima et al2012 8) Definitions like this emphasize TEK as a sub-stantive body of knowledge that is created and stored

by human societies to aid in their flourishing in the faceof environmental and natural resources challenges Thetime scale of this knowledge is many generations Inthis sense TEK is taken as archival in nature It is astore of knowledge of the relationships between livingthings and their environmentA key assumption about knowledge mobilization in

this definition is that TEK is a supply of knowledgeready to hand to be used by people in different contextsIn the policy document Weathering Uncertainty Trad-itional Knowledge for Climate Change Assessment andAdaptation (United Nations) Nakashima et al write thatsuch ldquocommunity-based and local knowledge may offervaluable insights into environmental change due toclimate change and complement broader-scale scienti-fic research with local precision and nuancerdquo (20126) They go on to state as an example that ldquoIndigenousobservations and interpretations of meteorological phe-nomena have guided seasonal and inter-annual activitiesof local communities for millennia This knowledge con-tributes to climate science by offering observations andinterpretations at a much finer spatial scale with consid-erable temporal depth and by highlighting elements thatmay not be considered by climate scientistsrdquo (8) In thisexample TEK is a body of knowledge or archivewaiting to be picked up by climate science TEK is con-ceived as an archive that is continually updated or anarchive of a society that no longer exists yet biologistsor ecologists can nonetheless find the knowledge and in-corporate it into their researchThe assumption that TEK is a basic body of know-

ledge is often accompanied by the idea that elements ofa societyrsquos worldview are an intimate dimension of itsTEK system Berkes for example defines TEK as ldquoa cu-mulative body of knowledge practice and belief evolvingby adaptive processes and handed down through genera-tions by cultural transmission about the relationship ofliving things (including humans) with one another andwith their environmentrdquo (Berkes 1999 8 see also Gadgilet al 1993 151) This definition situates TEK as a bodyof ldquoknowledge practice and beliefrdquo inspired by a particu-lar worldview and bioregion It is interwoven with asocietyrsquos cultural fabric Here TEK is not just an archivebut a part of what members of a particular culture thinkbelieve and do It is situated knowledgeThe definition of TEK as a situated body of knowledge is

found in policy documents For example the Natural Re-sources Conservation Service (NRCS) published Indigen-ous Stewardship Methods and NRCS which aims to guideNRCS staff to work better with tribes TEK is seen asbound up with ldquoindigenous stewardship methodrdquo which isdefined as the ldquoecologically sustainable use of natural re-sources within their capacity to sustain natural processesrdquoIndigenous stewardship method (ISM) is possibly a

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 3 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

subset of Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK)in which indigenous peoples acquired the knowledgebase over hundreds of years through direct experienceand contact with the environment ISM is thephysical spiritual mental emotional and intuitiverelationship of indigenous peoples with all aspects andelements of their environment

These relationships include but are not limited to acombination of knowledge experience traditionplaces locality all living and nonliving things skillspractices theories social strategies momentsspirituality history heritage and more and may notbe fully embraced by people who fail to understand allthose dimensions (Leonetti 2010 13)

In this definition TEK is considered a knowledge ldquobaserdquoor body of knowledge though one embedded within mul-tiple relationships among living beings non-living thingsand the environment The passage above also raises aquestion concerning the degree that outsiders will be ableto respect or comprehend a TEK system But the purposeof the NRCS guide is to advance a set of best practicesand principles so that NRCS staff can begin to work withcommunities for whom TEK forms a significant dimen-sion of their lifewaysAn implication of definitions based on the assumption

that TEK is a body of knowledge is that TEK can be pickedup and used by scientists or agency staff Each of the policydocuments just cited involves the idea that TEK can begleaned from the communities who have it either throughhistorical research or working with actual communitiesand can then be incorporated into the environmental gov-ernance of non-indigenous institutions like those of theUnited Nations or US Department of Agriculture So theassumption about knowledge mobilization is that TEK nomatter what the society is ldquosomethingrdquo that can be seen asarchival With some effort it can be interpreted for use indifferent contexts especially science policy contexts thatis contexts where there is a given role for scientific infor-mation in environmental governanceSome indigenous scientists in particular have offered

definitions of TEK that resist the assumption that it ismainly a body of knowledge McGregor for example ar-gues that TEK involves the relationships between ldquoknow-ledge people and all Creation (the lsquonaturalrsquo world aswell as the spiritual) TEK is viewed as the process ofparticipating (a verb) fully and responsibly in such rela-tionships rather than specifically as the knowledgegained from such experiences For Aboriginal peopleTEK is not just about understanding relationships it isthe relationship with Creation TEK is something onedoesrdquo (McGregor 2004ab 2008 145) For McGregorTEK refers to the activities that people in indigenous

societies are doing as part of their stewardship It is notarchival or body-like To speak of a societyrsquos TEK is tospeak of ongoing activities expressive of responsibilitiesThe ideas of ldquofullyrdquo and ldquoresponsiblyrdquo suggest what in

the field of philosophy is often called moral character orjust character Character refers to the idea that acting re-sponsibly (and hence ethically) is a matter of possessingembodied traits like courage or respect that enable oneto know the right thing to do in particular situations andto act in ways that maintain relations of balance withinonersquos society People who possess the character traitsalso possess the internal motivation to do what is rightWithin a societyrsquos system of responsibilities characterrefers to the particular traits that people acquire overmany years (since childhood) in order to express respon-sibilities and balanced relationships in all that they doDefinitions like McGregorrsquos see TEK systems as systemsof responsibilities that cannot be detached from thecharacter traits required to fulfill the moral demands ofthese systemsOther native scholars have also emphasized the re-

sponsibilities and character dimensions of TEK Pierottiand Wildcat see TEK as

based in the knowledge that native societies existedunder conditions of constant pressure on the resourcesupon which they depended and that a means had to befound to convince communities and families toeconomize with regard to their use of naturalresources The connections that are a crucial aspectof TEK are based on a mixture of extraction eganimals are taken as prey combined with recognitionof the inherent value and good of non-human livesTraditional knowledge is based on the premise thathumans should not view themselves as responsible fornature ie we are not stewards of the nature world butinstead that we are a part of that world no greater thanany other part In this way TEK deals largely withmotivating humans to show respect for nonhumans(Pierotti and Wildcat 2000 1336)

Pierotti and Wildcat see motivation an important as-pect of character as a key component of TEK Theyeven suggest that terms like stewardship are not suffi-cient for describing the actual intimacies involved in re-lationships among living beings and non-living things onwhich TEK systems are based As with McGregor TEKis a doing a full participation in a system of responsibil-ities needed for a societyrsquos flourishing For both Pierottiand Wildcat and McGregor great emphasis is placed onthe idea that TEK is not knowledge about relationshipsbut is the complete participation in the responsibilitiesSimilar definitions are found in the work of other indi-genous scholars (Reo and Whyte 2012 Cajete 1999)

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 4 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

TEK systems then are systems of responsibilities thatarise from particular cosmological beliefs about the rela-tionships between living beings and non-living things orhumans and the natural world There is an important im-plication for knowledge mobilization TEK cannot bereadily transferred to different contexts unless the peoplein the new context also learn the systems of responsibil-ities and character traits Such learning entails completecultural immersion Thus it could be problematic on thesystem of responsibility assumption to see TEK as some-thing that could be incorporated by for example climatescience For climate science may not be used in a policycontext that seeks to integrate the system of responsibil-ities of a particular indigenous people into its strategiesfor environmental governanceThe body of knowledge assumption and the system of

responsibility assumption are different in important waysto the degree that they underlie various definitions of TEKIn terms of the former TEK can be extracted from its soci-ety and fit into policy-relevant science The gist goes some-thing like this climate science for example already fitswithin a particular policy context This fit is not deter-mined by indigenous peoples That is indigenous peoplesare not active participants in the majority of decisions ofgovernments universities and organizations about whatfunding programs to create for climate science and forselecting who should be on review panels Moreover TEKis not taken to be tied in any important ways to particularstewardship or management strategies Insofar as climatescience in sticking with the last example fits into a par-ticular kind of understanding of management or adapta-tion TEK is seen to contribute to that by being pluggedinto structures of scientific inquiry But definitions basedon the assumption that TEK is a system of responsibilitiessuggest that for TEK to be genuinely included the peoplewho participate fully in it must be at the table equally withnon-indigenous scientists and policy makers TEK is not apiece broken off of one of these strategies and applied toanother TEK just is the living environmental governanceof indigenous peoples stemming directly from their cos-mologies in relation to the environmental challenges theyhave faced over many generationsThe difference between the two assumptions can en-

gender some difficulties in forming a consensus on thedefinition of TEK in terms of knowledge mobilizationOne assumption seeks to fit TEK within established sci-ence policy decision-making frameworks whereas theother seeks to change this framework in favor of greaterparticipation by indigenous peoples

The relation between TEK and scienceTEK is also defined in ways that are based on assumptionsabout its relation to disciplines like forestry or climatologyThe kind of assumption active in these definitions involves

how TEK can be compared or contrasted to scientific dis-ciplines (ie science) There are three assumptions cov-ered in this subsection (1) TEK and science should beseen as separate knowledge production systems Thisdistinction should never be collapsed (2) TEK and scienceshould be seen as twins or two knowledge-bearingperspectives on the world that complement each other(3) There is no basis for distinguishing TEK or Indigen-ous knowledge from science and the term TEK or itssynonyms should not be used In all three of these viewsthere is a lot riding on how TEK and science are seen asrelated to each other because there are implications forwhat sorts of empirical authorities are deemed relevantfor environmental governanceThe first version of this kind of assumption is that

TEK and science are sufficiently different to warrantmaintaining separate definitions Proponents of this viewbelieve that there are definite differences in the valuesand aspirations of science and those of TEK systemsEl-Hani and Souza de Ferreira Bandeira exemplify thisview They use the term ldquoindigenous knowledgerdquo insteadof TEK though their use of this term is synonymouswith TEK because they are talking about indigenous peo-plesrsquo knowledge of the natural world and the relation-ships between living things and the environmentb Theysee Western modern science as ldquothe most powerful wayof producing naturalistic explanations of natural phe-nomenardquo Yet it is also the case that ldquothere are plenty ofdifferent accounts of the world [ie indigenous know-ledge] which are also powerful in their own waysrdquo (2008756) They see indigenous knowledge as part of this lat-ter grouping these other accounts ldquoare producing expla-nations about supernatural (or maybe non-natural is abetter term) beings and phenomena that are useful toseveral human cultures And in the face of natural phe-nomena they are producing explanations that appeal tospiritual domains going beyond naturalistic chains ornetworks of eventsrdquo (2008 756) The key to this differ-ence then is that indigenous knowledge usually involvessome account of non-natural beings whereas science al-ways excludes these non-natural beings This reflectssome of the ideas of the previous section where TEK istied to spiritualityTo call something science then for El-Hani and Souza

de Ferreira Bandeira certain standards must be met Forexample science embodies values and skills such asldquotechnical precision control creative genius and ex-planatory power rdquo Quoting Siegel they argue that sci-ence and indigenous knowledge could only be the samething ldquoif it could be cogently argued that some particularlsquoethnicrsquo science offered compelling theoriespredic-tionsexplanations of natural phenomena Could an ani-mistic ethnic theory of volcanic activity and lavaflow provide the sort of explanation prediction grasp

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 5 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

of relations among unobservables and between observ-ables and unobservables and depth of scientific under-standing provided by Western sciencerdquo (El-Hani et al2008 757 Siegel 1997 100) According to this under-standing there are definite values and knowledge-bearing capabilities of science that cannot be attributedto indigenous knowledge of the environmentIndigenous knowledge while it may produce important

knowledge does not do so in the ways that scientific disci-plines do This is according to the authors not a form ofdiscrimination ldquoNotice that we are not saying that theway this community builds knowledge the knowledgebuilt or the criteria employed to appraise cognitive state-ments are epistemically superior to any other body of ap-proaches ideas statements criteria We are just sayingthat they are different and should be kept different forthe sake of clarity about the nature of knowledge and thenature of sciencerdquo (El-Hani and Souza de FerreiraBandeira 2008 758) In this assumption about indigenousknowledge (or TEK) and science there are definite cri-teria values skills and so on that science and TEK havebut there is not a lot of crossover So TEKrsquos supernaturaland social aspects respectfully so exclude the possibilityof the kind of rationality associated with science More-over societies without computing capacities built intotheir TEK systems cannot value quantitative research inthe same way that it is valued in natural sciences disci-plines nor can they engage in the same kind of researchThis first assumption that TEK and science are funda-

mentally different differs from the second assumptionwhich sees the former and the latter as two complemen-tary perspectives on the environment that stem fromcomplementary views on the world The views are com-plementary because there is both crossover as well asgap filling Kimmerer argues that

Traditional ecological knowledge refers to theknowledge practice and belief concerning therelationships of living beings to one another and tothe physical environment which is held by peoples inrelatively nontechnical societies with a directdependence upon local resources It is born of longintimacy and attentiveness to a homeland and canarise wherever people are materially and spirituallyintegrated within their landscape TEK is rational andreliable knowledge that has been developed throughgenerations of intimate contact by native peoples withtheir lands (Kimmerer 2002 431)

TEK and science for Kimmerer can be seen as having acomplementary relation to each other Indeed TEK can beseen as the ldquointellectual twin to sciencerdquo a term she bor-rows from Deloria (433) Kimmerer claims that TEK existsldquoin parallel to Western sciencerdquo (433) She claims that ldquoBoth

knowledge systems yield detailed empirical information ofnatural phenomena and relationships among ecosystemcomponentsrdquo This can include ldquopredictive powerrdquo overlap-ping biological information ldquodetailed empirical knowledgeof population biology resource assessment and monitoringsuccessional dynamics patterns of fluctuation in climateand resources species interactions ethnotaxonomy sus-tainable harvesting and adaptive management and ma-nipulation of disturbance regimes rdquo (Kimmerer 2002433) Yet TEK differs from science for Kimmerer in import-ant ways

TEK observations tend to be qualitative and theycreate a diachronic database that is a record ofobservations from a single locale over a long timeperiod The National Science Foundation in itssupport of the Long-Term Ecological Researchprogram has validated the importance of suchcontinuous data In TEK the observers tend to be theresource users themselves for example huntersfishers and gatherers whose harvesting success isinextricably linked to the quality and reliability oftheir ecological observations In contrast scientificobservations made by a small group of professionalstend to be quantitative and often represent synchronicdata or simultaneous observations from a wide rangeof sites which frequently lack the long-termperspective of TEK Western science is conductedin academic culture in which nature is viewed strictlyobjectively TEK is woven into and is inseparablefrom the social and spiritual contexts of the culture TEK may also extend its explanatory power beyondthe strictly empirical where science cannot go Inindigenous science nature is subject not object Embraced as an equal partner to the power ofWestern science TEK offers not only importantbiological insights but a cultural framework forenvironmental problem solving that incorporateshuman values (Kimmerer 2002 433ndash434)

Here then for Kimmerer TEK and science are two paral-lel complementary perspectives on the environment andnatural resources They go hand in hand Different fromthe first assumption Kimmerer has no problem using con-cepts like ldquopredictionrdquo or ldquorationalrdquo with respect to TEKnor stating straightforwardly that techniques in TEK sys-tems fit well with and are valued by science She also showsthat the influence of culture in TEK systems could be con-sidered beneficial to science Though she admits differ-ences they are not the stark differences that are maintainedin the first assumption For Kimmerer then knowledgeproduction that fails to incorporate both TEK systems andthe relevant sciences would be missing key perspectives onthe world Instead of saying that they are valuable in their

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 6 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

own ways (as in the first assumption) Kimmerer is sayingthat they are valuable together Both knowledge productionsystems can learn a great deal from each otherA third assumption diverges in general from the first

two by desiring to dispense altogether with the pursuitof defining differences and complementarities betweenTEK systems and science That is in this assumptionthere is really no use in even talking theoretically abouta distinction between TEK and science because at theend of the day they are faces of the same phenomenathe pursuit of usable knowledge by human societiesAgrawal for example argues that

The attempt to create distinctions in terms ofindigenous and western is potentially ridiculous Itmakes much more sense to talk about multipledomains and types of knowledges with differinglogics and epistemologies Somewhat contradictorilybut inescapably so the same knowledge can beclassified one way or the other depending on theinterests it serves the purposes for which it isharnessed or the manner in which it is generated [A]nchored unavoidably in institutional origins andmoorings knowledge can only be useful But it isuseful to particular peoples Specific strategies forprotecting systematizing and disseminatingknowledge will differentially benefit different socialgroups and individuals The recognition of this simpletruism is obscured by the confounding labels ofindigenous and western It is only when we moveaway from the sterile dichotomy between indigenousand western when we begin to recognize intra-groupdifferentiation and when we seek out bridges acrossthe constructed chasm between the traditional andthe scientific that we will initiate a productivedialogue to safeguard the interests of those who aredisadvantaged (Agrawal 1995 433)

This third view then suggests that to use terms like in-digenous knowledge or TEK or Western science obscuresseveral important points First TEK and science are allvalue-laden knowledge systems The literature in socialstudies of science shows multiple ways in which science isguided by particular values and even associated with spir-ituality (Biagioli 1999 Turnbull 2000) Second there is noreason why the criteria and values attributed to varioussciences cannot also be those of various TEK systemsMoreover by ldquointra-grouprdquo differentiation Agrawal pointsout that there are few indigenous people who rely on asingle homogenous TEK system rather their knowledgesystem has changed and they likely also rely on differentscientific disciplines as well Examples of this abound likeGuptarsquos 1998 study of how rural farmers in India engagein hybrid agricultural practices that mix Western scientific

and traditional knowledge systems (Gupta 1998) OrWatson-Verran and Turnbull discuss how Western sci-ence is composed of heterogeneous elements (Watson-Verran and Turnbull 1995)Agrawalrsquos position is based on the idea that every society

has some sort of knowledge system which may be a patch-work of systems with multiple origins (eg European indi-genous) There is no such thing as a knowledge systemthat is not guided by peoplersquos interpretations of the chal-lenges that they face And interpretations are influenced byworldviews There is no such thing as a knowledge systemthat is more neutral than any other In the case of scientificdisciplines values of objectivity are based on cosmologicalassumptions about there being subjects and objects in theworld and which beings entities and phenomena fallunder one or the other A science based on such assump-tions may be of limited use to a society that does not carveup reality in this way But on the other hand such a societymay have great use for this kind of information Context iskey Agrawalrsquos assumption speaks to the situation thatmany indigenous peoples encounter in the world Theyneed reliable information for the environmental govern-ance challenges they face And they are likely in the pos-ition to draw from many sources of knowledge Whatknowledge they can use depends on how suitable differentforms of knowledge are for their purposes Whether formsof knowledge are indigenous or not does not really matterin the end Some indigenous peoples may be served per-fectly well by disciplines like biology as the basis of theirenvironmental governance strategies So the implication isthat terms like TEK or indigenous knowledge are not veryuseful and may even waste our time We should focusmore on figuring out what knowledge systems best servethe needs of particular communities and how to realizethem in practiceAs with knowledge mobilization the distinction be-

tween TEK and science does not generate many easy op-tions for consensus on how to define the two in relationto each other First the view that TEK and science mustbe labeled as such and kept distinct misses the realities ofindigenous environmental governance today There is noreason why any so-called TEK system cannot embracesimilar empirical values that are found commonly in vari-ous scientific disciplines One who adopts this assumptionwould perhaps have to consider dropping it were one toconcede that certain values and criteria are not exclusiveto science So it would be tricky for one to accept certainparts of both the first and second assumptions Moreovercontemporary tribal environmental governance involvesexamples of institutions that are guided by TEK but thatuse technologies and methods that originate from non-tribal scientific disciplines (Woodard 2005) Even exam-ples of practices like hunting show that TEK systems areadaptive in their adoption of technologies (Reo and Whyte

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 7 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

2012) In these cases it is hard to imagine a rigid separ-ation between TEK and science and technology becauseTEK systems can incorporate scientific techniques Advo-cates of the third assumption of course would find itfairly difficult to accept the first two assumptions becausethey invoke a distinction between TEK and science tooreadily Agrawalrsquos conclusion is that the term TEK mustbe dispensed with altogether as must particularly loadedconceptions of science So the first assumption seeks tomaintain a rigid separation in definitions the second as-sumption seeks a definition that reveals complementaritythe third assumption can be seen as desiring to dispensewith the business of the first two assumptions altogetherIt is somewhat hard to see people who hold any of these

three assumptions coming to a consensus definition Com-bined with differences regarding knowledge mobilizationit is even harder to see there ever being a single definitionacceptable to all stakeholders But I want to offer anotherfruitful approach to coming to an understanding of TEKthat can advance environmental governance even as wediscuss and disagree on the assumptions underlying vari-ous definitions My approach is different from Agrawalrsquosinsofar as I do not see the need to dispense with the termTEK While Agrawal comes close to my understanding ofthe difficulties in defining TEK he does not draw the onlypossible conclusion from accepting the reality of these dif-ficulties The fact that a term is defined in ways that areproblematic and subject to deep differences does not entailthat it has no use Rather this fact motivates us to considerwhether the term given all its potential definitions andconfusing dimensions has a proper role to play in advan-cing collaborative environmental governance I turn to thistopic in the next subsection

The role of TEK as a collaborative conceptThis subsection shows why TEK should be considered asa collaborative concept that bridges cross-cultural andcross-situational divides To make this case the initialpages of this section focus on the environmental govern-ance situations in which many tribes are embedded and Iuse the term co-management as an example of this I thenmove on to define what a collaborative concept is andhow this relates to the discussion of TEK I have beenbuilding so far in this paper In this sense the initial pagesof this section take a slight detour before returning to theconcept of TEKRegardless of how TEK can be defined what is the role

of the concept of TEK in the first place in the world ofenvironmental governance The world of environmentalgovernance here involves relations between environmen-tal governance institutions associated with and responsibleto indigenous peoples like tribal natural resources depart-ments and those regulating indigenous hunting practicesand governance institutions associated with states and

subnational units like the US Forest Service and Environ-ment Canada All of these institutions have evolved waysof doing things out of histories in which the very idea ofindigenous environmental governance was overtly andsubtly marginalized Times are changing and greater re-spect is accorded to indigenous peoples through inter-national federal and local law and policy These changescreate opportunities for indigenous peoples to work col-laboratively with non-indigenous peoples instead ofagainst them or in secrecy from them (covertly) Indigen-ous peoples can begin to build institutions of environmen-tal governance that are integrated with non-indigenousinstitutions in ways that benefit indigenous communitiesand respect the stewardship goals of their worldviewsBut institution building of this kind is always a work in

progress because of cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides Cross-cultural divides are simply the differences inworldview language lifestyle and so on that obtain be-tween indigenous and non-indigenous populations Forexample an indigenous people may see the goal of restor-ing a native fish species as rekindling the relationship be-tween that species and humans living in the regionwhereas a non-indigenous population may see restorationof the same species as a matter of achieving certain popu-lation numbers conducive to a recreational outcome likeincreasing tourism in the region Cross-cultural dividescan also have an intra-group dimension to them as theremay be differences in beliefs about building relationshipswith a species in an indigenous community and territoryfor example Cross-situational divides are differences incapacities for environmental governance For example anindigenous people may have access to fewer financial re-sources than the neighboring state or province have lim-ited political control over the entire region where itsmembers live and have less representation in nationaldecision-making than representatives of the neighboringstate or province Cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides make collaboration challenging It may be hard forfederal institutions to incorporate indigenous peoplersquosgoals within their policy frameworks It may be frustratingto work across institutions with different bureaucraticcapabilitiesSince the possibility of meaningful collaboration is a rela-

tively recent turn of events there is yet to be perfect guid-ance about how collaboration that bridges cross-culturaland cross-situational divides ought to be done There arecases of success and cases of failure And there is still a lotto be learned regarding whether the lessons from cases ofsuccess can simply be transferred over to other contextsCaught in this predicament there are a host of conceptsthat are being debated as concepts that facilitate or dis-courage genuine collaboration For example the conceptof co-management has been used to suggest a possibleroute to cooperative environmental and natural resources

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 8 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

governance (Goetze 2005)c Co-management invokes theidea of joint political relationships between indigenous andnon-indigenous institutions that work together accordingto standards of fairness to govern particular areas andbkresources Standards of fairness include norms like equalrepresentation and voting rights The concept of co-management is the basis of actual co-management boardsand committees that are composed of indigenous and non-indigenous participants and that are responsible for man-aging a fishery or forested area or particular species like acaribou population Indigenous and non-indigenous insti-tutions often rely on the term co-management as part of ashared language for bridging cross-cultural and cross-situation divides However there is also dialogue on howthe concept of co-management can be taken the wrongway and provide insufficient guidance for collaboration Itis often argued that the concept co-management impliesthat the nation-statersquos (eg Canada US) vision for envir-onmental governance is used to evaluate the collaborativeefforts between indigenous and non-indigenous institu-tions This is because the term ldquomanagementrdquo can connotea non-indigenous view of the appropriate relationshipamong humans other living beings and the environmentThis term can slant the meaning of co-management so thatnon-indigenous participants in a co-management boardfor example come in with expectations that their assump-tions about ldquomanagementrdquo should be prioritized and maynot listen to their indigenous colleagues The term thencan have the effect of silencing genuine negotiation ofcross-cultural and cross-situational differencesInstead the concept of co-existence is offered (McGregor

2004b) which suggests the importance of balancing indi-genous and non-indigenous aspirations of governance intothe evaluation of collaboration In this case one might beinclined to think cynically that it is all about labels Butthere is much more going on than preferences about labelsWe need to consider the role played by concepts likeco-management and co-existence in facilitating or discour-aging collaboration People who reject the concept of co-management based on the contexts they are familiar withsee in it problematic assumptions about how indigenousand non-indigenous institutions should work togetherNon-indigenous people may not see how the concept ofco-management might encourage these assumptions eventhough perhaps co-management is the preferred conceptin some contexts Those who reject the concept of co-management and wish to replace it with the concept of co-existence are inviting non-indigenous people to learn moreabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides This isthe role that concepts like co-management and co-existence play The concept of co-existence does not in it-self contain enough meaning for non-indigenous personsto suggest in advance exactly how a collaborative processshould play out What proponents of co-existence are

saying is that there is much learning to do The concept ofco-existence suggests a very different possibility for collab-oration than what non-indigenous peoples may be used toWork on co-existence expresses an invitation to learnabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides so as toachieve better collaborations in particular contextsThere are two important points here regarding the role

of these concepts First co-management and co-existenceare invoked for better or worse by many different institu-tions in contexts where they are trying to collaborateacross cross-cultural and cross-situational divides Secondthe example of co-existence I gave is an example of howsome people seek to use concepts to improve collaborationby inviting people to consider alternatives that may nothave been on their conceptual radar before The conceptof TEK and its synonyms plays a somewhat analogous roleto the term co-existence As in the first point various defi-nitions of TEK are used in collaborative contexts for betteror worse As in the second point those who bring new def-initions of TEK into dialogue are inviting others to con-sider new possibilities for thinking about the function ofknowledge systems in environmental governanceHowever we need to be precise about what this meansmdash

because I am not arguing that there is a single definition ofTEK that can count for all This is impossible TEK nomatter how it is defined is not adequate for any indigenouscommunity The English articulation TEK is not an indi-genous word or concept and it is likely not used withinvery many communities unto themselves The terms trad-itional and ecological are awkward Traditional can havethe effect of putting knowledge in the past whereas TEK isoften supposed to mean contemporary knowledge Eco-logical aligns TEK with a particular discipline whereas TEKrefers to knowledge that does not stem from that disciplineTerms like indigenous knowledge and native science aresimilarly awkward when we unpack what associations anddissociations they may imply Moreover there may be manycontexts where an indigenous people does see the conceptas referring to accumulated observations for example orcontexts where TEK is viewed as a Western construct ir-relevant to environmental governance There are likelyother contexts where TEK needs to refer to systems of re-sponsibilities There are multiple possible scenarios Theconcept of TEK cannot possibly do justice to the know-ledge systems and articulations of knowledge systems be-longing to the thousands of indigenous peoples TEK is alsonot a concept that was an integral part of the education ofmost ecologists or foresters nor is it a concept that hasexisted for a long time in the federal policies of a nation-state This does not mean though that the concept shouldbe dispensed with Non-indigenous peoples may be equallyuncomfortable with referring to something they are not fa-miliar with as science or linked with a particular scientificdiscipline It may be no easier for them to change out terms

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 9 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

like TEK with even more general terms like Agrawalrsquos ldquous-able knowledgerdquod

Thus whenever the concept of TEK is invoked the rolethat it plays is to suggest that indigenous communitiesmay approach the very question of the nature of know-ledge and how it relates to environmental and natural re-source governance rather differently than disciplines likeecology or biology and the policy contexts in which theyare used By ldquorather differentlyrdquo I do not mean in somesense that applies to all communities For example theremay be some indigenous communities that invoke TEK tomean a radically different cultural paradigm one in whichit is not appropriate to speak of knowledge as distinct frompractice or belief But other indigenous communities wholive in different regions because of historical removal mayinvoke TEK to stand for the values that they believe disci-plines like ecology should serve even if they lack intimateexperiences with the environment they currently inhabitYet other communities might use TEK to suggest differentways in which multiple empirical techniques for gatheringknowledge from huntersrsquo observations to scientific fieldmethods can be used in harmony TEK could also refer toideas about how elders should be involved in the designand peer review of research in tribal environmental de-partments that collect their own data about the environ-ment and the condition of natural resources There aremany more scenarios of course These scenarios indicatethe diversity of how people at a philosophical level thinkabout the meaning of knowledge in relation to their livesAnd their thinking arises from multiple cultural historicalglobal social and personal sourcesThe significance of this point is that when the concept

of TEK is used it really points to the possibility thatthere are cross-cultural and cross-situational divides thatmake it so that non-indigenous parties cannot expecttheir own assumptions to apply to indigenous contextsThe concept of TEK should be invoked to invite non-indigenous parties to learn more about how particularindigenous communities approach fundamental ques-tions of the nature of knowledge and how it fits intotheir visions of environmental governance This invita-tion is not one that promises easy answers Rather it isan invitation to become a part of a long term processwhereby cross-cultural and cross-situation divides arebetter bridged through mutual respect and learning andrelationships among collaborators are given the oppor-tunity to mature Examples of long term processes in-clude ldquothe way of peacerdquo used among indigenous andnon-indigenous participants in the Ontario Model Forest(Holmes et al 2002 Story and Lickers 1997) There aremany other examples We need not only be concernedwith striking the right definition of TEK Rather we needto cultivate attitudes of awareness that the concept ofTEK plays a role as a collaborative concept which is

what I call a concept that invites people to engage in aprocess of respectful learning about significant differ-encese

ConclusionsTEK and its synonyms indigenous knowledge and nativescience have been defined mainly based on two kinds ofassumptions how knowledge is to be mobilized and whatTEKrsquos relation to science is The different assumptionsmake it tricky to come to a consensus definition that satis-fies all stakeholders This makes us interrogate what therole of TEK is in a world of relationships among differentinstitutions of environmental governance for whom TEKis an issue TEK must play the role of inviting cross-cultural and cross-situational learning for indigenous andnon-indigenous policy makers natural resource managersscientists activists elders and youthAn important implication of this is that science and

policy literatures that invoke TEK should discuss it as acollaborative concept That is care must be taken toshow that the concept invites participation to a longterm process of mutually respectful learning And moreeffort needs to be taken to understand what these pro-cesses should look like Already of course there is workthat exemplifies this interpretation of TEK (Barnhardt2005 Ross et al 2010) Yet the point has not beenbrought out that TEK is playing the role of a collabora-tive concept in this work This point should figure morein natural resources and policy literatures Differencesover the meaning of TEK should be seen as invitationsto learn more in circumstances where the possibility ofgenuine collaboration is a relatively recent development

EndnotesaIndigenous peoples refer to the pre-invasion inhabi-

tants of lands now dominated by others examples beingthe Maori in New Zealand or the Anishinaabe in theUnited States and Canada (Anaya 2004)

bI will use the term indigenous knowledge specificallywhen I refer to the work of these authors and shift backto the term TEK for my own analysis My analysis ofAgrawal later on in the same section will also use indi-genous knowledge when referring specifically to hiswork and TEK when referring to my own analysis

cOther collaborative literature includes Fortmann 2008and Colwell-Chanthaphonh and Ferguson 2008

dAgrawal too has considered the role of the concept ofTEK in cross-cultural and cross-situational collabor-ation He argues that

it is possibly the case that advocates of indigenousknowledge find in the term a particularly potent wayto summarize and invoke many of their concerns andhopes about peoples livelihoods life styles and

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 10 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

resource systems they view as disappearing Thephrase evokes embattled ways of living-in-the-worldthat real economic social and political pressures arenudging and frog-marching toward furthermarginalization and oblivion Because the indigenousscientific division of knowledge effectively representsdurable underlying social confrontations the studyand defense of indigenous knowledge continues toattract attention Indeed even as one questions theneed to contrast indigenous and scientificknowledges one underscores this contrastmdashin thevery use of the contrasting adjectives Indigenousknowledge is here to stay even if what it represents isforever and always disappearing (Agrawal 2009 158)

I hope to articulate in this paper that there are farmore reasons why people invoke concepts like TEK orindigenous knowledge than what Agrawal states

eCollaborative concepts also differ from boundary ob-jects (Star and Griesemer 1989) Boundary objects arecommonly shared by diverse stakeholders and serve tocoordinate their actions despite different interests Col-laborative concepts are invitations to learn more whichsuggest the need for a long term process of mutually re-spectful learning

Competing interestsThe author declares that there are no competing interests

AcknowledgmentsI wish to thank Kristie Dotson Michael ORourke Nicholas Reo and theanonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on this paper

Received 11 December 2012 Accepted 17 January 2013Published 5 April 2013

ReferencesAgrawal A (1995) Dismantling the divide between indigenous and scientific

knowledge Dev Change 26(3)413ndash439Agrawal A (2009) Why ldquoindigenousrdquo knowledge J R Soc N Z 39(4)157ndash158Anaya SJ (2004) Indigenous peoples in international law 2nd edition Oxford

University Press New YorkBarnhardt R (2005) Indigenous knowledge systems and Alaska Native ways of

knowing Anthropol Ed Q 36(1)8ndash23Berkes F (1999) Sacred ecology traditional ecological knowledge and resource

management Taylor amp Francis PhiladelphiaBiagioli M (1999) The science studies reader Routledge New YorkBrokensha DW Warren DM Werner O (1980) Indigenous knowledge systems and

development University Press of America Washington DCCajete G (1999) Native science natural laws of interdependence Clear Light

Books Santa Fe NMColwell-Chanthaphonh JS Ferguson TJ (2008) Collaboration in archaeological

practice engaging descendant communities AltaMira Lanham MDEisner WR Cuomo CJ Hinkel KM Jones BM Brower S Ronald H (2009)

Advancing Landscape Change Research through the Incorporation ofIntildeupiaq Knowledge Arctic 62(4)429ndash442

El-Hani C de Ferreira S Bandeira F (2008) Valuing indigenous knowledge to callit ldquosciencerdquo will not help Cult Stud Sci Educ 3(3)751ndash779 doi101007s11422-008-9129-6

Ellen R (2000) Indigenous environmental knowledge and its transformationscritical anthropological perspectives vol 5 Routledge New York

Fortmann L (2008) Participatory research in conservation and rural livelihoodsDoing science together vol 3 Wiley-Blackwell Hoboken

Gadgil M Berkes F Folke C (1993) Indigenous knowledge for biodiversityconservation Ambio 22(23)151ndash156

Goetze TC (2005) Empowered co-management towards power-sharing andindigenous rights in Clayoquot Sound BC Anthropologica 47(2)247ndash265

Gupta A (1998) Postcolonial developments agriculture in the making of modernIndia Duke University Press Durham NC

Harding S (1998) Is science multicultural postcolonialisms feminisms andepistemologies Indiana University Press Bloomington

Harding S (2011) The postcolonial science and technology studies reader DukeUniversity Press Durham NC

Harris G (ed) (2011) Northwest Forest Planmdashthe first 15 years [1994ndash2008]effectiveness of the federal-tribal relationship Tech Paper R6-RPM-TP-01-2011 US Department of Agriculture Forest Service Pacific NorthwestRegion Portland

Holmes E Lickers H Barkley B (2002) A critical assessment of ten years of on-the-ground sustainable forestry in eastern Ontariorsquos settled landscape For Chron78(5)643ndash647

Houde N (2007) The six faces of traditional ecological knowledge challenges andopportunities for Canadian co-management arrangements Ecol Soc 12(2)34

Huntington H (2000) Using traditional ecological knowledge in science methodsand applications Ecol Appl 10(5)1270ndash1274

Kimmerer R (2002) Weaving traditional ecological knowledge into biologicaleducation7 a call to action Bioscience 52(5)432ndash438 doi1016410006-3568(2002)052[0432WTEKIB]20CO2

Kimmerer R Lake F (2001) The role of indigenous burning in land managementJ For 99(11)36ndash41

Kofinas GP (2005) Caribou hunters and researchers at the co-managementinterface emergent dilemmas and the dynamics of legitimacy in powersharing Anthropologica 47(2)179ndash196

Leonetti C (2010) Indigenous stewardship methods and NRCS conservationpractices United States Department of Agriculture Natural ResourcesConservation Service Anchorage

McGregor D (2004a) Coming full circle indigenous knowledge environment andour future Am Indian Q 28(3amp4)385ndash410

McGregor D (2004b) Traditional ecological knowledge and sustainabledevelopment towards coexistence In Blaser M Feit HA McRae G (ed) In theway of development indigenous peoples life projects and globalizationZedIDRC Ottawa

McGregor D (2008) Linking traditional ecological knowledge and westernscience aboriginal perspectives from the 2000 State of the Lakes EcosystemConference Can J Nativ Stud XXVIII(1)139ndash158

Nadasdy P (1999) The politics of TEK power and the integration of knowledgeArct Anthropol 36(1ndash2)1ndash18

Nakashima DJ (1993) Astute observers on the sea ice edge Inuit knowledge as abasis for arctic co-management In Inglis J (ed) Traditional ecologicalknoweldge concepts and cases International Program on TraditionalEcological Knowledge and International Development Research CentreOttawa pp 99ndash110

Nakashima DJ Galloway McLean K Thulstrup HD Ramos Castillo A Rubis JT(2012) Weathering uncertainty traditional knowledge for climate changeassessment and adaptation UNESCO and Darwin UNU Paris

Pierotti R Wildcat D (2000) Traditional ecological knowledge the thirdalternative Ecol Appl 10(5)1333ndash1340

Reo N Whyte K (2012) Hunting and morality as elements of traditional ecologicalknowledge Hum Ecol 40(1)15ndash27 doi101007s10745-011-9448-1

Ross A Sherman R Snodgrass JG Delcore HD (2010) Indigenous peoples and thecollaborative stewardship of nature knowledge binds and institutionalconflicts Left Coast Press Walnut Creek CA

Salmon E (1996) Decolonizing our voices Winds Change 11(3)70ndash72Siegel H (1997) Science education multicultural and universal Interchange 28

(2)97ndash108Star SL Griesemer JR (1989) Institutional ecology Translations and boundary

objects amateurs and professionals in Berkeleys museum of vertebratezoology 1907ndash39 Soc Stud Sci 19(3)387ndash420

Story P Lickers F (1997) Partnership building for sustainable development a FirstNations perspective from Ontario J Sustain For 4(3ndash4)149ndash162

Turnbull D (2000) Masons tricksters and cartographers comparative studies inthe sociology of scientific and indigenous knowledge Taylor amp FrancisPhiladelphia

UNEP (1998) Report of the fourth meeting of the parties to the convention onbiodiversity UNEPCBDCOP Nairobi Kenya

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 11 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

subset of Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK)in which indigenous peoples acquired the knowledgebase over hundreds of years through direct experienceand contact with the environment ISM is thephysical spiritual mental emotional and intuitiverelationship of indigenous peoples with all aspects andelements of their environment

These relationships include but are not limited to acombination of knowledge experience traditionplaces locality all living and nonliving things skillspractices theories social strategies momentsspirituality history heritage and more and may notbe fully embraced by people who fail to understand allthose dimensions (Leonetti 2010 13)

In this definition TEK is considered a knowledge ldquobaserdquoor body of knowledge though one embedded within mul-tiple relationships among living beings non-living thingsand the environment The passage above also raises aquestion concerning the degree that outsiders will be ableto respect or comprehend a TEK system But the purposeof the NRCS guide is to advance a set of best practicesand principles so that NRCS staff can begin to work withcommunities for whom TEK forms a significant dimen-sion of their lifewaysAn implication of definitions based on the assumption

that TEK is a body of knowledge is that TEK can be pickedup and used by scientists or agency staff Each of the policydocuments just cited involves the idea that TEK can begleaned from the communities who have it either throughhistorical research or working with actual communitiesand can then be incorporated into the environmental gov-ernance of non-indigenous institutions like those of theUnited Nations or US Department of Agriculture So theassumption about knowledge mobilization is that TEK nomatter what the society is ldquosomethingrdquo that can be seen asarchival With some effort it can be interpreted for use indifferent contexts especially science policy contexts thatis contexts where there is a given role for scientific infor-mation in environmental governanceSome indigenous scientists in particular have offered

definitions of TEK that resist the assumption that it ismainly a body of knowledge McGregor for example ar-gues that TEK involves the relationships between ldquoknow-ledge people and all Creation (the lsquonaturalrsquo world aswell as the spiritual) TEK is viewed as the process ofparticipating (a verb) fully and responsibly in such rela-tionships rather than specifically as the knowledgegained from such experiences For Aboriginal peopleTEK is not just about understanding relationships it isthe relationship with Creation TEK is something onedoesrdquo (McGregor 2004ab 2008 145) For McGregorTEK refers to the activities that people in indigenous

societies are doing as part of their stewardship It is notarchival or body-like To speak of a societyrsquos TEK is tospeak of ongoing activities expressive of responsibilitiesThe ideas of ldquofullyrdquo and ldquoresponsiblyrdquo suggest what in

the field of philosophy is often called moral character orjust character Character refers to the idea that acting re-sponsibly (and hence ethically) is a matter of possessingembodied traits like courage or respect that enable oneto know the right thing to do in particular situations andto act in ways that maintain relations of balance withinonersquos society People who possess the character traitsalso possess the internal motivation to do what is rightWithin a societyrsquos system of responsibilities characterrefers to the particular traits that people acquire overmany years (since childhood) in order to express respon-sibilities and balanced relationships in all that they doDefinitions like McGregorrsquos see TEK systems as systemsof responsibilities that cannot be detached from thecharacter traits required to fulfill the moral demands ofthese systemsOther native scholars have also emphasized the re-

sponsibilities and character dimensions of TEK Pierottiand Wildcat see TEK as

based in the knowledge that native societies existedunder conditions of constant pressure on the resourcesupon which they depended and that a means had to befound to convince communities and families toeconomize with regard to their use of naturalresources The connections that are a crucial aspectof TEK are based on a mixture of extraction eganimals are taken as prey combined with recognitionof the inherent value and good of non-human livesTraditional knowledge is based on the premise thathumans should not view themselves as responsible fornature ie we are not stewards of the nature world butinstead that we are a part of that world no greater thanany other part In this way TEK deals largely withmotivating humans to show respect for nonhumans(Pierotti and Wildcat 2000 1336)

Pierotti and Wildcat see motivation an important as-pect of character as a key component of TEK Theyeven suggest that terms like stewardship are not suffi-cient for describing the actual intimacies involved in re-lationships among living beings and non-living things onwhich TEK systems are based As with McGregor TEKis a doing a full participation in a system of responsibil-ities needed for a societyrsquos flourishing For both Pierottiand Wildcat and McGregor great emphasis is placed onthe idea that TEK is not knowledge about relationshipsbut is the complete participation in the responsibilitiesSimilar definitions are found in the work of other indi-genous scholars (Reo and Whyte 2012 Cajete 1999)

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TEK systems then are systems of responsibilities thatarise from particular cosmological beliefs about the rela-tionships between living beings and non-living things orhumans and the natural world There is an important im-plication for knowledge mobilization TEK cannot bereadily transferred to different contexts unless the peoplein the new context also learn the systems of responsibil-ities and character traits Such learning entails completecultural immersion Thus it could be problematic on thesystem of responsibility assumption to see TEK as some-thing that could be incorporated by for example climatescience For climate science may not be used in a policycontext that seeks to integrate the system of responsibil-ities of a particular indigenous people into its strategiesfor environmental governanceThe body of knowledge assumption and the system of

responsibility assumption are different in important waysto the degree that they underlie various definitions of TEKIn terms of the former TEK can be extracted from its soci-ety and fit into policy-relevant science The gist goes some-thing like this climate science for example already fitswithin a particular policy context This fit is not deter-mined by indigenous peoples That is indigenous peoplesare not active participants in the majority of decisions ofgovernments universities and organizations about whatfunding programs to create for climate science and forselecting who should be on review panels Moreover TEKis not taken to be tied in any important ways to particularstewardship or management strategies Insofar as climatescience in sticking with the last example fits into a par-ticular kind of understanding of management or adapta-tion TEK is seen to contribute to that by being pluggedinto structures of scientific inquiry But definitions basedon the assumption that TEK is a system of responsibilitiessuggest that for TEK to be genuinely included the peoplewho participate fully in it must be at the table equally withnon-indigenous scientists and policy makers TEK is not apiece broken off of one of these strategies and applied toanother TEK just is the living environmental governanceof indigenous peoples stemming directly from their cos-mologies in relation to the environmental challenges theyhave faced over many generationsThe difference between the two assumptions can en-

gender some difficulties in forming a consensus on thedefinition of TEK in terms of knowledge mobilizationOne assumption seeks to fit TEK within established sci-ence policy decision-making frameworks whereas theother seeks to change this framework in favor of greaterparticipation by indigenous peoples

The relation between TEK and scienceTEK is also defined in ways that are based on assumptionsabout its relation to disciplines like forestry or climatologyThe kind of assumption active in these definitions involves

how TEK can be compared or contrasted to scientific dis-ciplines (ie science) There are three assumptions cov-ered in this subsection (1) TEK and science should beseen as separate knowledge production systems Thisdistinction should never be collapsed (2) TEK and scienceshould be seen as twins or two knowledge-bearingperspectives on the world that complement each other(3) There is no basis for distinguishing TEK or Indigen-ous knowledge from science and the term TEK or itssynonyms should not be used In all three of these viewsthere is a lot riding on how TEK and science are seen asrelated to each other because there are implications forwhat sorts of empirical authorities are deemed relevantfor environmental governanceThe first version of this kind of assumption is that

TEK and science are sufficiently different to warrantmaintaining separate definitions Proponents of this viewbelieve that there are definite differences in the valuesand aspirations of science and those of TEK systemsEl-Hani and Souza de Ferreira Bandeira exemplify thisview They use the term ldquoindigenous knowledgerdquo insteadof TEK though their use of this term is synonymouswith TEK because they are talking about indigenous peo-plesrsquo knowledge of the natural world and the relation-ships between living things and the environmentb Theysee Western modern science as ldquothe most powerful wayof producing naturalistic explanations of natural phe-nomenardquo Yet it is also the case that ldquothere are plenty ofdifferent accounts of the world [ie indigenous know-ledge] which are also powerful in their own waysrdquo (2008756) They see indigenous knowledge as part of this lat-ter grouping these other accounts ldquoare producing expla-nations about supernatural (or maybe non-natural is abetter term) beings and phenomena that are useful toseveral human cultures And in the face of natural phe-nomena they are producing explanations that appeal tospiritual domains going beyond naturalistic chains ornetworks of eventsrdquo (2008 756) The key to this differ-ence then is that indigenous knowledge usually involvessome account of non-natural beings whereas science al-ways excludes these non-natural beings This reflectssome of the ideas of the previous section where TEK istied to spiritualityTo call something science then for El-Hani and Souza

de Ferreira Bandeira certain standards must be met Forexample science embodies values and skills such asldquotechnical precision control creative genius and ex-planatory power rdquo Quoting Siegel they argue that sci-ence and indigenous knowledge could only be the samething ldquoif it could be cogently argued that some particularlsquoethnicrsquo science offered compelling theoriespredic-tionsexplanations of natural phenomena Could an ani-mistic ethnic theory of volcanic activity and lavaflow provide the sort of explanation prediction grasp

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of relations among unobservables and between observ-ables and unobservables and depth of scientific under-standing provided by Western sciencerdquo (El-Hani et al2008 757 Siegel 1997 100) According to this under-standing there are definite values and knowledge-bearing capabilities of science that cannot be attributedto indigenous knowledge of the environmentIndigenous knowledge while it may produce important

knowledge does not do so in the ways that scientific disci-plines do This is according to the authors not a form ofdiscrimination ldquoNotice that we are not saying that theway this community builds knowledge the knowledgebuilt or the criteria employed to appraise cognitive state-ments are epistemically superior to any other body of ap-proaches ideas statements criteria We are just sayingthat they are different and should be kept different forthe sake of clarity about the nature of knowledge and thenature of sciencerdquo (El-Hani and Souza de FerreiraBandeira 2008 758) In this assumption about indigenousknowledge (or TEK) and science there are definite cri-teria values skills and so on that science and TEK havebut there is not a lot of crossover So TEKrsquos supernaturaland social aspects respectfully so exclude the possibilityof the kind of rationality associated with science More-over societies without computing capacities built intotheir TEK systems cannot value quantitative research inthe same way that it is valued in natural sciences disci-plines nor can they engage in the same kind of researchThis first assumption that TEK and science are funda-

mentally different differs from the second assumptionwhich sees the former and the latter as two complemen-tary perspectives on the environment that stem fromcomplementary views on the world The views are com-plementary because there is both crossover as well asgap filling Kimmerer argues that

Traditional ecological knowledge refers to theknowledge practice and belief concerning therelationships of living beings to one another and tothe physical environment which is held by peoples inrelatively nontechnical societies with a directdependence upon local resources It is born of longintimacy and attentiveness to a homeland and canarise wherever people are materially and spirituallyintegrated within their landscape TEK is rational andreliable knowledge that has been developed throughgenerations of intimate contact by native peoples withtheir lands (Kimmerer 2002 431)

TEK and science for Kimmerer can be seen as having acomplementary relation to each other Indeed TEK can beseen as the ldquointellectual twin to sciencerdquo a term she bor-rows from Deloria (433) Kimmerer claims that TEK existsldquoin parallel to Western sciencerdquo (433) She claims that ldquoBoth

knowledge systems yield detailed empirical information ofnatural phenomena and relationships among ecosystemcomponentsrdquo This can include ldquopredictive powerrdquo overlap-ping biological information ldquodetailed empirical knowledgeof population biology resource assessment and monitoringsuccessional dynamics patterns of fluctuation in climateand resources species interactions ethnotaxonomy sus-tainable harvesting and adaptive management and ma-nipulation of disturbance regimes rdquo (Kimmerer 2002433) Yet TEK differs from science for Kimmerer in import-ant ways

TEK observations tend to be qualitative and theycreate a diachronic database that is a record ofobservations from a single locale over a long timeperiod The National Science Foundation in itssupport of the Long-Term Ecological Researchprogram has validated the importance of suchcontinuous data In TEK the observers tend to be theresource users themselves for example huntersfishers and gatherers whose harvesting success isinextricably linked to the quality and reliability oftheir ecological observations In contrast scientificobservations made by a small group of professionalstend to be quantitative and often represent synchronicdata or simultaneous observations from a wide rangeof sites which frequently lack the long-termperspective of TEK Western science is conductedin academic culture in which nature is viewed strictlyobjectively TEK is woven into and is inseparablefrom the social and spiritual contexts of the culture TEK may also extend its explanatory power beyondthe strictly empirical where science cannot go Inindigenous science nature is subject not object Embraced as an equal partner to the power ofWestern science TEK offers not only importantbiological insights but a cultural framework forenvironmental problem solving that incorporateshuman values (Kimmerer 2002 433ndash434)

Here then for Kimmerer TEK and science are two paral-lel complementary perspectives on the environment andnatural resources They go hand in hand Different fromthe first assumption Kimmerer has no problem using con-cepts like ldquopredictionrdquo or ldquorationalrdquo with respect to TEKnor stating straightforwardly that techniques in TEK sys-tems fit well with and are valued by science She also showsthat the influence of culture in TEK systems could be con-sidered beneficial to science Though she admits differ-ences they are not the stark differences that are maintainedin the first assumption For Kimmerer then knowledgeproduction that fails to incorporate both TEK systems andthe relevant sciences would be missing key perspectives onthe world Instead of saying that they are valuable in their

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 6 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

own ways (as in the first assumption) Kimmerer is sayingthat they are valuable together Both knowledge productionsystems can learn a great deal from each otherA third assumption diverges in general from the first

two by desiring to dispense altogether with the pursuitof defining differences and complementarities betweenTEK systems and science That is in this assumptionthere is really no use in even talking theoretically abouta distinction between TEK and science because at theend of the day they are faces of the same phenomenathe pursuit of usable knowledge by human societiesAgrawal for example argues that

The attempt to create distinctions in terms ofindigenous and western is potentially ridiculous Itmakes much more sense to talk about multipledomains and types of knowledges with differinglogics and epistemologies Somewhat contradictorilybut inescapably so the same knowledge can beclassified one way or the other depending on theinterests it serves the purposes for which it isharnessed or the manner in which it is generated [A]nchored unavoidably in institutional origins andmoorings knowledge can only be useful But it isuseful to particular peoples Specific strategies forprotecting systematizing and disseminatingknowledge will differentially benefit different socialgroups and individuals The recognition of this simpletruism is obscured by the confounding labels ofindigenous and western It is only when we moveaway from the sterile dichotomy between indigenousand western when we begin to recognize intra-groupdifferentiation and when we seek out bridges acrossthe constructed chasm between the traditional andthe scientific that we will initiate a productivedialogue to safeguard the interests of those who aredisadvantaged (Agrawal 1995 433)

This third view then suggests that to use terms like in-digenous knowledge or TEK or Western science obscuresseveral important points First TEK and science are allvalue-laden knowledge systems The literature in socialstudies of science shows multiple ways in which science isguided by particular values and even associated with spir-ituality (Biagioli 1999 Turnbull 2000) Second there is noreason why the criteria and values attributed to varioussciences cannot also be those of various TEK systemsMoreover by ldquointra-grouprdquo differentiation Agrawal pointsout that there are few indigenous people who rely on asingle homogenous TEK system rather their knowledgesystem has changed and they likely also rely on differentscientific disciplines as well Examples of this abound likeGuptarsquos 1998 study of how rural farmers in India engagein hybrid agricultural practices that mix Western scientific

and traditional knowledge systems (Gupta 1998) OrWatson-Verran and Turnbull discuss how Western sci-ence is composed of heterogeneous elements (Watson-Verran and Turnbull 1995)Agrawalrsquos position is based on the idea that every society

has some sort of knowledge system which may be a patch-work of systems with multiple origins (eg European indi-genous) There is no such thing as a knowledge systemthat is not guided by peoplersquos interpretations of the chal-lenges that they face And interpretations are influenced byworldviews There is no such thing as a knowledge systemthat is more neutral than any other In the case of scientificdisciplines values of objectivity are based on cosmologicalassumptions about there being subjects and objects in theworld and which beings entities and phenomena fallunder one or the other A science based on such assump-tions may be of limited use to a society that does not carveup reality in this way But on the other hand such a societymay have great use for this kind of information Context iskey Agrawalrsquos assumption speaks to the situation thatmany indigenous peoples encounter in the world Theyneed reliable information for the environmental govern-ance challenges they face And they are likely in the pos-ition to draw from many sources of knowledge Whatknowledge they can use depends on how suitable differentforms of knowledge are for their purposes Whether formsof knowledge are indigenous or not does not really matterin the end Some indigenous peoples may be served per-fectly well by disciplines like biology as the basis of theirenvironmental governance strategies So the implication isthat terms like TEK or indigenous knowledge are not veryuseful and may even waste our time We should focusmore on figuring out what knowledge systems best servethe needs of particular communities and how to realizethem in practiceAs with knowledge mobilization the distinction be-

tween TEK and science does not generate many easy op-tions for consensus on how to define the two in relationto each other First the view that TEK and science mustbe labeled as such and kept distinct misses the realities ofindigenous environmental governance today There is noreason why any so-called TEK system cannot embracesimilar empirical values that are found commonly in vari-ous scientific disciplines One who adopts this assumptionwould perhaps have to consider dropping it were one toconcede that certain values and criteria are not exclusiveto science So it would be tricky for one to accept certainparts of both the first and second assumptions Moreovercontemporary tribal environmental governance involvesexamples of institutions that are guided by TEK but thatuse technologies and methods that originate from non-tribal scientific disciplines (Woodard 2005) Even exam-ples of practices like hunting show that TEK systems areadaptive in their adoption of technologies (Reo and Whyte

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 7 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

2012) In these cases it is hard to imagine a rigid separ-ation between TEK and science and technology becauseTEK systems can incorporate scientific techniques Advo-cates of the third assumption of course would find itfairly difficult to accept the first two assumptions becausethey invoke a distinction between TEK and science tooreadily Agrawalrsquos conclusion is that the term TEK mustbe dispensed with altogether as must particularly loadedconceptions of science So the first assumption seeks tomaintain a rigid separation in definitions the second as-sumption seeks a definition that reveals complementaritythe third assumption can be seen as desiring to dispensewith the business of the first two assumptions altogetherIt is somewhat hard to see people who hold any of these

three assumptions coming to a consensus definition Com-bined with differences regarding knowledge mobilizationit is even harder to see there ever being a single definitionacceptable to all stakeholders But I want to offer anotherfruitful approach to coming to an understanding of TEKthat can advance environmental governance even as wediscuss and disagree on the assumptions underlying vari-ous definitions My approach is different from Agrawalrsquosinsofar as I do not see the need to dispense with the termTEK While Agrawal comes close to my understanding ofthe difficulties in defining TEK he does not draw the onlypossible conclusion from accepting the reality of these dif-ficulties The fact that a term is defined in ways that areproblematic and subject to deep differences does not entailthat it has no use Rather this fact motivates us to considerwhether the term given all its potential definitions andconfusing dimensions has a proper role to play in advan-cing collaborative environmental governance I turn to thistopic in the next subsection

The role of TEK as a collaborative conceptThis subsection shows why TEK should be considered asa collaborative concept that bridges cross-cultural andcross-situational divides To make this case the initialpages of this section focus on the environmental govern-ance situations in which many tribes are embedded and Iuse the term co-management as an example of this I thenmove on to define what a collaborative concept is andhow this relates to the discussion of TEK I have beenbuilding so far in this paper In this sense the initial pagesof this section take a slight detour before returning to theconcept of TEKRegardless of how TEK can be defined what is the role

of the concept of TEK in the first place in the world ofenvironmental governance The world of environmentalgovernance here involves relations between environmen-tal governance institutions associated with and responsibleto indigenous peoples like tribal natural resources depart-ments and those regulating indigenous hunting practicesand governance institutions associated with states and

subnational units like the US Forest Service and Environ-ment Canada All of these institutions have evolved waysof doing things out of histories in which the very idea ofindigenous environmental governance was overtly andsubtly marginalized Times are changing and greater re-spect is accorded to indigenous peoples through inter-national federal and local law and policy These changescreate opportunities for indigenous peoples to work col-laboratively with non-indigenous peoples instead ofagainst them or in secrecy from them (covertly) Indigen-ous peoples can begin to build institutions of environmen-tal governance that are integrated with non-indigenousinstitutions in ways that benefit indigenous communitiesand respect the stewardship goals of their worldviewsBut institution building of this kind is always a work in

progress because of cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides Cross-cultural divides are simply the differences inworldview language lifestyle and so on that obtain be-tween indigenous and non-indigenous populations Forexample an indigenous people may see the goal of restor-ing a native fish species as rekindling the relationship be-tween that species and humans living in the regionwhereas a non-indigenous population may see restorationof the same species as a matter of achieving certain popu-lation numbers conducive to a recreational outcome likeincreasing tourism in the region Cross-cultural dividescan also have an intra-group dimension to them as theremay be differences in beliefs about building relationshipswith a species in an indigenous community and territoryfor example Cross-situational divides are differences incapacities for environmental governance For example anindigenous people may have access to fewer financial re-sources than the neighboring state or province have lim-ited political control over the entire region where itsmembers live and have less representation in nationaldecision-making than representatives of the neighboringstate or province Cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides make collaboration challenging It may be hard forfederal institutions to incorporate indigenous peoplersquosgoals within their policy frameworks It may be frustratingto work across institutions with different bureaucraticcapabilitiesSince the possibility of meaningful collaboration is a rela-

tively recent turn of events there is yet to be perfect guid-ance about how collaboration that bridges cross-culturaland cross-situational divides ought to be done There arecases of success and cases of failure And there is still a lotto be learned regarding whether the lessons from cases ofsuccess can simply be transferred over to other contextsCaught in this predicament there are a host of conceptsthat are being debated as concepts that facilitate or dis-courage genuine collaboration For example the conceptof co-management has been used to suggest a possibleroute to cooperative environmental and natural resources

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governance (Goetze 2005)c Co-management invokes theidea of joint political relationships between indigenous andnon-indigenous institutions that work together accordingto standards of fairness to govern particular areas andbkresources Standards of fairness include norms like equalrepresentation and voting rights The concept of co-management is the basis of actual co-management boardsand committees that are composed of indigenous and non-indigenous participants and that are responsible for man-aging a fishery or forested area or particular species like acaribou population Indigenous and non-indigenous insti-tutions often rely on the term co-management as part of ashared language for bridging cross-cultural and cross-situation divides However there is also dialogue on howthe concept of co-management can be taken the wrongway and provide insufficient guidance for collaboration Itis often argued that the concept co-management impliesthat the nation-statersquos (eg Canada US) vision for envir-onmental governance is used to evaluate the collaborativeefforts between indigenous and non-indigenous institu-tions This is because the term ldquomanagementrdquo can connotea non-indigenous view of the appropriate relationshipamong humans other living beings and the environmentThis term can slant the meaning of co-management so thatnon-indigenous participants in a co-management boardfor example come in with expectations that their assump-tions about ldquomanagementrdquo should be prioritized and maynot listen to their indigenous colleagues The term thencan have the effect of silencing genuine negotiation ofcross-cultural and cross-situational differencesInstead the concept of co-existence is offered (McGregor

2004b) which suggests the importance of balancing indi-genous and non-indigenous aspirations of governance intothe evaluation of collaboration In this case one might beinclined to think cynically that it is all about labels Butthere is much more going on than preferences about labelsWe need to consider the role played by concepts likeco-management and co-existence in facilitating or discour-aging collaboration People who reject the concept of co-management based on the contexts they are familiar withsee in it problematic assumptions about how indigenousand non-indigenous institutions should work togetherNon-indigenous people may not see how the concept ofco-management might encourage these assumptions eventhough perhaps co-management is the preferred conceptin some contexts Those who reject the concept of co-management and wish to replace it with the concept of co-existence are inviting non-indigenous people to learn moreabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides This isthe role that concepts like co-management and co-existence play The concept of co-existence does not in it-self contain enough meaning for non-indigenous personsto suggest in advance exactly how a collaborative processshould play out What proponents of co-existence are

saying is that there is much learning to do The concept ofco-existence suggests a very different possibility for collab-oration than what non-indigenous peoples may be used toWork on co-existence expresses an invitation to learnabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides so as toachieve better collaborations in particular contextsThere are two important points here regarding the role

of these concepts First co-management and co-existenceare invoked for better or worse by many different institu-tions in contexts where they are trying to collaborateacross cross-cultural and cross-situational divides Secondthe example of co-existence I gave is an example of howsome people seek to use concepts to improve collaborationby inviting people to consider alternatives that may nothave been on their conceptual radar before The conceptof TEK and its synonyms plays a somewhat analogous roleto the term co-existence As in the first point various defi-nitions of TEK are used in collaborative contexts for betteror worse As in the second point those who bring new def-initions of TEK into dialogue are inviting others to con-sider new possibilities for thinking about the function ofknowledge systems in environmental governanceHowever we need to be precise about what this meansmdash

because I am not arguing that there is a single definition ofTEK that can count for all This is impossible TEK nomatter how it is defined is not adequate for any indigenouscommunity The English articulation TEK is not an indi-genous word or concept and it is likely not used withinvery many communities unto themselves The terms trad-itional and ecological are awkward Traditional can havethe effect of putting knowledge in the past whereas TEK isoften supposed to mean contemporary knowledge Eco-logical aligns TEK with a particular discipline whereas TEKrefers to knowledge that does not stem from that disciplineTerms like indigenous knowledge and native science aresimilarly awkward when we unpack what associations anddissociations they may imply Moreover there may be manycontexts where an indigenous people does see the conceptas referring to accumulated observations for example orcontexts where TEK is viewed as a Western construct ir-relevant to environmental governance There are likelyother contexts where TEK needs to refer to systems of re-sponsibilities There are multiple possible scenarios Theconcept of TEK cannot possibly do justice to the know-ledge systems and articulations of knowledge systems be-longing to the thousands of indigenous peoples TEK is alsonot a concept that was an integral part of the education ofmost ecologists or foresters nor is it a concept that hasexisted for a long time in the federal policies of a nation-state This does not mean though that the concept shouldbe dispensed with Non-indigenous peoples may be equallyuncomfortable with referring to something they are not fa-miliar with as science or linked with a particular scientificdiscipline It may be no easier for them to change out terms

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 9 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

like TEK with even more general terms like Agrawalrsquos ldquous-able knowledgerdquod

Thus whenever the concept of TEK is invoked the rolethat it plays is to suggest that indigenous communitiesmay approach the very question of the nature of know-ledge and how it relates to environmental and natural re-source governance rather differently than disciplines likeecology or biology and the policy contexts in which theyare used By ldquorather differentlyrdquo I do not mean in somesense that applies to all communities For example theremay be some indigenous communities that invoke TEK tomean a radically different cultural paradigm one in whichit is not appropriate to speak of knowledge as distinct frompractice or belief But other indigenous communities wholive in different regions because of historical removal mayinvoke TEK to stand for the values that they believe disci-plines like ecology should serve even if they lack intimateexperiences with the environment they currently inhabitYet other communities might use TEK to suggest differentways in which multiple empirical techniques for gatheringknowledge from huntersrsquo observations to scientific fieldmethods can be used in harmony TEK could also refer toideas about how elders should be involved in the designand peer review of research in tribal environmental de-partments that collect their own data about the environ-ment and the condition of natural resources There aremany more scenarios of course These scenarios indicatethe diversity of how people at a philosophical level thinkabout the meaning of knowledge in relation to their livesAnd their thinking arises from multiple cultural historicalglobal social and personal sourcesThe significance of this point is that when the concept

of TEK is used it really points to the possibility thatthere are cross-cultural and cross-situational divides thatmake it so that non-indigenous parties cannot expecttheir own assumptions to apply to indigenous contextsThe concept of TEK should be invoked to invite non-indigenous parties to learn more about how particularindigenous communities approach fundamental ques-tions of the nature of knowledge and how it fits intotheir visions of environmental governance This invita-tion is not one that promises easy answers Rather it isan invitation to become a part of a long term processwhereby cross-cultural and cross-situation divides arebetter bridged through mutual respect and learning andrelationships among collaborators are given the oppor-tunity to mature Examples of long term processes in-clude ldquothe way of peacerdquo used among indigenous andnon-indigenous participants in the Ontario Model Forest(Holmes et al 2002 Story and Lickers 1997) There aremany other examples We need not only be concernedwith striking the right definition of TEK Rather we needto cultivate attitudes of awareness that the concept ofTEK plays a role as a collaborative concept which is

what I call a concept that invites people to engage in aprocess of respectful learning about significant differ-encese

ConclusionsTEK and its synonyms indigenous knowledge and nativescience have been defined mainly based on two kinds ofassumptions how knowledge is to be mobilized and whatTEKrsquos relation to science is The different assumptionsmake it tricky to come to a consensus definition that satis-fies all stakeholders This makes us interrogate what therole of TEK is in a world of relationships among differentinstitutions of environmental governance for whom TEKis an issue TEK must play the role of inviting cross-cultural and cross-situational learning for indigenous andnon-indigenous policy makers natural resource managersscientists activists elders and youthAn important implication of this is that science and

policy literatures that invoke TEK should discuss it as acollaborative concept That is care must be taken toshow that the concept invites participation to a longterm process of mutually respectful learning And moreeffort needs to be taken to understand what these pro-cesses should look like Already of course there is workthat exemplifies this interpretation of TEK (Barnhardt2005 Ross et al 2010) Yet the point has not beenbrought out that TEK is playing the role of a collabora-tive concept in this work This point should figure morein natural resources and policy literatures Differencesover the meaning of TEK should be seen as invitationsto learn more in circumstances where the possibility ofgenuine collaboration is a relatively recent development

EndnotesaIndigenous peoples refer to the pre-invasion inhabi-

tants of lands now dominated by others examples beingthe Maori in New Zealand or the Anishinaabe in theUnited States and Canada (Anaya 2004)

bI will use the term indigenous knowledge specificallywhen I refer to the work of these authors and shift backto the term TEK for my own analysis My analysis ofAgrawal later on in the same section will also use indi-genous knowledge when referring specifically to hiswork and TEK when referring to my own analysis

cOther collaborative literature includes Fortmann 2008and Colwell-Chanthaphonh and Ferguson 2008

dAgrawal too has considered the role of the concept ofTEK in cross-cultural and cross-situational collabor-ation He argues that

it is possibly the case that advocates of indigenousknowledge find in the term a particularly potent wayto summarize and invoke many of their concerns andhopes about peoples livelihoods life styles and

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 10 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

resource systems they view as disappearing Thephrase evokes embattled ways of living-in-the-worldthat real economic social and political pressures arenudging and frog-marching toward furthermarginalization and oblivion Because the indigenousscientific division of knowledge effectively representsdurable underlying social confrontations the studyand defense of indigenous knowledge continues toattract attention Indeed even as one questions theneed to contrast indigenous and scientificknowledges one underscores this contrastmdashin thevery use of the contrasting adjectives Indigenousknowledge is here to stay even if what it represents isforever and always disappearing (Agrawal 2009 158)

I hope to articulate in this paper that there are farmore reasons why people invoke concepts like TEK orindigenous knowledge than what Agrawal states

eCollaborative concepts also differ from boundary ob-jects (Star and Griesemer 1989) Boundary objects arecommonly shared by diverse stakeholders and serve tocoordinate their actions despite different interests Col-laborative concepts are invitations to learn more whichsuggest the need for a long term process of mutually re-spectful learning

Competing interestsThe author declares that there are no competing interests

AcknowledgmentsI wish to thank Kristie Dotson Michael ORourke Nicholas Reo and theanonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on this paper

Received 11 December 2012 Accepted 17 January 2013Published 5 April 2013

ReferencesAgrawal A (1995) Dismantling the divide between indigenous and scientific

knowledge Dev Change 26(3)413ndash439Agrawal A (2009) Why ldquoindigenousrdquo knowledge J R Soc N Z 39(4)157ndash158Anaya SJ (2004) Indigenous peoples in international law 2nd edition Oxford

University Press New YorkBarnhardt R (2005) Indigenous knowledge systems and Alaska Native ways of

knowing Anthropol Ed Q 36(1)8ndash23Berkes F (1999) Sacred ecology traditional ecological knowledge and resource

management Taylor amp Francis PhiladelphiaBiagioli M (1999) The science studies reader Routledge New YorkBrokensha DW Warren DM Werner O (1980) Indigenous knowledge systems and

development University Press of America Washington DCCajete G (1999) Native science natural laws of interdependence Clear Light

Books Santa Fe NMColwell-Chanthaphonh JS Ferguson TJ (2008) Collaboration in archaeological

practice engaging descendant communities AltaMira Lanham MDEisner WR Cuomo CJ Hinkel KM Jones BM Brower S Ronald H (2009)

Advancing Landscape Change Research through the Incorporation ofIntildeupiaq Knowledge Arctic 62(4)429ndash442

El-Hani C de Ferreira S Bandeira F (2008) Valuing indigenous knowledge to callit ldquosciencerdquo will not help Cult Stud Sci Educ 3(3)751ndash779 doi101007s11422-008-9129-6

Ellen R (2000) Indigenous environmental knowledge and its transformationscritical anthropological perspectives vol 5 Routledge New York

Fortmann L (2008) Participatory research in conservation and rural livelihoodsDoing science together vol 3 Wiley-Blackwell Hoboken

Gadgil M Berkes F Folke C (1993) Indigenous knowledge for biodiversityconservation Ambio 22(23)151ndash156

Goetze TC (2005) Empowered co-management towards power-sharing andindigenous rights in Clayoquot Sound BC Anthropologica 47(2)247ndash265

Gupta A (1998) Postcolonial developments agriculture in the making of modernIndia Duke University Press Durham NC

Harding S (1998) Is science multicultural postcolonialisms feminisms andepistemologies Indiana University Press Bloomington

Harding S (2011) The postcolonial science and technology studies reader DukeUniversity Press Durham NC

Harris G (ed) (2011) Northwest Forest Planmdashthe first 15 years [1994ndash2008]effectiveness of the federal-tribal relationship Tech Paper R6-RPM-TP-01-2011 US Department of Agriculture Forest Service Pacific NorthwestRegion Portland

Holmes E Lickers H Barkley B (2002) A critical assessment of ten years of on-the-ground sustainable forestry in eastern Ontariorsquos settled landscape For Chron78(5)643ndash647

Houde N (2007) The six faces of traditional ecological knowledge challenges andopportunities for Canadian co-management arrangements Ecol Soc 12(2)34

Huntington H (2000) Using traditional ecological knowledge in science methodsand applications Ecol Appl 10(5)1270ndash1274

Kimmerer R (2002) Weaving traditional ecological knowledge into biologicaleducation7 a call to action Bioscience 52(5)432ndash438 doi1016410006-3568(2002)052[0432WTEKIB]20CO2

Kimmerer R Lake F (2001) The role of indigenous burning in land managementJ For 99(11)36ndash41

Kofinas GP (2005) Caribou hunters and researchers at the co-managementinterface emergent dilemmas and the dynamics of legitimacy in powersharing Anthropologica 47(2)179ndash196

Leonetti C (2010) Indigenous stewardship methods and NRCS conservationpractices United States Department of Agriculture Natural ResourcesConservation Service Anchorage

McGregor D (2004a) Coming full circle indigenous knowledge environment andour future Am Indian Q 28(3amp4)385ndash410

McGregor D (2004b) Traditional ecological knowledge and sustainabledevelopment towards coexistence In Blaser M Feit HA McRae G (ed) In theway of development indigenous peoples life projects and globalizationZedIDRC Ottawa

McGregor D (2008) Linking traditional ecological knowledge and westernscience aboriginal perspectives from the 2000 State of the Lakes EcosystemConference Can J Nativ Stud XXVIII(1)139ndash158

Nadasdy P (1999) The politics of TEK power and the integration of knowledgeArct Anthropol 36(1ndash2)1ndash18

Nakashima DJ (1993) Astute observers on the sea ice edge Inuit knowledge as abasis for arctic co-management In Inglis J (ed) Traditional ecologicalknoweldge concepts and cases International Program on TraditionalEcological Knowledge and International Development Research CentreOttawa pp 99ndash110

Nakashima DJ Galloway McLean K Thulstrup HD Ramos Castillo A Rubis JT(2012) Weathering uncertainty traditional knowledge for climate changeassessment and adaptation UNESCO and Darwin UNU Paris

Pierotti R Wildcat D (2000) Traditional ecological knowledge the thirdalternative Ecol Appl 10(5)1333ndash1340

Reo N Whyte K (2012) Hunting and morality as elements of traditional ecologicalknowledge Hum Ecol 40(1)15ndash27 doi101007s10745-011-9448-1

Ross A Sherman R Snodgrass JG Delcore HD (2010) Indigenous peoples and thecollaborative stewardship of nature knowledge binds and institutionalconflicts Left Coast Press Walnut Creek CA

Salmon E (1996) Decolonizing our voices Winds Change 11(3)70ndash72Siegel H (1997) Science education multicultural and universal Interchange 28

(2)97ndash108Star SL Griesemer JR (1989) Institutional ecology Translations and boundary

objects amateurs and professionals in Berkeleys museum of vertebratezoology 1907ndash39 Soc Stud Sci 19(3)387ndash420

Story P Lickers F (1997) Partnership building for sustainable development a FirstNations perspective from Ontario J Sustain For 4(3ndash4)149ndash162

Turnbull D (2000) Masons tricksters and cartographers comparative studies inthe sociology of scientific and indigenous knowledge Taylor amp FrancisPhiladelphia

UNEP (1998) Report of the fourth meeting of the parties to the convention onbiodiversity UNEPCBDCOP Nairobi Kenya

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 11 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

TEK systems then are systems of responsibilities thatarise from particular cosmological beliefs about the rela-tionships between living beings and non-living things orhumans and the natural world There is an important im-plication for knowledge mobilization TEK cannot bereadily transferred to different contexts unless the peoplein the new context also learn the systems of responsibil-ities and character traits Such learning entails completecultural immersion Thus it could be problematic on thesystem of responsibility assumption to see TEK as some-thing that could be incorporated by for example climatescience For climate science may not be used in a policycontext that seeks to integrate the system of responsibil-ities of a particular indigenous people into its strategiesfor environmental governanceThe body of knowledge assumption and the system of

responsibility assumption are different in important waysto the degree that they underlie various definitions of TEKIn terms of the former TEK can be extracted from its soci-ety and fit into policy-relevant science The gist goes some-thing like this climate science for example already fitswithin a particular policy context This fit is not deter-mined by indigenous peoples That is indigenous peoplesare not active participants in the majority of decisions ofgovernments universities and organizations about whatfunding programs to create for climate science and forselecting who should be on review panels Moreover TEKis not taken to be tied in any important ways to particularstewardship or management strategies Insofar as climatescience in sticking with the last example fits into a par-ticular kind of understanding of management or adapta-tion TEK is seen to contribute to that by being pluggedinto structures of scientific inquiry But definitions basedon the assumption that TEK is a system of responsibilitiessuggest that for TEK to be genuinely included the peoplewho participate fully in it must be at the table equally withnon-indigenous scientists and policy makers TEK is not apiece broken off of one of these strategies and applied toanother TEK just is the living environmental governanceof indigenous peoples stemming directly from their cos-mologies in relation to the environmental challenges theyhave faced over many generationsThe difference between the two assumptions can en-

gender some difficulties in forming a consensus on thedefinition of TEK in terms of knowledge mobilizationOne assumption seeks to fit TEK within established sci-ence policy decision-making frameworks whereas theother seeks to change this framework in favor of greaterparticipation by indigenous peoples

The relation between TEK and scienceTEK is also defined in ways that are based on assumptionsabout its relation to disciplines like forestry or climatologyThe kind of assumption active in these definitions involves

how TEK can be compared or contrasted to scientific dis-ciplines (ie science) There are three assumptions cov-ered in this subsection (1) TEK and science should beseen as separate knowledge production systems Thisdistinction should never be collapsed (2) TEK and scienceshould be seen as twins or two knowledge-bearingperspectives on the world that complement each other(3) There is no basis for distinguishing TEK or Indigen-ous knowledge from science and the term TEK or itssynonyms should not be used In all three of these viewsthere is a lot riding on how TEK and science are seen asrelated to each other because there are implications forwhat sorts of empirical authorities are deemed relevantfor environmental governanceThe first version of this kind of assumption is that

TEK and science are sufficiently different to warrantmaintaining separate definitions Proponents of this viewbelieve that there are definite differences in the valuesand aspirations of science and those of TEK systemsEl-Hani and Souza de Ferreira Bandeira exemplify thisview They use the term ldquoindigenous knowledgerdquo insteadof TEK though their use of this term is synonymouswith TEK because they are talking about indigenous peo-plesrsquo knowledge of the natural world and the relation-ships between living things and the environmentb Theysee Western modern science as ldquothe most powerful wayof producing naturalistic explanations of natural phe-nomenardquo Yet it is also the case that ldquothere are plenty ofdifferent accounts of the world [ie indigenous know-ledge] which are also powerful in their own waysrdquo (2008756) They see indigenous knowledge as part of this lat-ter grouping these other accounts ldquoare producing expla-nations about supernatural (or maybe non-natural is abetter term) beings and phenomena that are useful toseveral human cultures And in the face of natural phe-nomena they are producing explanations that appeal tospiritual domains going beyond naturalistic chains ornetworks of eventsrdquo (2008 756) The key to this differ-ence then is that indigenous knowledge usually involvessome account of non-natural beings whereas science al-ways excludes these non-natural beings This reflectssome of the ideas of the previous section where TEK istied to spiritualityTo call something science then for El-Hani and Souza

de Ferreira Bandeira certain standards must be met Forexample science embodies values and skills such asldquotechnical precision control creative genius and ex-planatory power rdquo Quoting Siegel they argue that sci-ence and indigenous knowledge could only be the samething ldquoif it could be cogently argued that some particularlsquoethnicrsquo science offered compelling theoriespredic-tionsexplanations of natural phenomena Could an ani-mistic ethnic theory of volcanic activity and lavaflow provide the sort of explanation prediction grasp

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 5 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

of relations among unobservables and between observ-ables and unobservables and depth of scientific under-standing provided by Western sciencerdquo (El-Hani et al2008 757 Siegel 1997 100) According to this under-standing there are definite values and knowledge-bearing capabilities of science that cannot be attributedto indigenous knowledge of the environmentIndigenous knowledge while it may produce important

knowledge does not do so in the ways that scientific disci-plines do This is according to the authors not a form ofdiscrimination ldquoNotice that we are not saying that theway this community builds knowledge the knowledgebuilt or the criteria employed to appraise cognitive state-ments are epistemically superior to any other body of ap-proaches ideas statements criteria We are just sayingthat they are different and should be kept different forthe sake of clarity about the nature of knowledge and thenature of sciencerdquo (El-Hani and Souza de FerreiraBandeira 2008 758) In this assumption about indigenousknowledge (or TEK) and science there are definite cri-teria values skills and so on that science and TEK havebut there is not a lot of crossover So TEKrsquos supernaturaland social aspects respectfully so exclude the possibilityof the kind of rationality associated with science More-over societies without computing capacities built intotheir TEK systems cannot value quantitative research inthe same way that it is valued in natural sciences disci-plines nor can they engage in the same kind of researchThis first assumption that TEK and science are funda-

mentally different differs from the second assumptionwhich sees the former and the latter as two complemen-tary perspectives on the environment that stem fromcomplementary views on the world The views are com-plementary because there is both crossover as well asgap filling Kimmerer argues that

Traditional ecological knowledge refers to theknowledge practice and belief concerning therelationships of living beings to one another and tothe physical environment which is held by peoples inrelatively nontechnical societies with a directdependence upon local resources It is born of longintimacy and attentiveness to a homeland and canarise wherever people are materially and spirituallyintegrated within their landscape TEK is rational andreliable knowledge that has been developed throughgenerations of intimate contact by native peoples withtheir lands (Kimmerer 2002 431)

TEK and science for Kimmerer can be seen as having acomplementary relation to each other Indeed TEK can beseen as the ldquointellectual twin to sciencerdquo a term she bor-rows from Deloria (433) Kimmerer claims that TEK existsldquoin parallel to Western sciencerdquo (433) She claims that ldquoBoth

knowledge systems yield detailed empirical information ofnatural phenomena and relationships among ecosystemcomponentsrdquo This can include ldquopredictive powerrdquo overlap-ping biological information ldquodetailed empirical knowledgeof population biology resource assessment and monitoringsuccessional dynamics patterns of fluctuation in climateand resources species interactions ethnotaxonomy sus-tainable harvesting and adaptive management and ma-nipulation of disturbance regimes rdquo (Kimmerer 2002433) Yet TEK differs from science for Kimmerer in import-ant ways

TEK observations tend to be qualitative and theycreate a diachronic database that is a record ofobservations from a single locale over a long timeperiod The National Science Foundation in itssupport of the Long-Term Ecological Researchprogram has validated the importance of suchcontinuous data In TEK the observers tend to be theresource users themselves for example huntersfishers and gatherers whose harvesting success isinextricably linked to the quality and reliability oftheir ecological observations In contrast scientificobservations made by a small group of professionalstend to be quantitative and often represent synchronicdata or simultaneous observations from a wide rangeof sites which frequently lack the long-termperspective of TEK Western science is conductedin academic culture in which nature is viewed strictlyobjectively TEK is woven into and is inseparablefrom the social and spiritual contexts of the culture TEK may also extend its explanatory power beyondthe strictly empirical where science cannot go Inindigenous science nature is subject not object Embraced as an equal partner to the power ofWestern science TEK offers not only importantbiological insights but a cultural framework forenvironmental problem solving that incorporateshuman values (Kimmerer 2002 433ndash434)

Here then for Kimmerer TEK and science are two paral-lel complementary perspectives on the environment andnatural resources They go hand in hand Different fromthe first assumption Kimmerer has no problem using con-cepts like ldquopredictionrdquo or ldquorationalrdquo with respect to TEKnor stating straightforwardly that techniques in TEK sys-tems fit well with and are valued by science She also showsthat the influence of culture in TEK systems could be con-sidered beneficial to science Though she admits differ-ences they are not the stark differences that are maintainedin the first assumption For Kimmerer then knowledgeproduction that fails to incorporate both TEK systems andthe relevant sciences would be missing key perspectives onthe world Instead of saying that they are valuable in their

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 6 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

own ways (as in the first assumption) Kimmerer is sayingthat they are valuable together Both knowledge productionsystems can learn a great deal from each otherA third assumption diverges in general from the first

two by desiring to dispense altogether with the pursuitof defining differences and complementarities betweenTEK systems and science That is in this assumptionthere is really no use in even talking theoretically abouta distinction between TEK and science because at theend of the day they are faces of the same phenomenathe pursuit of usable knowledge by human societiesAgrawal for example argues that

The attempt to create distinctions in terms ofindigenous and western is potentially ridiculous Itmakes much more sense to talk about multipledomains and types of knowledges with differinglogics and epistemologies Somewhat contradictorilybut inescapably so the same knowledge can beclassified one way or the other depending on theinterests it serves the purposes for which it isharnessed or the manner in which it is generated [A]nchored unavoidably in institutional origins andmoorings knowledge can only be useful But it isuseful to particular peoples Specific strategies forprotecting systematizing and disseminatingknowledge will differentially benefit different socialgroups and individuals The recognition of this simpletruism is obscured by the confounding labels ofindigenous and western It is only when we moveaway from the sterile dichotomy between indigenousand western when we begin to recognize intra-groupdifferentiation and when we seek out bridges acrossthe constructed chasm between the traditional andthe scientific that we will initiate a productivedialogue to safeguard the interests of those who aredisadvantaged (Agrawal 1995 433)

This third view then suggests that to use terms like in-digenous knowledge or TEK or Western science obscuresseveral important points First TEK and science are allvalue-laden knowledge systems The literature in socialstudies of science shows multiple ways in which science isguided by particular values and even associated with spir-ituality (Biagioli 1999 Turnbull 2000) Second there is noreason why the criteria and values attributed to varioussciences cannot also be those of various TEK systemsMoreover by ldquointra-grouprdquo differentiation Agrawal pointsout that there are few indigenous people who rely on asingle homogenous TEK system rather their knowledgesystem has changed and they likely also rely on differentscientific disciplines as well Examples of this abound likeGuptarsquos 1998 study of how rural farmers in India engagein hybrid agricultural practices that mix Western scientific

and traditional knowledge systems (Gupta 1998) OrWatson-Verran and Turnbull discuss how Western sci-ence is composed of heterogeneous elements (Watson-Verran and Turnbull 1995)Agrawalrsquos position is based on the idea that every society

has some sort of knowledge system which may be a patch-work of systems with multiple origins (eg European indi-genous) There is no such thing as a knowledge systemthat is not guided by peoplersquos interpretations of the chal-lenges that they face And interpretations are influenced byworldviews There is no such thing as a knowledge systemthat is more neutral than any other In the case of scientificdisciplines values of objectivity are based on cosmologicalassumptions about there being subjects and objects in theworld and which beings entities and phenomena fallunder one or the other A science based on such assump-tions may be of limited use to a society that does not carveup reality in this way But on the other hand such a societymay have great use for this kind of information Context iskey Agrawalrsquos assumption speaks to the situation thatmany indigenous peoples encounter in the world Theyneed reliable information for the environmental govern-ance challenges they face And they are likely in the pos-ition to draw from many sources of knowledge Whatknowledge they can use depends on how suitable differentforms of knowledge are for their purposes Whether formsof knowledge are indigenous or not does not really matterin the end Some indigenous peoples may be served per-fectly well by disciplines like biology as the basis of theirenvironmental governance strategies So the implication isthat terms like TEK or indigenous knowledge are not veryuseful and may even waste our time We should focusmore on figuring out what knowledge systems best servethe needs of particular communities and how to realizethem in practiceAs with knowledge mobilization the distinction be-

tween TEK and science does not generate many easy op-tions for consensus on how to define the two in relationto each other First the view that TEK and science mustbe labeled as such and kept distinct misses the realities ofindigenous environmental governance today There is noreason why any so-called TEK system cannot embracesimilar empirical values that are found commonly in vari-ous scientific disciplines One who adopts this assumptionwould perhaps have to consider dropping it were one toconcede that certain values and criteria are not exclusiveto science So it would be tricky for one to accept certainparts of both the first and second assumptions Moreovercontemporary tribal environmental governance involvesexamples of institutions that are guided by TEK but thatuse technologies and methods that originate from non-tribal scientific disciplines (Woodard 2005) Even exam-ples of practices like hunting show that TEK systems areadaptive in their adoption of technologies (Reo and Whyte

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 7 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

2012) In these cases it is hard to imagine a rigid separ-ation between TEK and science and technology becauseTEK systems can incorporate scientific techniques Advo-cates of the third assumption of course would find itfairly difficult to accept the first two assumptions becausethey invoke a distinction between TEK and science tooreadily Agrawalrsquos conclusion is that the term TEK mustbe dispensed with altogether as must particularly loadedconceptions of science So the first assumption seeks tomaintain a rigid separation in definitions the second as-sumption seeks a definition that reveals complementaritythe third assumption can be seen as desiring to dispensewith the business of the first two assumptions altogetherIt is somewhat hard to see people who hold any of these

three assumptions coming to a consensus definition Com-bined with differences regarding knowledge mobilizationit is even harder to see there ever being a single definitionacceptable to all stakeholders But I want to offer anotherfruitful approach to coming to an understanding of TEKthat can advance environmental governance even as wediscuss and disagree on the assumptions underlying vari-ous definitions My approach is different from Agrawalrsquosinsofar as I do not see the need to dispense with the termTEK While Agrawal comes close to my understanding ofthe difficulties in defining TEK he does not draw the onlypossible conclusion from accepting the reality of these dif-ficulties The fact that a term is defined in ways that areproblematic and subject to deep differences does not entailthat it has no use Rather this fact motivates us to considerwhether the term given all its potential definitions andconfusing dimensions has a proper role to play in advan-cing collaborative environmental governance I turn to thistopic in the next subsection

The role of TEK as a collaborative conceptThis subsection shows why TEK should be considered asa collaborative concept that bridges cross-cultural andcross-situational divides To make this case the initialpages of this section focus on the environmental govern-ance situations in which many tribes are embedded and Iuse the term co-management as an example of this I thenmove on to define what a collaborative concept is andhow this relates to the discussion of TEK I have beenbuilding so far in this paper In this sense the initial pagesof this section take a slight detour before returning to theconcept of TEKRegardless of how TEK can be defined what is the role

of the concept of TEK in the first place in the world ofenvironmental governance The world of environmentalgovernance here involves relations between environmen-tal governance institutions associated with and responsibleto indigenous peoples like tribal natural resources depart-ments and those regulating indigenous hunting practicesand governance institutions associated with states and

subnational units like the US Forest Service and Environ-ment Canada All of these institutions have evolved waysof doing things out of histories in which the very idea ofindigenous environmental governance was overtly andsubtly marginalized Times are changing and greater re-spect is accorded to indigenous peoples through inter-national federal and local law and policy These changescreate opportunities for indigenous peoples to work col-laboratively with non-indigenous peoples instead ofagainst them or in secrecy from them (covertly) Indigen-ous peoples can begin to build institutions of environmen-tal governance that are integrated with non-indigenousinstitutions in ways that benefit indigenous communitiesand respect the stewardship goals of their worldviewsBut institution building of this kind is always a work in

progress because of cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides Cross-cultural divides are simply the differences inworldview language lifestyle and so on that obtain be-tween indigenous and non-indigenous populations Forexample an indigenous people may see the goal of restor-ing a native fish species as rekindling the relationship be-tween that species and humans living in the regionwhereas a non-indigenous population may see restorationof the same species as a matter of achieving certain popu-lation numbers conducive to a recreational outcome likeincreasing tourism in the region Cross-cultural dividescan also have an intra-group dimension to them as theremay be differences in beliefs about building relationshipswith a species in an indigenous community and territoryfor example Cross-situational divides are differences incapacities for environmental governance For example anindigenous people may have access to fewer financial re-sources than the neighboring state or province have lim-ited political control over the entire region where itsmembers live and have less representation in nationaldecision-making than representatives of the neighboringstate or province Cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides make collaboration challenging It may be hard forfederal institutions to incorporate indigenous peoplersquosgoals within their policy frameworks It may be frustratingto work across institutions with different bureaucraticcapabilitiesSince the possibility of meaningful collaboration is a rela-

tively recent turn of events there is yet to be perfect guid-ance about how collaboration that bridges cross-culturaland cross-situational divides ought to be done There arecases of success and cases of failure And there is still a lotto be learned regarding whether the lessons from cases ofsuccess can simply be transferred over to other contextsCaught in this predicament there are a host of conceptsthat are being debated as concepts that facilitate or dis-courage genuine collaboration For example the conceptof co-management has been used to suggest a possibleroute to cooperative environmental and natural resources

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 8 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

governance (Goetze 2005)c Co-management invokes theidea of joint political relationships between indigenous andnon-indigenous institutions that work together accordingto standards of fairness to govern particular areas andbkresources Standards of fairness include norms like equalrepresentation and voting rights The concept of co-management is the basis of actual co-management boardsand committees that are composed of indigenous and non-indigenous participants and that are responsible for man-aging a fishery or forested area or particular species like acaribou population Indigenous and non-indigenous insti-tutions often rely on the term co-management as part of ashared language for bridging cross-cultural and cross-situation divides However there is also dialogue on howthe concept of co-management can be taken the wrongway and provide insufficient guidance for collaboration Itis often argued that the concept co-management impliesthat the nation-statersquos (eg Canada US) vision for envir-onmental governance is used to evaluate the collaborativeefforts between indigenous and non-indigenous institu-tions This is because the term ldquomanagementrdquo can connotea non-indigenous view of the appropriate relationshipamong humans other living beings and the environmentThis term can slant the meaning of co-management so thatnon-indigenous participants in a co-management boardfor example come in with expectations that their assump-tions about ldquomanagementrdquo should be prioritized and maynot listen to their indigenous colleagues The term thencan have the effect of silencing genuine negotiation ofcross-cultural and cross-situational differencesInstead the concept of co-existence is offered (McGregor

2004b) which suggests the importance of balancing indi-genous and non-indigenous aspirations of governance intothe evaluation of collaboration In this case one might beinclined to think cynically that it is all about labels Butthere is much more going on than preferences about labelsWe need to consider the role played by concepts likeco-management and co-existence in facilitating or discour-aging collaboration People who reject the concept of co-management based on the contexts they are familiar withsee in it problematic assumptions about how indigenousand non-indigenous institutions should work togetherNon-indigenous people may not see how the concept ofco-management might encourage these assumptions eventhough perhaps co-management is the preferred conceptin some contexts Those who reject the concept of co-management and wish to replace it with the concept of co-existence are inviting non-indigenous people to learn moreabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides This isthe role that concepts like co-management and co-existence play The concept of co-existence does not in it-self contain enough meaning for non-indigenous personsto suggest in advance exactly how a collaborative processshould play out What proponents of co-existence are

saying is that there is much learning to do The concept ofco-existence suggests a very different possibility for collab-oration than what non-indigenous peoples may be used toWork on co-existence expresses an invitation to learnabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides so as toachieve better collaborations in particular contextsThere are two important points here regarding the role

of these concepts First co-management and co-existenceare invoked for better or worse by many different institu-tions in contexts where they are trying to collaborateacross cross-cultural and cross-situational divides Secondthe example of co-existence I gave is an example of howsome people seek to use concepts to improve collaborationby inviting people to consider alternatives that may nothave been on their conceptual radar before The conceptof TEK and its synonyms plays a somewhat analogous roleto the term co-existence As in the first point various defi-nitions of TEK are used in collaborative contexts for betteror worse As in the second point those who bring new def-initions of TEK into dialogue are inviting others to con-sider new possibilities for thinking about the function ofknowledge systems in environmental governanceHowever we need to be precise about what this meansmdash

because I am not arguing that there is a single definition ofTEK that can count for all This is impossible TEK nomatter how it is defined is not adequate for any indigenouscommunity The English articulation TEK is not an indi-genous word or concept and it is likely not used withinvery many communities unto themselves The terms trad-itional and ecological are awkward Traditional can havethe effect of putting knowledge in the past whereas TEK isoften supposed to mean contemporary knowledge Eco-logical aligns TEK with a particular discipline whereas TEKrefers to knowledge that does not stem from that disciplineTerms like indigenous knowledge and native science aresimilarly awkward when we unpack what associations anddissociations they may imply Moreover there may be manycontexts where an indigenous people does see the conceptas referring to accumulated observations for example orcontexts where TEK is viewed as a Western construct ir-relevant to environmental governance There are likelyother contexts where TEK needs to refer to systems of re-sponsibilities There are multiple possible scenarios Theconcept of TEK cannot possibly do justice to the know-ledge systems and articulations of knowledge systems be-longing to the thousands of indigenous peoples TEK is alsonot a concept that was an integral part of the education ofmost ecologists or foresters nor is it a concept that hasexisted for a long time in the federal policies of a nation-state This does not mean though that the concept shouldbe dispensed with Non-indigenous peoples may be equallyuncomfortable with referring to something they are not fa-miliar with as science or linked with a particular scientificdiscipline It may be no easier for them to change out terms

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 9 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

like TEK with even more general terms like Agrawalrsquos ldquous-able knowledgerdquod

Thus whenever the concept of TEK is invoked the rolethat it plays is to suggest that indigenous communitiesmay approach the very question of the nature of know-ledge and how it relates to environmental and natural re-source governance rather differently than disciplines likeecology or biology and the policy contexts in which theyare used By ldquorather differentlyrdquo I do not mean in somesense that applies to all communities For example theremay be some indigenous communities that invoke TEK tomean a radically different cultural paradigm one in whichit is not appropriate to speak of knowledge as distinct frompractice or belief But other indigenous communities wholive in different regions because of historical removal mayinvoke TEK to stand for the values that they believe disci-plines like ecology should serve even if they lack intimateexperiences with the environment they currently inhabitYet other communities might use TEK to suggest differentways in which multiple empirical techniques for gatheringknowledge from huntersrsquo observations to scientific fieldmethods can be used in harmony TEK could also refer toideas about how elders should be involved in the designand peer review of research in tribal environmental de-partments that collect their own data about the environ-ment and the condition of natural resources There aremany more scenarios of course These scenarios indicatethe diversity of how people at a philosophical level thinkabout the meaning of knowledge in relation to their livesAnd their thinking arises from multiple cultural historicalglobal social and personal sourcesThe significance of this point is that when the concept

of TEK is used it really points to the possibility thatthere are cross-cultural and cross-situational divides thatmake it so that non-indigenous parties cannot expecttheir own assumptions to apply to indigenous contextsThe concept of TEK should be invoked to invite non-indigenous parties to learn more about how particularindigenous communities approach fundamental ques-tions of the nature of knowledge and how it fits intotheir visions of environmental governance This invita-tion is not one that promises easy answers Rather it isan invitation to become a part of a long term processwhereby cross-cultural and cross-situation divides arebetter bridged through mutual respect and learning andrelationships among collaborators are given the oppor-tunity to mature Examples of long term processes in-clude ldquothe way of peacerdquo used among indigenous andnon-indigenous participants in the Ontario Model Forest(Holmes et al 2002 Story and Lickers 1997) There aremany other examples We need not only be concernedwith striking the right definition of TEK Rather we needto cultivate attitudes of awareness that the concept ofTEK plays a role as a collaborative concept which is

what I call a concept that invites people to engage in aprocess of respectful learning about significant differ-encese

ConclusionsTEK and its synonyms indigenous knowledge and nativescience have been defined mainly based on two kinds ofassumptions how knowledge is to be mobilized and whatTEKrsquos relation to science is The different assumptionsmake it tricky to come to a consensus definition that satis-fies all stakeholders This makes us interrogate what therole of TEK is in a world of relationships among differentinstitutions of environmental governance for whom TEKis an issue TEK must play the role of inviting cross-cultural and cross-situational learning for indigenous andnon-indigenous policy makers natural resource managersscientists activists elders and youthAn important implication of this is that science and

policy literatures that invoke TEK should discuss it as acollaborative concept That is care must be taken toshow that the concept invites participation to a longterm process of mutually respectful learning And moreeffort needs to be taken to understand what these pro-cesses should look like Already of course there is workthat exemplifies this interpretation of TEK (Barnhardt2005 Ross et al 2010) Yet the point has not beenbrought out that TEK is playing the role of a collabora-tive concept in this work This point should figure morein natural resources and policy literatures Differencesover the meaning of TEK should be seen as invitationsto learn more in circumstances where the possibility ofgenuine collaboration is a relatively recent development

EndnotesaIndigenous peoples refer to the pre-invasion inhabi-

tants of lands now dominated by others examples beingthe Maori in New Zealand or the Anishinaabe in theUnited States and Canada (Anaya 2004)

bI will use the term indigenous knowledge specificallywhen I refer to the work of these authors and shift backto the term TEK for my own analysis My analysis ofAgrawal later on in the same section will also use indi-genous knowledge when referring specifically to hiswork and TEK when referring to my own analysis

cOther collaborative literature includes Fortmann 2008and Colwell-Chanthaphonh and Ferguson 2008

dAgrawal too has considered the role of the concept ofTEK in cross-cultural and cross-situational collabor-ation He argues that

it is possibly the case that advocates of indigenousknowledge find in the term a particularly potent wayto summarize and invoke many of their concerns andhopes about peoples livelihoods life styles and

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 10 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

resource systems they view as disappearing Thephrase evokes embattled ways of living-in-the-worldthat real economic social and political pressures arenudging and frog-marching toward furthermarginalization and oblivion Because the indigenousscientific division of knowledge effectively representsdurable underlying social confrontations the studyand defense of indigenous knowledge continues toattract attention Indeed even as one questions theneed to contrast indigenous and scientificknowledges one underscores this contrastmdashin thevery use of the contrasting adjectives Indigenousknowledge is here to stay even if what it represents isforever and always disappearing (Agrawal 2009 158)

I hope to articulate in this paper that there are farmore reasons why people invoke concepts like TEK orindigenous knowledge than what Agrawal states

eCollaborative concepts also differ from boundary ob-jects (Star and Griesemer 1989) Boundary objects arecommonly shared by diverse stakeholders and serve tocoordinate their actions despite different interests Col-laborative concepts are invitations to learn more whichsuggest the need for a long term process of mutually re-spectful learning

Competing interestsThe author declares that there are no competing interests

AcknowledgmentsI wish to thank Kristie Dotson Michael ORourke Nicholas Reo and theanonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on this paper

Received 11 December 2012 Accepted 17 January 2013Published 5 April 2013

ReferencesAgrawal A (1995) Dismantling the divide between indigenous and scientific

knowledge Dev Change 26(3)413ndash439Agrawal A (2009) Why ldquoindigenousrdquo knowledge J R Soc N Z 39(4)157ndash158Anaya SJ (2004) Indigenous peoples in international law 2nd edition Oxford

University Press New YorkBarnhardt R (2005) Indigenous knowledge systems and Alaska Native ways of

knowing Anthropol Ed Q 36(1)8ndash23Berkes F (1999) Sacred ecology traditional ecological knowledge and resource

management Taylor amp Francis PhiladelphiaBiagioli M (1999) The science studies reader Routledge New YorkBrokensha DW Warren DM Werner O (1980) Indigenous knowledge systems and

development University Press of America Washington DCCajete G (1999) Native science natural laws of interdependence Clear Light

Books Santa Fe NMColwell-Chanthaphonh JS Ferguson TJ (2008) Collaboration in archaeological

practice engaging descendant communities AltaMira Lanham MDEisner WR Cuomo CJ Hinkel KM Jones BM Brower S Ronald H (2009)

Advancing Landscape Change Research through the Incorporation ofIntildeupiaq Knowledge Arctic 62(4)429ndash442

El-Hani C de Ferreira S Bandeira F (2008) Valuing indigenous knowledge to callit ldquosciencerdquo will not help Cult Stud Sci Educ 3(3)751ndash779 doi101007s11422-008-9129-6

Ellen R (2000) Indigenous environmental knowledge and its transformationscritical anthropological perspectives vol 5 Routledge New York

Fortmann L (2008) Participatory research in conservation and rural livelihoodsDoing science together vol 3 Wiley-Blackwell Hoboken

Gadgil M Berkes F Folke C (1993) Indigenous knowledge for biodiversityconservation Ambio 22(23)151ndash156

Goetze TC (2005) Empowered co-management towards power-sharing andindigenous rights in Clayoquot Sound BC Anthropologica 47(2)247ndash265

Gupta A (1998) Postcolonial developments agriculture in the making of modernIndia Duke University Press Durham NC

Harding S (1998) Is science multicultural postcolonialisms feminisms andepistemologies Indiana University Press Bloomington

Harding S (2011) The postcolonial science and technology studies reader DukeUniversity Press Durham NC

Harris G (ed) (2011) Northwest Forest Planmdashthe first 15 years [1994ndash2008]effectiveness of the federal-tribal relationship Tech Paper R6-RPM-TP-01-2011 US Department of Agriculture Forest Service Pacific NorthwestRegion Portland

Holmes E Lickers H Barkley B (2002) A critical assessment of ten years of on-the-ground sustainable forestry in eastern Ontariorsquos settled landscape For Chron78(5)643ndash647

Houde N (2007) The six faces of traditional ecological knowledge challenges andopportunities for Canadian co-management arrangements Ecol Soc 12(2)34

Huntington H (2000) Using traditional ecological knowledge in science methodsand applications Ecol Appl 10(5)1270ndash1274

Kimmerer R (2002) Weaving traditional ecological knowledge into biologicaleducation7 a call to action Bioscience 52(5)432ndash438 doi1016410006-3568(2002)052[0432WTEKIB]20CO2

Kimmerer R Lake F (2001) The role of indigenous burning in land managementJ For 99(11)36ndash41

Kofinas GP (2005) Caribou hunters and researchers at the co-managementinterface emergent dilemmas and the dynamics of legitimacy in powersharing Anthropologica 47(2)179ndash196

Leonetti C (2010) Indigenous stewardship methods and NRCS conservationpractices United States Department of Agriculture Natural ResourcesConservation Service Anchorage

McGregor D (2004a) Coming full circle indigenous knowledge environment andour future Am Indian Q 28(3amp4)385ndash410

McGregor D (2004b) Traditional ecological knowledge and sustainabledevelopment towards coexistence In Blaser M Feit HA McRae G (ed) In theway of development indigenous peoples life projects and globalizationZedIDRC Ottawa

McGregor D (2008) Linking traditional ecological knowledge and westernscience aboriginal perspectives from the 2000 State of the Lakes EcosystemConference Can J Nativ Stud XXVIII(1)139ndash158

Nadasdy P (1999) The politics of TEK power and the integration of knowledgeArct Anthropol 36(1ndash2)1ndash18

Nakashima DJ (1993) Astute observers on the sea ice edge Inuit knowledge as abasis for arctic co-management In Inglis J (ed) Traditional ecologicalknoweldge concepts and cases International Program on TraditionalEcological Knowledge and International Development Research CentreOttawa pp 99ndash110

Nakashima DJ Galloway McLean K Thulstrup HD Ramos Castillo A Rubis JT(2012) Weathering uncertainty traditional knowledge for climate changeassessment and adaptation UNESCO and Darwin UNU Paris

Pierotti R Wildcat D (2000) Traditional ecological knowledge the thirdalternative Ecol Appl 10(5)1333ndash1340

Reo N Whyte K (2012) Hunting and morality as elements of traditional ecologicalknowledge Hum Ecol 40(1)15ndash27 doi101007s10745-011-9448-1

Ross A Sherman R Snodgrass JG Delcore HD (2010) Indigenous peoples and thecollaborative stewardship of nature knowledge binds and institutionalconflicts Left Coast Press Walnut Creek CA

Salmon E (1996) Decolonizing our voices Winds Change 11(3)70ndash72Siegel H (1997) Science education multicultural and universal Interchange 28

(2)97ndash108Star SL Griesemer JR (1989) Institutional ecology Translations and boundary

objects amateurs and professionals in Berkeleys museum of vertebratezoology 1907ndash39 Soc Stud Sci 19(3)387ndash420

Story P Lickers F (1997) Partnership building for sustainable development a FirstNations perspective from Ontario J Sustain For 4(3ndash4)149ndash162

Turnbull D (2000) Masons tricksters and cartographers comparative studies inthe sociology of scientific and indigenous knowledge Taylor amp FrancisPhiladelphia

UNEP (1998) Report of the fourth meeting of the parties to the convention onbiodiversity UNEPCBDCOP Nairobi Kenya

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 11 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

of relations among unobservables and between observ-ables and unobservables and depth of scientific under-standing provided by Western sciencerdquo (El-Hani et al2008 757 Siegel 1997 100) According to this under-standing there are definite values and knowledge-bearing capabilities of science that cannot be attributedto indigenous knowledge of the environmentIndigenous knowledge while it may produce important

knowledge does not do so in the ways that scientific disci-plines do This is according to the authors not a form ofdiscrimination ldquoNotice that we are not saying that theway this community builds knowledge the knowledgebuilt or the criteria employed to appraise cognitive state-ments are epistemically superior to any other body of ap-proaches ideas statements criteria We are just sayingthat they are different and should be kept different forthe sake of clarity about the nature of knowledge and thenature of sciencerdquo (El-Hani and Souza de FerreiraBandeira 2008 758) In this assumption about indigenousknowledge (or TEK) and science there are definite cri-teria values skills and so on that science and TEK havebut there is not a lot of crossover So TEKrsquos supernaturaland social aspects respectfully so exclude the possibilityof the kind of rationality associated with science More-over societies without computing capacities built intotheir TEK systems cannot value quantitative research inthe same way that it is valued in natural sciences disci-plines nor can they engage in the same kind of researchThis first assumption that TEK and science are funda-

mentally different differs from the second assumptionwhich sees the former and the latter as two complemen-tary perspectives on the environment that stem fromcomplementary views on the world The views are com-plementary because there is both crossover as well asgap filling Kimmerer argues that

Traditional ecological knowledge refers to theknowledge practice and belief concerning therelationships of living beings to one another and tothe physical environment which is held by peoples inrelatively nontechnical societies with a directdependence upon local resources It is born of longintimacy and attentiveness to a homeland and canarise wherever people are materially and spirituallyintegrated within their landscape TEK is rational andreliable knowledge that has been developed throughgenerations of intimate contact by native peoples withtheir lands (Kimmerer 2002 431)

TEK and science for Kimmerer can be seen as having acomplementary relation to each other Indeed TEK can beseen as the ldquointellectual twin to sciencerdquo a term she bor-rows from Deloria (433) Kimmerer claims that TEK existsldquoin parallel to Western sciencerdquo (433) She claims that ldquoBoth

knowledge systems yield detailed empirical information ofnatural phenomena and relationships among ecosystemcomponentsrdquo This can include ldquopredictive powerrdquo overlap-ping biological information ldquodetailed empirical knowledgeof population biology resource assessment and monitoringsuccessional dynamics patterns of fluctuation in climateand resources species interactions ethnotaxonomy sus-tainable harvesting and adaptive management and ma-nipulation of disturbance regimes rdquo (Kimmerer 2002433) Yet TEK differs from science for Kimmerer in import-ant ways

TEK observations tend to be qualitative and theycreate a diachronic database that is a record ofobservations from a single locale over a long timeperiod The National Science Foundation in itssupport of the Long-Term Ecological Researchprogram has validated the importance of suchcontinuous data In TEK the observers tend to be theresource users themselves for example huntersfishers and gatherers whose harvesting success isinextricably linked to the quality and reliability oftheir ecological observations In contrast scientificobservations made by a small group of professionalstend to be quantitative and often represent synchronicdata or simultaneous observations from a wide rangeof sites which frequently lack the long-termperspective of TEK Western science is conductedin academic culture in which nature is viewed strictlyobjectively TEK is woven into and is inseparablefrom the social and spiritual contexts of the culture TEK may also extend its explanatory power beyondthe strictly empirical where science cannot go Inindigenous science nature is subject not object Embraced as an equal partner to the power ofWestern science TEK offers not only importantbiological insights but a cultural framework forenvironmental problem solving that incorporateshuman values (Kimmerer 2002 433ndash434)

Here then for Kimmerer TEK and science are two paral-lel complementary perspectives on the environment andnatural resources They go hand in hand Different fromthe first assumption Kimmerer has no problem using con-cepts like ldquopredictionrdquo or ldquorationalrdquo with respect to TEKnor stating straightforwardly that techniques in TEK sys-tems fit well with and are valued by science She also showsthat the influence of culture in TEK systems could be con-sidered beneficial to science Though she admits differ-ences they are not the stark differences that are maintainedin the first assumption For Kimmerer then knowledgeproduction that fails to incorporate both TEK systems andthe relevant sciences would be missing key perspectives onthe world Instead of saying that they are valuable in their

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 6 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

own ways (as in the first assumption) Kimmerer is sayingthat they are valuable together Both knowledge productionsystems can learn a great deal from each otherA third assumption diverges in general from the first

two by desiring to dispense altogether with the pursuitof defining differences and complementarities betweenTEK systems and science That is in this assumptionthere is really no use in even talking theoretically abouta distinction between TEK and science because at theend of the day they are faces of the same phenomenathe pursuit of usable knowledge by human societiesAgrawal for example argues that

The attempt to create distinctions in terms ofindigenous and western is potentially ridiculous Itmakes much more sense to talk about multipledomains and types of knowledges with differinglogics and epistemologies Somewhat contradictorilybut inescapably so the same knowledge can beclassified one way or the other depending on theinterests it serves the purposes for which it isharnessed or the manner in which it is generated [A]nchored unavoidably in institutional origins andmoorings knowledge can only be useful But it isuseful to particular peoples Specific strategies forprotecting systematizing and disseminatingknowledge will differentially benefit different socialgroups and individuals The recognition of this simpletruism is obscured by the confounding labels ofindigenous and western It is only when we moveaway from the sterile dichotomy between indigenousand western when we begin to recognize intra-groupdifferentiation and when we seek out bridges acrossthe constructed chasm between the traditional andthe scientific that we will initiate a productivedialogue to safeguard the interests of those who aredisadvantaged (Agrawal 1995 433)

This third view then suggests that to use terms like in-digenous knowledge or TEK or Western science obscuresseveral important points First TEK and science are allvalue-laden knowledge systems The literature in socialstudies of science shows multiple ways in which science isguided by particular values and even associated with spir-ituality (Biagioli 1999 Turnbull 2000) Second there is noreason why the criteria and values attributed to varioussciences cannot also be those of various TEK systemsMoreover by ldquointra-grouprdquo differentiation Agrawal pointsout that there are few indigenous people who rely on asingle homogenous TEK system rather their knowledgesystem has changed and they likely also rely on differentscientific disciplines as well Examples of this abound likeGuptarsquos 1998 study of how rural farmers in India engagein hybrid agricultural practices that mix Western scientific

and traditional knowledge systems (Gupta 1998) OrWatson-Verran and Turnbull discuss how Western sci-ence is composed of heterogeneous elements (Watson-Verran and Turnbull 1995)Agrawalrsquos position is based on the idea that every society

has some sort of knowledge system which may be a patch-work of systems with multiple origins (eg European indi-genous) There is no such thing as a knowledge systemthat is not guided by peoplersquos interpretations of the chal-lenges that they face And interpretations are influenced byworldviews There is no such thing as a knowledge systemthat is more neutral than any other In the case of scientificdisciplines values of objectivity are based on cosmologicalassumptions about there being subjects and objects in theworld and which beings entities and phenomena fallunder one or the other A science based on such assump-tions may be of limited use to a society that does not carveup reality in this way But on the other hand such a societymay have great use for this kind of information Context iskey Agrawalrsquos assumption speaks to the situation thatmany indigenous peoples encounter in the world Theyneed reliable information for the environmental govern-ance challenges they face And they are likely in the pos-ition to draw from many sources of knowledge Whatknowledge they can use depends on how suitable differentforms of knowledge are for their purposes Whether formsof knowledge are indigenous or not does not really matterin the end Some indigenous peoples may be served per-fectly well by disciplines like biology as the basis of theirenvironmental governance strategies So the implication isthat terms like TEK or indigenous knowledge are not veryuseful and may even waste our time We should focusmore on figuring out what knowledge systems best servethe needs of particular communities and how to realizethem in practiceAs with knowledge mobilization the distinction be-

tween TEK and science does not generate many easy op-tions for consensus on how to define the two in relationto each other First the view that TEK and science mustbe labeled as such and kept distinct misses the realities ofindigenous environmental governance today There is noreason why any so-called TEK system cannot embracesimilar empirical values that are found commonly in vari-ous scientific disciplines One who adopts this assumptionwould perhaps have to consider dropping it were one toconcede that certain values and criteria are not exclusiveto science So it would be tricky for one to accept certainparts of both the first and second assumptions Moreovercontemporary tribal environmental governance involvesexamples of institutions that are guided by TEK but thatuse technologies and methods that originate from non-tribal scientific disciplines (Woodard 2005) Even exam-ples of practices like hunting show that TEK systems areadaptive in their adoption of technologies (Reo and Whyte

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 7 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

2012) In these cases it is hard to imagine a rigid separ-ation between TEK and science and technology becauseTEK systems can incorporate scientific techniques Advo-cates of the third assumption of course would find itfairly difficult to accept the first two assumptions becausethey invoke a distinction between TEK and science tooreadily Agrawalrsquos conclusion is that the term TEK mustbe dispensed with altogether as must particularly loadedconceptions of science So the first assumption seeks tomaintain a rigid separation in definitions the second as-sumption seeks a definition that reveals complementaritythe third assumption can be seen as desiring to dispensewith the business of the first two assumptions altogetherIt is somewhat hard to see people who hold any of these

three assumptions coming to a consensus definition Com-bined with differences regarding knowledge mobilizationit is even harder to see there ever being a single definitionacceptable to all stakeholders But I want to offer anotherfruitful approach to coming to an understanding of TEKthat can advance environmental governance even as wediscuss and disagree on the assumptions underlying vari-ous definitions My approach is different from Agrawalrsquosinsofar as I do not see the need to dispense with the termTEK While Agrawal comes close to my understanding ofthe difficulties in defining TEK he does not draw the onlypossible conclusion from accepting the reality of these dif-ficulties The fact that a term is defined in ways that areproblematic and subject to deep differences does not entailthat it has no use Rather this fact motivates us to considerwhether the term given all its potential definitions andconfusing dimensions has a proper role to play in advan-cing collaborative environmental governance I turn to thistopic in the next subsection

The role of TEK as a collaborative conceptThis subsection shows why TEK should be considered asa collaborative concept that bridges cross-cultural andcross-situational divides To make this case the initialpages of this section focus on the environmental govern-ance situations in which many tribes are embedded and Iuse the term co-management as an example of this I thenmove on to define what a collaborative concept is andhow this relates to the discussion of TEK I have beenbuilding so far in this paper In this sense the initial pagesof this section take a slight detour before returning to theconcept of TEKRegardless of how TEK can be defined what is the role

of the concept of TEK in the first place in the world ofenvironmental governance The world of environmentalgovernance here involves relations between environmen-tal governance institutions associated with and responsibleto indigenous peoples like tribal natural resources depart-ments and those regulating indigenous hunting practicesand governance institutions associated with states and

subnational units like the US Forest Service and Environ-ment Canada All of these institutions have evolved waysof doing things out of histories in which the very idea ofindigenous environmental governance was overtly andsubtly marginalized Times are changing and greater re-spect is accorded to indigenous peoples through inter-national federal and local law and policy These changescreate opportunities for indigenous peoples to work col-laboratively with non-indigenous peoples instead ofagainst them or in secrecy from them (covertly) Indigen-ous peoples can begin to build institutions of environmen-tal governance that are integrated with non-indigenousinstitutions in ways that benefit indigenous communitiesand respect the stewardship goals of their worldviewsBut institution building of this kind is always a work in

progress because of cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides Cross-cultural divides are simply the differences inworldview language lifestyle and so on that obtain be-tween indigenous and non-indigenous populations Forexample an indigenous people may see the goal of restor-ing a native fish species as rekindling the relationship be-tween that species and humans living in the regionwhereas a non-indigenous population may see restorationof the same species as a matter of achieving certain popu-lation numbers conducive to a recreational outcome likeincreasing tourism in the region Cross-cultural dividescan also have an intra-group dimension to them as theremay be differences in beliefs about building relationshipswith a species in an indigenous community and territoryfor example Cross-situational divides are differences incapacities for environmental governance For example anindigenous people may have access to fewer financial re-sources than the neighboring state or province have lim-ited political control over the entire region where itsmembers live and have less representation in nationaldecision-making than representatives of the neighboringstate or province Cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides make collaboration challenging It may be hard forfederal institutions to incorporate indigenous peoplersquosgoals within their policy frameworks It may be frustratingto work across institutions with different bureaucraticcapabilitiesSince the possibility of meaningful collaboration is a rela-

tively recent turn of events there is yet to be perfect guid-ance about how collaboration that bridges cross-culturaland cross-situational divides ought to be done There arecases of success and cases of failure And there is still a lotto be learned regarding whether the lessons from cases ofsuccess can simply be transferred over to other contextsCaught in this predicament there are a host of conceptsthat are being debated as concepts that facilitate or dis-courage genuine collaboration For example the conceptof co-management has been used to suggest a possibleroute to cooperative environmental and natural resources

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 8 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

governance (Goetze 2005)c Co-management invokes theidea of joint political relationships between indigenous andnon-indigenous institutions that work together accordingto standards of fairness to govern particular areas andbkresources Standards of fairness include norms like equalrepresentation and voting rights The concept of co-management is the basis of actual co-management boardsand committees that are composed of indigenous and non-indigenous participants and that are responsible for man-aging a fishery or forested area or particular species like acaribou population Indigenous and non-indigenous insti-tutions often rely on the term co-management as part of ashared language for bridging cross-cultural and cross-situation divides However there is also dialogue on howthe concept of co-management can be taken the wrongway and provide insufficient guidance for collaboration Itis often argued that the concept co-management impliesthat the nation-statersquos (eg Canada US) vision for envir-onmental governance is used to evaluate the collaborativeefforts between indigenous and non-indigenous institu-tions This is because the term ldquomanagementrdquo can connotea non-indigenous view of the appropriate relationshipamong humans other living beings and the environmentThis term can slant the meaning of co-management so thatnon-indigenous participants in a co-management boardfor example come in with expectations that their assump-tions about ldquomanagementrdquo should be prioritized and maynot listen to their indigenous colleagues The term thencan have the effect of silencing genuine negotiation ofcross-cultural and cross-situational differencesInstead the concept of co-existence is offered (McGregor

2004b) which suggests the importance of balancing indi-genous and non-indigenous aspirations of governance intothe evaluation of collaboration In this case one might beinclined to think cynically that it is all about labels Butthere is much more going on than preferences about labelsWe need to consider the role played by concepts likeco-management and co-existence in facilitating or discour-aging collaboration People who reject the concept of co-management based on the contexts they are familiar withsee in it problematic assumptions about how indigenousand non-indigenous institutions should work togetherNon-indigenous people may not see how the concept ofco-management might encourage these assumptions eventhough perhaps co-management is the preferred conceptin some contexts Those who reject the concept of co-management and wish to replace it with the concept of co-existence are inviting non-indigenous people to learn moreabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides This isthe role that concepts like co-management and co-existence play The concept of co-existence does not in it-self contain enough meaning for non-indigenous personsto suggest in advance exactly how a collaborative processshould play out What proponents of co-existence are

saying is that there is much learning to do The concept ofco-existence suggests a very different possibility for collab-oration than what non-indigenous peoples may be used toWork on co-existence expresses an invitation to learnabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides so as toachieve better collaborations in particular contextsThere are two important points here regarding the role

of these concepts First co-management and co-existenceare invoked for better or worse by many different institu-tions in contexts where they are trying to collaborateacross cross-cultural and cross-situational divides Secondthe example of co-existence I gave is an example of howsome people seek to use concepts to improve collaborationby inviting people to consider alternatives that may nothave been on their conceptual radar before The conceptof TEK and its synonyms plays a somewhat analogous roleto the term co-existence As in the first point various defi-nitions of TEK are used in collaborative contexts for betteror worse As in the second point those who bring new def-initions of TEK into dialogue are inviting others to con-sider new possibilities for thinking about the function ofknowledge systems in environmental governanceHowever we need to be precise about what this meansmdash

because I am not arguing that there is a single definition ofTEK that can count for all This is impossible TEK nomatter how it is defined is not adequate for any indigenouscommunity The English articulation TEK is not an indi-genous word or concept and it is likely not used withinvery many communities unto themselves The terms trad-itional and ecological are awkward Traditional can havethe effect of putting knowledge in the past whereas TEK isoften supposed to mean contemporary knowledge Eco-logical aligns TEK with a particular discipline whereas TEKrefers to knowledge that does not stem from that disciplineTerms like indigenous knowledge and native science aresimilarly awkward when we unpack what associations anddissociations they may imply Moreover there may be manycontexts where an indigenous people does see the conceptas referring to accumulated observations for example orcontexts where TEK is viewed as a Western construct ir-relevant to environmental governance There are likelyother contexts where TEK needs to refer to systems of re-sponsibilities There are multiple possible scenarios Theconcept of TEK cannot possibly do justice to the know-ledge systems and articulations of knowledge systems be-longing to the thousands of indigenous peoples TEK is alsonot a concept that was an integral part of the education ofmost ecologists or foresters nor is it a concept that hasexisted for a long time in the federal policies of a nation-state This does not mean though that the concept shouldbe dispensed with Non-indigenous peoples may be equallyuncomfortable with referring to something they are not fa-miliar with as science or linked with a particular scientificdiscipline It may be no easier for them to change out terms

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 9 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

like TEK with even more general terms like Agrawalrsquos ldquous-able knowledgerdquod

Thus whenever the concept of TEK is invoked the rolethat it plays is to suggest that indigenous communitiesmay approach the very question of the nature of know-ledge and how it relates to environmental and natural re-source governance rather differently than disciplines likeecology or biology and the policy contexts in which theyare used By ldquorather differentlyrdquo I do not mean in somesense that applies to all communities For example theremay be some indigenous communities that invoke TEK tomean a radically different cultural paradigm one in whichit is not appropriate to speak of knowledge as distinct frompractice or belief But other indigenous communities wholive in different regions because of historical removal mayinvoke TEK to stand for the values that they believe disci-plines like ecology should serve even if they lack intimateexperiences with the environment they currently inhabitYet other communities might use TEK to suggest differentways in which multiple empirical techniques for gatheringknowledge from huntersrsquo observations to scientific fieldmethods can be used in harmony TEK could also refer toideas about how elders should be involved in the designand peer review of research in tribal environmental de-partments that collect their own data about the environ-ment and the condition of natural resources There aremany more scenarios of course These scenarios indicatethe diversity of how people at a philosophical level thinkabout the meaning of knowledge in relation to their livesAnd their thinking arises from multiple cultural historicalglobal social and personal sourcesThe significance of this point is that when the concept

of TEK is used it really points to the possibility thatthere are cross-cultural and cross-situational divides thatmake it so that non-indigenous parties cannot expecttheir own assumptions to apply to indigenous contextsThe concept of TEK should be invoked to invite non-indigenous parties to learn more about how particularindigenous communities approach fundamental ques-tions of the nature of knowledge and how it fits intotheir visions of environmental governance This invita-tion is not one that promises easy answers Rather it isan invitation to become a part of a long term processwhereby cross-cultural and cross-situation divides arebetter bridged through mutual respect and learning andrelationships among collaborators are given the oppor-tunity to mature Examples of long term processes in-clude ldquothe way of peacerdquo used among indigenous andnon-indigenous participants in the Ontario Model Forest(Holmes et al 2002 Story and Lickers 1997) There aremany other examples We need not only be concernedwith striking the right definition of TEK Rather we needto cultivate attitudes of awareness that the concept ofTEK plays a role as a collaborative concept which is

what I call a concept that invites people to engage in aprocess of respectful learning about significant differ-encese

ConclusionsTEK and its synonyms indigenous knowledge and nativescience have been defined mainly based on two kinds ofassumptions how knowledge is to be mobilized and whatTEKrsquos relation to science is The different assumptionsmake it tricky to come to a consensus definition that satis-fies all stakeholders This makes us interrogate what therole of TEK is in a world of relationships among differentinstitutions of environmental governance for whom TEKis an issue TEK must play the role of inviting cross-cultural and cross-situational learning for indigenous andnon-indigenous policy makers natural resource managersscientists activists elders and youthAn important implication of this is that science and

policy literatures that invoke TEK should discuss it as acollaborative concept That is care must be taken toshow that the concept invites participation to a longterm process of mutually respectful learning And moreeffort needs to be taken to understand what these pro-cesses should look like Already of course there is workthat exemplifies this interpretation of TEK (Barnhardt2005 Ross et al 2010) Yet the point has not beenbrought out that TEK is playing the role of a collabora-tive concept in this work This point should figure morein natural resources and policy literatures Differencesover the meaning of TEK should be seen as invitationsto learn more in circumstances where the possibility ofgenuine collaboration is a relatively recent development

EndnotesaIndigenous peoples refer to the pre-invasion inhabi-

tants of lands now dominated by others examples beingthe Maori in New Zealand or the Anishinaabe in theUnited States and Canada (Anaya 2004)

bI will use the term indigenous knowledge specificallywhen I refer to the work of these authors and shift backto the term TEK for my own analysis My analysis ofAgrawal later on in the same section will also use indi-genous knowledge when referring specifically to hiswork and TEK when referring to my own analysis

cOther collaborative literature includes Fortmann 2008and Colwell-Chanthaphonh and Ferguson 2008

dAgrawal too has considered the role of the concept ofTEK in cross-cultural and cross-situational collabor-ation He argues that

it is possibly the case that advocates of indigenousknowledge find in the term a particularly potent wayto summarize and invoke many of their concerns andhopes about peoples livelihoods life styles and

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 10 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

resource systems they view as disappearing Thephrase evokes embattled ways of living-in-the-worldthat real economic social and political pressures arenudging and frog-marching toward furthermarginalization and oblivion Because the indigenousscientific division of knowledge effectively representsdurable underlying social confrontations the studyand defense of indigenous knowledge continues toattract attention Indeed even as one questions theneed to contrast indigenous and scientificknowledges one underscores this contrastmdashin thevery use of the contrasting adjectives Indigenousknowledge is here to stay even if what it represents isforever and always disappearing (Agrawal 2009 158)

I hope to articulate in this paper that there are farmore reasons why people invoke concepts like TEK orindigenous knowledge than what Agrawal states

eCollaborative concepts also differ from boundary ob-jects (Star and Griesemer 1989) Boundary objects arecommonly shared by diverse stakeholders and serve tocoordinate their actions despite different interests Col-laborative concepts are invitations to learn more whichsuggest the need for a long term process of mutually re-spectful learning

Competing interestsThe author declares that there are no competing interests

AcknowledgmentsI wish to thank Kristie Dotson Michael ORourke Nicholas Reo and theanonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on this paper

Received 11 December 2012 Accepted 17 January 2013Published 5 April 2013

ReferencesAgrawal A (1995) Dismantling the divide between indigenous and scientific

knowledge Dev Change 26(3)413ndash439Agrawal A (2009) Why ldquoindigenousrdquo knowledge J R Soc N Z 39(4)157ndash158Anaya SJ (2004) Indigenous peoples in international law 2nd edition Oxford

University Press New YorkBarnhardt R (2005) Indigenous knowledge systems and Alaska Native ways of

knowing Anthropol Ed Q 36(1)8ndash23Berkes F (1999) Sacred ecology traditional ecological knowledge and resource

management Taylor amp Francis PhiladelphiaBiagioli M (1999) The science studies reader Routledge New YorkBrokensha DW Warren DM Werner O (1980) Indigenous knowledge systems and

development University Press of America Washington DCCajete G (1999) Native science natural laws of interdependence Clear Light

Books Santa Fe NMColwell-Chanthaphonh JS Ferguson TJ (2008) Collaboration in archaeological

practice engaging descendant communities AltaMira Lanham MDEisner WR Cuomo CJ Hinkel KM Jones BM Brower S Ronald H (2009)

Advancing Landscape Change Research through the Incorporation ofIntildeupiaq Knowledge Arctic 62(4)429ndash442

El-Hani C de Ferreira S Bandeira F (2008) Valuing indigenous knowledge to callit ldquosciencerdquo will not help Cult Stud Sci Educ 3(3)751ndash779 doi101007s11422-008-9129-6

Ellen R (2000) Indigenous environmental knowledge and its transformationscritical anthropological perspectives vol 5 Routledge New York

Fortmann L (2008) Participatory research in conservation and rural livelihoodsDoing science together vol 3 Wiley-Blackwell Hoboken

Gadgil M Berkes F Folke C (1993) Indigenous knowledge for biodiversityconservation Ambio 22(23)151ndash156

Goetze TC (2005) Empowered co-management towards power-sharing andindigenous rights in Clayoquot Sound BC Anthropologica 47(2)247ndash265

Gupta A (1998) Postcolonial developments agriculture in the making of modernIndia Duke University Press Durham NC

Harding S (1998) Is science multicultural postcolonialisms feminisms andepistemologies Indiana University Press Bloomington

Harding S (2011) The postcolonial science and technology studies reader DukeUniversity Press Durham NC

Harris G (ed) (2011) Northwest Forest Planmdashthe first 15 years [1994ndash2008]effectiveness of the federal-tribal relationship Tech Paper R6-RPM-TP-01-2011 US Department of Agriculture Forest Service Pacific NorthwestRegion Portland

Holmes E Lickers H Barkley B (2002) A critical assessment of ten years of on-the-ground sustainable forestry in eastern Ontariorsquos settled landscape For Chron78(5)643ndash647

Houde N (2007) The six faces of traditional ecological knowledge challenges andopportunities for Canadian co-management arrangements Ecol Soc 12(2)34

Huntington H (2000) Using traditional ecological knowledge in science methodsand applications Ecol Appl 10(5)1270ndash1274

Kimmerer R (2002) Weaving traditional ecological knowledge into biologicaleducation7 a call to action Bioscience 52(5)432ndash438 doi1016410006-3568(2002)052[0432WTEKIB]20CO2

Kimmerer R Lake F (2001) The role of indigenous burning in land managementJ For 99(11)36ndash41

Kofinas GP (2005) Caribou hunters and researchers at the co-managementinterface emergent dilemmas and the dynamics of legitimacy in powersharing Anthropologica 47(2)179ndash196

Leonetti C (2010) Indigenous stewardship methods and NRCS conservationpractices United States Department of Agriculture Natural ResourcesConservation Service Anchorage

McGregor D (2004a) Coming full circle indigenous knowledge environment andour future Am Indian Q 28(3amp4)385ndash410

McGregor D (2004b) Traditional ecological knowledge and sustainabledevelopment towards coexistence In Blaser M Feit HA McRae G (ed) In theway of development indigenous peoples life projects and globalizationZedIDRC Ottawa

McGregor D (2008) Linking traditional ecological knowledge and westernscience aboriginal perspectives from the 2000 State of the Lakes EcosystemConference Can J Nativ Stud XXVIII(1)139ndash158

Nadasdy P (1999) The politics of TEK power and the integration of knowledgeArct Anthropol 36(1ndash2)1ndash18

Nakashima DJ (1993) Astute observers on the sea ice edge Inuit knowledge as abasis for arctic co-management In Inglis J (ed) Traditional ecologicalknoweldge concepts and cases International Program on TraditionalEcological Knowledge and International Development Research CentreOttawa pp 99ndash110

Nakashima DJ Galloway McLean K Thulstrup HD Ramos Castillo A Rubis JT(2012) Weathering uncertainty traditional knowledge for climate changeassessment and adaptation UNESCO and Darwin UNU Paris

Pierotti R Wildcat D (2000) Traditional ecological knowledge the thirdalternative Ecol Appl 10(5)1333ndash1340

Reo N Whyte K (2012) Hunting and morality as elements of traditional ecologicalknowledge Hum Ecol 40(1)15ndash27 doi101007s10745-011-9448-1

Ross A Sherman R Snodgrass JG Delcore HD (2010) Indigenous peoples and thecollaborative stewardship of nature knowledge binds and institutionalconflicts Left Coast Press Walnut Creek CA

Salmon E (1996) Decolonizing our voices Winds Change 11(3)70ndash72Siegel H (1997) Science education multicultural and universal Interchange 28

(2)97ndash108Star SL Griesemer JR (1989) Institutional ecology Translations and boundary

objects amateurs and professionals in Berkeleys museum of vertebratezoology 1907ndash39 Soc Stud Sci 19(3)387ndash420

Story P Lickers F (1997) Partnership building for sustainable development a FirstNations perspective from Ontario J Sustain For 4(3ndash4)149ndash162

Turnbull D (2000) Masons tricksters and cartographers comparative studies inthe sociology of scientific and indigenous knowledge Taylor amp FrancisPhiladelphia

UNEP (1998) Report of the fourth meeting of the parties to the convention onbiodiversity UNEPCBDCOP Nairobi Kenya

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 11 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

own ways (as in the first assumption) Kimmerer is sayingthat they are valuable together Both knowledge productionsystems can learn a great deal from each otherA third assumption diverges in general from the first

two by desiring to dispense altogether with the pursuitof defining differences and complementarities betweenTEK systems and science That is in this assumptionthere is really no use in even talking theoretically abouta distinction between TEK and science because at theend of the day they are faces of the same phenomenathe pursuit of usable knowledge by human societiesAgrawal for example argues that

The attempt to create distinctions in terms ofindigenous and western is potentially ridiculous Itmakes much more sense to talk about multipledomains and types of knowledges with differinglogics and epistemologies Somewhat contradictorilybut inescapably so the same knowledge can beclassified one way or the other depending on theinterests it serves the purposes for which it isharnessed or the manner in which it is generated [A]nchored unavoidably in institutional origins andmoorings knowledge can only be useful But it isuseful to particular peoples Specific strategies forprotecting systematizing and disseminatingknowledge will differentially benefit different socialgroups and individuals The recognition of this simpletruism is obscured by the confounding labels ofindigenous and western It is only when we moveaway from the sterile dichotomy between indigenousand western when we begin to recognize intra-groupdifferentiation and when we seek out bridges acrossthe constructed chasm between the traditional andthe scientific that we will initiate a productivedialogue to safeguard the interests of those who aredisadvantaged (Agrawal 1995 433)

This third view then suggests that to use terms like in-digenous knowledge or TEK or Western science obscuresseveral important points First TEK and science are allvalue-laden knowledge systems The literature in socialstudies of science shows multiple ways in which science isguided by particular values and even associated with spir-ituality (Biagioli 1999 Turnbull 2000) Second there is noreason why the criteria and values attributed to varioussciences cannot also be those of various TEK systemsMoreover by ldquointra-grouprdquo differentiation Agrawal pointsout that there are few indigenous people who rely on asingle homogenous TEK system rather their knowledgesystem has changed and they likely also rely on differentscientific disciplines as well Examples of this abound likeGuptarsquos 1998 study of how rural farmers in India engagein hybrid agricultural practices that mix Western scientific

and traditional knowledge systems (Gupta 1998) OrWatson-Verran and Turnbull discuss how Western sci-ence is composed of heterogeneous elements (Watson-Verran and Turnbull 1995)Agrawalrsquos position is based on the idea that every society

has some sort of knowledge system which may be a patch-work of systems with multiple origins (eg European indi-genous) There is no such thing as a knowledge systemthat is not guided by peoplersquos interpretations of the chal-lenges that they face And interpretations are influenced byworldviews There is no such thing as a knowledge systemthat is more neutral than any other In the case of scientificdisciplines values of objectivity are based on cosmologicalassumptions about there being subjects and objects in theworld and which beings entities and phenomena fallunder one or the other A science based on such assump-tions may be of limited use to a society that does not carveup reality in this way But on the other hand such a societymay have great use for this kind of information Context iskey Agrawalrsquos assumption speaks to the situation thatmany indigenous peoples encounter in the world Theyneed reliable information for the environmental govern-ance challenges they face And they are likely in the pos-ition to draw from many sources of knowledge Whatknowledge they can use depends on how suitable differentforms of knowledge are for their purposes Whether formsof knowledge are indigenous or not does not really matterin the end Some indigenous peoples may be served per-fectly well by disciplines like biology as the basis of theirenvironmental governance strategies So the implication isthat terms like TEK or indigenous knowledge are not veryuseful and may even waste our time We should focusmore on figuring out what knowledge systems best servethe needs of particular communities and how to realizethem in practiceAs with knowledge mobilization the distinction be-

tween TEK and science does not generate many easy op-tions for consensus on how to define the two in relationto each other First the view that TEK and science mustbe labeled as such and kept distinct misses the realities ofindigenous environmental governance today There is noreason why any so-called TEK system cannot embracesimilar empirical values that are found commonly in vari-ous scientific disciplines One who adopts this assumptionwould perhaps have to consider dropping it were one toconcede that certain values and criteria are not exclusiveto science So it would be tricky for one to accept certainparts of both the first and second assumptions Moreovercontemporary tribal environmental governance involvesexamples of institutions that are guided by TEK but thatuse technologies and methods that originate from non-tribal scientific disciplines (Woodard 2005) Even exam-ples of practices like hunting show that TEK systems areadaptive in their adoption of technologies (Reo and Whyte

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 7 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

2012) In these cases it is hard to imagine a rigid separ-ation between TEK and science and technology becauseTEK systems can incorporate scientific techniques Advo-cates of the third assumption of course would find itfairly difficult to accept the first two assumptions becausethey invoke a distinction between TEK and science tooreadily Agrawalrsquos conclusion is that the term TEK mustbe dispensed with altogether as must particularly loadedconceptions of science So the first assumption seeks tomaintain a rigid separation in definitions the second as-sumption seeks a definition that reveals complementaritythe third assumption can be seen as desiring to dispensewith the business of the first two assumptions altogetherIt is somewhat hard to see people who hold any of these

three assumptions coming to a consensus definition Com-bined with differences regarding knowledge mobilizationit is even harder to see there ever being a single definitionacceptable to all stakeholders But I want to offer anotherfruitful approach to coming to an understanding of TEKthat can advance environmental governance even as wediscuss and disagree on the assumptions underlying vari-ous definitions My approach is different from Agrawalrsquosinsofar as I do not see the need to dispense with the termTEK While Agrawal comes close to my understanding ofthe difficulties in defining TEK he does not draw the onlypossible conclusion from accepting the reality of these dif-ficulties The fact that a term is defined in ways that areproblematic and subject to deep differences does not entailthat it has no use Rather this fact motivates us to considerwhether the term given all its potential definitions andconfusing dimensions has a proper role to play in advan-cing collaborative environmental governance I turn to thistopic in the next subsection

The role of TEK as a collaborative conceptThis subsection shows why TEK should be considered asa collaborative concept that bridges cross-cultural andcross-situational divides To make this case the initialpages of this section focus on the environmental govern-ance situations in which many tribes are embedded and Iuse the term co-management as an example of this I thenmove on to define what a collaborative concept is andhow this relates to the discussion of TEK I have beenbuilding so far in this paper In this sense the initial pagesof this section take a slight detour before returning to theconcept of TEKRegardless of how TEK can be defined what is the role

of the concept of TEK in the first place in the world ofenvironmental governance The world of environmentalgovernance here involves relations between environmen-tal governance institutions associated with and responsibleto indigenous peoples like tribal natural resources depart-ments and those regulating indigenous hunting practicesand governance institutions associated with states and

subnational units like the US Forest Service and Environ-ment Canada All of these institutions have evolved waysof doing things out of histories in which the very idea ofindigenous environmental governance was overtly andsubtly marginalized Times are changing and greater re-spect is accorded to indigenous peoples through inter-national federal and local law and policy These changescreate opportunities for indigenous peoples to work col-laboratively with non-indigenous peoples instead ofagainst them or in secrecy from them (covertly) Indigen-ous peoples can begin to build institutions of environmen-tal governance that are integrated with non-indigenousinstitutions in ways that benefit indigenous communitiesand respect the stewardship goals of their worldviewsBut institution building of this kind is always a work in

progress because of cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides Cross-cultural divides are simply the differences inworldview language lifestyle and so on that obtain be-tween indigenous and non-indigenous populations Forexample an indigenous people may see the goal of restor-ing a native fish species as rekindling the relationship be-tween that species and humans living in the regionwhereas a non-indigenous population may see restorationof the same species as a matter of achieving certain popu-lation numbers conducive to a recreational outcome likeincreasing tourism in the region Cross-cultural dividescan also have an intra-group dimension to them as theremay be differences in beliefs about building relationshipswith a species in an indigenous community and territoryfor example Cross-situational divides are differences incapacities for environmental governance For example anindigenous people may have access to fewer financial re-sources than the neighboring state or province have lim-ited political control over the entire region where itsmembers live and have less representation in nationaldecision-making than representatives of the neighboringstate or province Cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides make collaboration challenging It may be hard forfederal institutions to incorporate indigenous peoplersquosgoals within their policy frameworks It may be frustratingto work across institutions with different bureaucraticcapabilitiesSince the possibility of meaningful collaboration is a rela-

tively recent turn of events there is yet to be perfect guid-ance about how collaboration that bridges cross-culturaland cross-situational divides ought to be done There arecases of success and cases of failure And there is still a lotto be learned regarding whether the lessons from cases ofsuccess can simply be transferred over to other contextsCaught in this predicament there are a host of conceptsthat are being debated as concepts that facilitate or dis-courage genuine collaboration For example the conceptof co-management has been used to suggest a possibleroute to cooperative environmental and natural resources

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 8 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

governance (Goetze 2005)c Co-management invokes theidea of joint political relationships between indigenous andnon-indigenous institutions that work together accordingto standards of fairness to govern particular areas andbkresources Standards of fairness include norms like equalrepresentation and voting rights The concept of co-management is the basis of actual co-management boardsand committees that are composed of indigenous and non-indigenous participants and that are responsible for man-aging a fishery or forested area or particular species like acaribou population Indigenous and non-indigenous insti-tutions often rely on the term co-management as part of ashared language for bridging cross-cultural and cross-situation divides However there is also dialogue on howthe concept of co-management can be taken the wrongway and provide insufficient guidance for collaboration Itis often argued that the concept co-management impliesthat the nation-statersquos (eg Canada US) vision for envir-onmental governance is used to evaluate the collaborativeefforts between indigenous and non-indigenous institu-tions This is because the term ldquomanagementrdquo can connotea non-indigenous view of the appropriate relationshipamong humans other living beings and the environmentThis term can slant the meaning of co-management so thatnon-indigenous participants in a co-management boardfor example come in with expectations that their assump-tions about ldquomanagementrdquo should be prioritized and maynot listen to their indigenous colleagues The term thencan have the effect of silencing genuine negotiation ofcross-cultural and cross-situational differencesInstead the concept of co-existence is offered (McGregor

2004b) which suggests the importance of balancing indi-genous and non-indigenous aspirations of governance intothe evaluation of collaboration In this case one might beinclined to think cynically that it is all about labels Butthere is much more going on than preferences about labelsWe need to consider the role played by concepts likeco-management and co-existence in facilitating or discour-aging collaboration People who reject the concept of co-management based on the contexts they are familiar withsee in it problematic assumptions about how indigenousand non-indigenous institutions should work togetherNon-indigenous people may not see how the concept ofco-management might encourage these assumptions eventhough perhaps co-management is the preferred conceptin some contexts Those who reject the concept of co-management and wish to replace it with the concept of co-existence are inviting non-indigenous people to learn moreabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides This isthe role that concepts like co-management and co-existence play The concept of co-existence does not in it-self contain enough meaning for non-indigenous personsto suggest in advance exactly how a collaborative processshould play out What proponents of co-existence are

saying is that there is much learning to do The concept ofco-existence suggests a very different possibility for collab-oration than what non-indigenous peoples may be used toWork on co-existence expresses an invitation to learnabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides so as toachieve better collaborations in particular contextsThere are two important points here regarding the role

of these concepts First co-management and co-existenceare invoked for better or worse by many different institu-tions in contexts where they are trying to collaborateacross cross-cultural and cross-situational divides Secondthe example of co-existence I gave is an example of howsome people seek to use concepts to improve collaborationby inviting people to consider alternatives that may nothave been on their conceptual radar before The conceptof TEK and its synonyms plays a somewhat analogous roleto the term co-existence As in the first point various defi-nitions of TEK are used in collaborative contexts for betteror worse As in the second point those who bring new def-initions of TEK into dialogue are inviting others to con-sider new possibilities for thinking about the function ofknowledge systems in environmental governanceHowever we need to be precise about what this meansmdash

because I am not arguing that there is a single definition ofTEK that can count for all This is impossible TEK nomatter how it is defined is not adequate for any indigenouscommunity The English articulation TEK is not an indi-genous word or concept and it is likely not used withinvery many communities unto themselves The terms trad-itional and ecological are awkward Traditional can havethe effect of putting knowledge in the past whereas TEK isoften supposed to mean contemporary knowledge Eco-logical aligns TEK with a particular discipline whereas TEKrefers to knowledge that does not stem from that disciplineTerms like indigenous knowledge and native science aresimilarly awkward when we unpack what associations anddissociations they may imply Moreover there may be manycontexts where an indigenous people does see the conceptas referring to accumulated observations for example orcontexts where TEK is viewed as a Western construct ir-relevant to environmental governance There are likelyother contexts where TEK needs to refer to systems of re-sponsibilities There are multiple possible scenarios Theconcept of TEK cannot possibly do justice to the know-ledge systems and articulations of knowledge systems be-longing to the thousands of indigenous peoples TEK is alsonot a concept that was an integral part of the education ofmost ecologists or foresters nor is it a concept that hasexisted for a long time in the federal policies of a nation-state This does not mean though that the concept shouldbe dispensed with Non-indigenous peoples may be equallyuncomfortable with referring to something they are not fa-miliar with as science or linked with a particular scientificdiscipline It may be no easier for them to change out terms

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 9 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

like TEK with even more general terms like Agrawalrsquos ldquous-able knowledgerdquod

Thus whenever the concept of TEK is invoked the rolethat it plays is to suggest that indigenous communitiesmay approach the very question of the nature of know-ledge and how it relates to environmental and natural re-source governance rather differently than disciplines likeecology or biology and the policy contexts in which theyare used By ldquorather differentlyrdquo I do not mean in somesense that applies to all communities For example theremay be some indigenous communities that invoke TEK tomean a radically different cultural paradigm one in whichit is not appropriate to speak of knowledge as distinct frompractice or belief But other indigenous communities wholive in different regions because of historical removal mayinvoke TEK to stand for the values that they believe disci-plines like ecology should serve even if they lack intimateexperiences with the environment they currently inhabitYet other communities might use TEK to suggest differentways in which multiple empirical techniques for gatheringknowledge from huntersrsquo observations to scientific fieldmethods can be used in harmony TEK could also refer toideas about how elders should be involved in the designand peer review of research in tribal environmental de-partments that collect their own data about the environ-ment and the condition of natural resources There aremany more scenarios of course These scenarios indicatethe diversity of how people at a philosophical level thinkabout the meaning of knowledge in relation to their livesAnd their thinking arises from multiple cultural historicalglobal social and personal sourcesThe significance of this point is that when the concept

of TEK is used it really points to the possibility thatthere are cross-cultural and cross-situational divides thatmake it so that non-indigenous parties cannot expecttheir own assumptions to apply to indigenous contextsThe concept of TEK should be invoked to invite non-indigenous parties to learn more about how particularindigenous communities approach fundamental ques-tions of the nature of knowledge and how it fits intotheir visions of environmental governance This invita-tion is not one that promises easy answers Rather it isan invitation to become a part of a long term processwhereby cross-cultural and cross-situation divides arebetter bridged through mutual respect and learning andrelationships among collaborators are given the oppor-tunity to mature Examples of long term processes in-clude ldquothe way of peacerdquo used among indigenous andnon-indigenous participants in the Ontario Model Forest(Holmes et al 2002 Story and Lickers 1997) There aremany other examples We need not only be concernedwith striking the right definition of TEK Rather we needto cultivate attitudes of awareness that the concept ofTEK plays a role as a collaborative concept which is

what I call a concept that invites people to engage in aprocess of respectful learning about significant differ-encese

ConclusionsTEK and its synonyms indigenous knowledge and nativescience have been defined mainly based on two kinds ofassumptions how knowledge is to be mobilized and whatTEKrsquos relation to science is The different assumptionsmake it tricky to come to a consensus definition that satis-fies all stakeholders This makes us interrogate what therole of TEK is in a world of relationships among differentinstitutions of environmental governance for whom TEKis an issue TEK must play the role of inviting cross-cultural and cross-situational learning for indigenous andnon-indigenous policy makers natural resource managersscientists activists elders and youthAn important implication of this is that science and

policy literatures that invoke TEK should discuss it as acollaborative concept That is care must be taken toshow that the concept invites participation to a longterm process of mutually respectful learning And moreeffort needs to be taken to understand what these pro-cesses should look like Already of course there is workthat exemplifies this interpretation of TEK (Barnhardt2005 Ross et al 2010) Yet the point has not beenbrought out that TEK is playing the role of a collabora-tive concept in this work This point should figure morein natural resources and policy literatures Differencesover the meaning of TEK should be seen as invitationsto learn more in circumstances where the possibility ofgenuine collaboration is a relatively recent development

EndnotesaIndigenous peoples refer to the pre-invasion inhabi-

tants of lands now dominated by others examples beingthe Maori in New Zealand or the Anishinaabe in theUnited States and Canada (Anaya 2004)

bI will use the term indigenous knowledge specificallywhen I refer to the work of these authors and shift backto the term TEK for my own analysis My analysis ofAgrawal later on in the same section will also use indi-genous knowledge when referring specifically to hiswork and TEK when referring to my own analysis

cOther collaborative literature includes Fortmann 2008and Colwell-Chanthaphonh and Ferguson 2008

dAgrawal too has considered the role of the concept ofTEK in cross-cultural and cross-situational collabor-ation He argues that

it is possibly the case that advocates of indigenousknowledge find in the term a particularly potent wayto summarize and invoke many of their concerns andhopes about peoples livelihoods life styles and

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 10 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

resource systems they view as disappearing Thephrase evokes embattled ways of living-in-the-worldthat real economic social and political pressures arenudging and frog-marching toward furthermarginalization and oblivion Because the indigenousscientific division of knowledge effectively representsdurable underlying social confrontations the studyand defense of indigenous knowledge continues toattract attention Indeed even as one questions theneed to contrast indigenous and scientificknowledges one underscores this contrastmdashin thevery use of the contrasting adjectives Indigenousknowledge is here to stay even if what it represents isforever and always disappearing (Agrawal 2009 158)

I hope to articulate in this paper that there are farmore reasons why people invoke concepts like TEK orindigenous knowledge than what Agrawal states

eCollaborative concepts also differ from boundary ob-jects (Star and Griesemer 1989) Boundary objects arecommonly shared by diverse stakeholders and serve tocoordinate their actions despite different interests Col-laborative concepts are invitations to learn more whichsuggest the need for a long term process of mutually re-spectful learning

Competing interestsThe author declares that there are no competing interests

AcknowledgmentsI wish to thank Kristie Dotson Michael ORourke Nicholas Reo and theanonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on this paper

Received 11 December 2012 Accepted 17 January 2013Published 5 April 2013

ReferencesAgrawal A (1995) Dismantling the divide between indigenous and scientific

knowledge Dev Change 26(3)413ndash439Agrawal A (2009) Why ldquoindigenousrdquo knowledge J R Soc N Z 39(4)157ndash158Anaya SJ (2004) Indigenous peoples in international law 2nd edition Oxford

University Press New YorkBarnhardt R (2005) Indigenous knowledge systems and Alaska Native ways of

knowing Anthropol Ed Q 36(1)8ndash23Berkes F (1999) Sacred ecology traditional ecological knowledge and resource

management Taylor amp Francis PhiladelphiaBiagioli M (1999) The science studies reader Routledge New YorkBrokensha DW Warren DM Werner O (1980) Indigenous knowledge systems and

development University Press of America Washington DCCajete G (1999) Native science natural laws of interdependence Clear Light

Books Santa Fe NMColwell-Chanthaphonh JS Ferguson TJ (2008) Collaboration in archaeological

practice engaging descendant communities AltaMira Lanham MDEisner WR Cuomo CJ Hinkel KM Jones BM Brower S Ronald H (2009)

Advancing Landscape Change Research through the Incorporation ofIntildeupiaq Knowledge Arctic 62(4)429ndash442

El-Hani C de Ferreira S Bandeira F (2008) Valuing indigenous knowledge to callit ldquosciencerdquo will not help Cult Stud Sci Educ 3(3)751ndash779 doi101007s11422-008-9129-6

Ellen R (2000) Indigenous environmental knowledge and its transformationscritical anthropological perspectives vol 5 Routledge New York

Fortmann L (2008) Participatory research in conservation and rural livelihoodsDoing science together vol 3 Wiley-Blackwell Hoboken

Gadgil M Berkes F Folke C (1993) Indigenous knowledge for biodiversityconservation Ambio 22(23)151ndash156

Goetze TC (2005) Empowered co-management towards power-sharing andindigenous rights in Clayoquot Sound BC Anthropologica 47(2)247ndash265

Gupta A (1998) Postcolonial developments agriculture in the making of modernIndia Duke University Press Durham NC

Harding S (1998) Is science multicultural postcolonialisms feminisms andepistemologies Indiana University Press Bloomington

Harding S (2011) The postcolonial science and technology studies reader DukeUniversity Press Durham NC

Harris G (ed) (2011) Northwest Forest Planmdashthe first 15 years [1994ndash2008]effectiveness of the federal-tribal relationship Tech Paper R6-RPM-TP-01-2011 US Department of Agriculture Forest Service Pacific NorthwestRegion Portland

Holmes E Lickers H Barkley B (2002) A critical assessment of ten years of on-the-ground sustainable forestry in eastern Ontariorsquos settled landscape For Chron78(5)643ndash647

Houde N (2007) The six faces of traditional ecological knowledge challenges andopportunities for Canadian co-management arrangements Ecol Soc 12(2)34

Huntington H (2000) Using traditional ecological knowledge in science methodsand applications Ecol Appl 10(5)1270ndash1274

Kimmerer R (2002) Weaving traditional ecological knowledge into biologicaleducation7 a call to action Bioscience 52(5)432ndash438 doi1016410006-3568(2002)052[0432WTEKIB]20CO2

Kimmerer R Lake F (2001) The role of indigenous burning in land managementJ For 99(11)36ndash41

Kofinas GP (2005) Caribou hunters and researchers at the co-managementinterface emergent dilemmas and the dynamics of legitimacy in powersharing Anthropologica 47(2)179ndash196

Leonetti C (2010) Indigenous stewardship methods and NRCS conservationpractices United States Department of Agriculture Natural ResourcesConservation Service Anchorage

McGregor D (2004a) Coming full circle indigenous knowledge environment andour future Am Indian Q 28(3amp4)385ndash410

McGregor D (2004b) Traditional ecological knowledge and sustainabledevelopment towards coexistence In Blaser M Feit HA McRae G (ed) In theway of development indigenous peoples life projects and globalizationZedIDRC Ottawa

McGregor D (2008) Linking traditional ecological knowledge and westernscience aboriginal perspectives from the 2000 State of the Lakes EcosystemConference Can J Nativ Stud XXVIII(1)139ndash158

Nadasdy P (1999) The politics of TEK power and the integration of knowledgeArct Anthropol 36(1ndash2)1ndash18

Nakashima DJ (1993) Astute observers on the sea ice edge Inuit knowledge as abasis for arctic co-management In Inglis J (ed) Traditional ecologicalknoweldge concepts and cases International Program on TraditionalEcological Knowledge and International Development Research CentreOttawa pp 99ndash110

Nakashima DJ Galloway McLean K Thulstrup HD Ramos Castillo A Rubis JT(2012) Weathering uncertainty traditional knowledge for climate changeassessment and adaptation UNESCO and Darwin UNU Paris

Pierotti R Wildcat D (2000) Traditional ecological knowledge the thirdalternative Ecol Appl 10(5)1333ndash1340

Reo N Whyte K (2012) Hunting and morality as elements of traditional ecologicalknowledge Hum Ecol 40(1)15ndash27 doi101007s10745-011-9448-1

Ross A Sherman R Snodgrass JG Delcore HD (2010) Indigenous peoples and thecollaborative stewardship of nature knowledge binds and institutionalconflicts Left Coast Press Walnut Creek CA

Salmon E (1996) Decolonizing our voices Winds Change 11(3)70ndash72Siegel H (1997) Science education multicultural and universal Interchange 28

(2)97ndash108Star SL Griesemer JR (1989) Institutional ecology Translations and boundary

objects amateurs and professionals in Berkeleys museum of vertebratezoology 1907ndash39 Soc Stud Sci 19(3)387ndash420

Story P Lickers F (1997) Partnership building for sustainable development a FirstNations perspective from Ontario J Sustain For 4(3ndash4)149ndash162

Turnbull D (2000) Masons tricksters and cartographers comparative studies inthe sociology of scientific and indigenous knowledge Taylor amp FrancisPhiladelphia

UNEP (1998) Report of the fourth meeting of the parties to the convention onbiodiversity UNEPCBDCOP Nairobi Kenya

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 11 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

2012) In these cases it is hard to imagine a rigid separ-ation between TEK and science and technology becauseTEK systems can incorporate scientific techniques Advo-cates of the third assumption of course would find itfairly difficult to accept the first two assumptions becausethey invoke a distinction between TEK and science tooreadily Agrawalrsquos conclusion is that the term TEK mustbe dispensed with altogether as must particularly loadedconceptions of science So the first assumption seeks tomaintain a rigid separation in definitions the second as-sumption seeks a definition that reveals complementaritythe third assumption can be seen as desiring to dispensewith the business of the first two assumptions altogetherIt is somewhat hard to see people who hold any of these

three assumptions coming to a consensus definition Com-bined with differences regarding knowledge mobilizationit is even harder to see there ever being a single definitionacceptable to all stakeholders But I want to offer anotherfruitful approach to coming to an understanding of TEKthat can advance environmental governance even as wediscuss and disagree on the assumptions underlying vari-ous definitions My approach is different from Agrawalrsquosinsofar as I do not see the need to dispense with the termTEK While Agrawal comes close to my understanding ofthe difficulties in defining TEK he does not draw the onlypossible conclusion from accepting the reality of these dif-ficulties The fact that a term is defined in ways that areproblematic and subject to deep differences does not entailthat it has no use Rather this fact motivates us to considerwhether the term given all its potential definitions andconfusing dimensions has a proper role to play in advan-cing collaborative environmental governance I turn to thistopic in the next subsection

The role of TEK as a collaborative conceptThis subsection shows why TEK should be considered asa collaborative concept that bridges cross-cultural andcross-situational divides To make this case the initialpages of this section focus on the environmental govern-ance situations in which many tribes are embedded and Iuse the term co-management as an example of this I thenmove on to define what a collaborative concept is andhow this relates to the discussion of TEK I have beenbuilding so far in this paper In this sense the initial pagesof this section take a slight detour before returning to theconcept of TEKRegardless of how TEK can be defined what is the role

of the concept of TEK in the first place in the world ofenvironmental governance The world of environmentalgovernance here involves relations between environmen-tal governance institutions associated with and responsibleto indigenous peoples like tribal natural resources depart-ments and those regulating indigenous hunting practicesand governance institutions associated with states and

subnational units like the US Forest Service and Environ-ment Canada All of these institutions have evolved waysof doing things out of histories in which the very idea ofindigenous environmental governance was overtly andsubtly marginalized Times are changing and greater re-spect is accorded to indigenous peoples through inter-national federal and local law and policy These changescreate opportunities for indigenous peoples to work col-laboratively with non-indigenous peoples instead ofagainst them or in secrecy from them (covertly) Indigen-ous peoples can begin to build institutions of environmen-tal governance that are integrated with non-indigenousinstitutions in ways that benefit indigenous communitiesand respect the stewardship goals of their worldviewsBut institution building of this kind is always a work in

progress because of cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides Cross-cultural divides are simply the differences inworldview language lifestyle and so on that obtain be-tween indigenous and non-indigenous populations Forexample an indigenous people may see the goal of restor-ing a native fish species as rekindling the relationship be-tween that species and humans living in the regionwhereas a non-indigenous population may see restorationof the same species as a matter of achieving certain popu-lation numbers conducive to a recreational outcome likeincreasing tourism in the region Cross-cultural dividescan also have an intra-group dimension to them as theremay be differences in beliefs about building relationshipswith a species in an indigenous community and territoryfor example Cross-situational divides are differences incapacities for environmental governance For example anindigenous people may have access to fewer financial re-sources than the neighboring state or province have lim-ited political control over the entire region where itsmembers live and have less representation in nationaldecision-making than representatives of the neighboringstate or province Cross-cultural and cross-situational di-vides make collaboration challenging It may be hard forfederal institutions to incorporate indigenous peoplersquosgoals within their policy frameworks It may be frustratingto work across institutions with different bureaucraticcapabilitiesSince the possibility of meaningful collaboration is a rela-

tively recent turn of events there is yet to be perfect guid-ance about how collaboration that bridges cross-culturaland cross-situational divides ought to be done There arecases of success and cases of failure And there is still a lotto be learned regarding whether the lessons from cases ofsuccess can simply be transferred over to other contextsCaught in this predicament there are a host of conceptsthat are being debated as concepts that facilitate or dis-courage genuine collaboration For example the conceptof co-management has been used to suggest a possibleroute to cooperative environmental and natural resources

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 8 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

governance (Goetze 2005)c Co-management invokes theidea of joint political relationships between indigenous andnon-indigenous institutions that work together accordingto standards of fairness to govern particular areas andbkresources Standards of fairness include norms like equalrepresentation and voting rights The concept of co-management is the basis of actual co-management boardsand committees that are composed of indigenous and non-indigenous participants and that are responsible for man-aging a fishery or forested area or particular species like acaribou population Indigenous and non-indigenous insti-tutions often rely on the term co-management as part of ashared language for bridging cross-cultural and cross-situation divides However there is also dialogue on howthe concept of co-management can be taken the wrongway and provide insufficient guidance for collaboration Itis often argued that the concept co-management impliesthat the nation-statersquos (eg Canada US) vision for envir-onmental governance is used to evaluate the collaborativeefforts between indigenous and non-indigenous institu-tions This is because the term ldquomanagementrdquo can connotea non-indigenous view of the appropriate relationshipamong humans other living beings and the environmentThis term can slant the meaning of co-management so thatnon-indigenous participants in a co-management boardfor example come in with expectations that their assump-tions about ldquomanagementrdquo should be prioritized and maynot listen to their indigenous colleagues The term thencan have the effect of silencing genuine negotiation ofcross-cultural and cross-situational differencesInstead the concept of co-existence is offered (McGregor

2004b) which suggests the importance of balancing indi-genous and non-indigenous aspirations of governance intothe evaluation of collaboration In this case one might beinclined to think cynically that it is all about labels Butthere is much more going on than preferences about labelsWe need to consider the role played by concepts likeco-management and co-existence in facilitating or discour-aging collaboration People who reject the concept of co-management based on the contexts they are familiar withsee in it problematic assumptions about how indigenousand non-indigenous institutions should work togetherNon-indigenous people may not see how the concept ofco-management might encourage these assumptions eventhough perhaps co-management is the preferred conceptin some contexts Those who reject the concept of co-management and wish to replace it with the concept of co-existence are inviting non-indigenous people to learn moreabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides This isthe role that concepts like co-management and co-existence play The concept of co-existence does not in it-self contain enough meaning for non-indigenous personsto suggest in advance exactly how a collaborative processshould play out What proponents of co-existence are

saying is that there is much learning to do The concept ofco-existence suggests a very different possibility for collab-oration than what non-indigenous peoples may be used toWork on co-existence expresses an invitation to learnabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides so as toachieve better collaborations in particular contextsThere are two important points here regarding the role

of these concepts First co-management and co-existenceare invoked for better or worse by many different institu-tions in contexts where they are trying to collaborateacross cross-cultural and cross-situational divides Secondthe example of co-existence I gave is an example of howsome people seek to use concepts to improve collaborationby inviting people to consider alternatives that may nothave been on their conceptual radar before The conceptof TEK and its synonyms plays a somewhat analogous roleto the term co-existence As in the first point various defi-nitions of TEK are used in collaborative contexts for betteror worse As in the second point those who bring new def-initions of TEK into dialogue are inviting others to con-sider new possibilities for thinking about the function ofknowledge systems in environmental governanceHowever we need to be precise about what this meansmdash

because I am not arguing that there is a single definition ofTEK that can count for all This is impossible TEK nomatter how it is defined is not adequate for any indigenouscommunity The English articulation TEK is not an indi-genous word or concept and it is likely not used withinvery many communities unto themselves The terms trad-itional and ecological are awkward Traditional can havethe effect of putting knowledge in the past whereas TEK isoften supposed to mean contemporary knowledge Eco-logical aligns TEK with a particular discipline whereas TEKrefers to knowledge that does not stem from that disciplineTerms like indigenous knowledge and native science aresimilarly awkward when we unpack what associations anddissociations they may imply Moreover there may be manycontexts where an indigenous people does see the conceptas referring to accumulated observations for example orcontexts where TEK is viewed as a Western construct ir-relevant to environmental governance There are likelyother contexts where TEK needs to refer to systems of re-sponsibilities There are multiple possible scenarios Theconcept of TEK cannot possibly do justice to the know-ledge systems and articulations of knowledge systems be-longing to the thousands of indigenous peoples TEK is alsonot a concept that was an integral part of the education ofmost ecologists or foresters nor is it a concept that hasexisted for a long time in the federal policies of a nation-state This does not mean though that the concept shouldbe dispensed with Non-indigenous peoples may be equallyuncomfortable with referring to something they are not fa-miliar with as science or linked with a particular scientificdiscipline It may be no easier for them to change out terms

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 9 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

like TEK with even more general terms like Agrawalrsquos ldquous-able knowledgerdquod

Thus whenever the concept of TEK is invoked the rolethat it plays is to suggest that indigenous communitiesmay approach the very question of the nature of know-ledge and how it relates to environmental and natural re-source governance rather differently than disciplines likeecology or biology and the policy contexts in which theyare used By ldquorather differentlyrdquo I do not mean in somesense that applies to all communities For example theremay be some indigenous communities that invoke TEK tomean a radically different cultural paradigm one in whichit is not appropriate to speak of knowledge as distinct frompractice or belief But other indigenous communities wholive in different regions because of historical removal mayinvoke TEK to stand for the values that they believe disci-plines like ecology should serve even if they lack intimateexperiences with the environment they currently inhabitYet other communities might use TEK to suggest differentways in which multiple empirical techniques for gatheringknowledge from huntersrsquo observations to scientific fieldmethods can be used in harmony TEK could also refer toideas about how elders should be involved in the designand peer review of research in tribal environmental de-partments that collect their own data about the environ-ment and the condition of natural resources There aremany more scenarios of course These scenarios indicatethe diversity of how people at a philosophical level thinkabout the meaning of knowledge in relation to their livesAnd their thinking arises from multiple cultural historicalglobal social and personal sourcesThe significance of this point is that when the concept

of TEK is used it really points to the possibility thatthere are cross-cultural and cross-situational divides thatmake it so that non-indigenous parties cannot expecttheir own assumptions to apply to indigenous contextsThe concept of TEK should be invoked to invite non-indigenous parties to learn more about how particularindigenous communities approach fundamental ques-tions of the nature of knowledge and how it fits intotheir visions of environmental governance This invita-tion is not one that promises easy answers Rather it isan invitation to become a part of a long term processwhereby cross-cultural and cross-situation divides arebetter bridged through mutual respect and learning andrelationships among collaborators are given the oppor-tunity to mature Examples of long term processes in-clude ldquothe way of peacerdquo used among indigenous andnon-indigenous participants in the Ontario Model Forest(Holmes et al 2002 Story and Lickers 1997) There aremany other examples We need not only be concernedwith striking the right definition of TEK Rather we needto cultivate attitudes of awareness that the concept ofTEK plays a role as a collaborative concept which is

what I call a concept that invites people to engage in aprocess of respectful learning about significant differ-encese

ConclusionsTEK and its synonyms indigenous knowledge and nativescience have been defined mainly based on two kinds ofassumptions how knowledge is to be mobilized and whatTEKrsquos relation to science is The different assumptionsmake it tricky to come to a consensus definition that satis-fies all stakeholders This makes us interrogate what therole of TEK is in a world of relationships among differentinstitutions of environmental governance for whom TEKis an issue TEK must play the role of inviting cross-cultural and cross-situational learning for indigenous andnon-indigenous policy makers natural resource managersscientists activists elders and youthAn important implication of this is that science and

policy literatures that invoke TEK should discuss it as acollaborative concept That is care must be taken toshow that the concept invites participation to a longterm process of mutually respectful learning And moreeffort needs to be taken to understand what these pro-cesses should look like Already of course there is workthat exemplifies this interpretation of TEK (Barnhardt2005 Ross et al 2010) Yet the point has not beenbrought out that TEK is playing the role of a collabora-tive concept in this work This point should figure morein natural resources and policy literatures Differencesover the meaning of TEK should be seen as invitationsto learn more in circumstances where the possibility ofgenuine collaboration is a relatively recent development

EndnotesaIndigenous peoples refer to the pre-invasion inhabi-

tants of lands now dominated by others examples beingthe Maori in New Zealand or the Anishinaabe in theUnited States and Canada (Anaya 2004)

bI will use the term indigenous knowledge specificallywhen I refer to the work of these authors and shift backto the term TEK for my own analysis My analysis ofAgrawal later on in the same section will also use indi-genous knowledge when referring specifically to hiswork and TEK when referring to my own analysis

cOther collaborative literature includes Fortmann 2008and Colwell-Chanthaphonh and Ferguson 2008

dAgrawal too has considered the role of the concept ofTEK in cross-cultural and cross-situational collabor-ation He argues that

it is possibly the case that advocates of indigenousknowledge find in the term a particularly potent wayto summarize and invoke many of their concerns andhopes about peoples livelihoods life styles and

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 10 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

resource systems they view as disappearing Thephrase evokes embattled ways of living-in-the-worldthat real economic social and political pressures arenudging and frog-marching toward furthermarginalization and oblivion Because the indigenousscientific division of knowledge effectively representsdurable underlying social confrontations the studyand defense of indigenous knowledge continues toattract attention Indeed even as one questions theneed to contrast indigenous and scientificknowledges one underscores this contrastmdashin thevery use of the contrasting adjectives Indigenousknowledge is here to stay even if what it represents isforever and always disappearing (Agrawal 2009 158)

I hope to articulate in this paper that there are farmore reasons why people invoke concepts like TEK orindigenous knowledge than what Agrawal states

eCollaborative concepts also differ from boundary ob-jects (Star and Griesemer 1989) Boundary objects arecommonly shared by diverse stakeholders and serve tocoordinate their actions despite different interests Col-laborative concepts are invitations to learn more whichsuggest the need for a long term process of mutually re-spectful learning

Competing interestsThe author declares that there are no competing interests

AcknowledgmentsI wish to thank Kristie Dotson Michael ORourke Nicholas Reo and theanonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on this paper

Received 11 December 2012 Accepted 17 January 2013Published 5 April 2013

ReferencesAgrawal A (1995) Dismantling the divide between indigenous and scientific

knowledge Dev Change 26(3)413ndash439Agrawal A (2009) Why ldquoindigenousrdquo knowledge J R Soc N Z 39(4)157ndash158Anaya SJ (2004) Indigenous peoples in international law 2nd edition Oxford

University Press New YorkBarnhardt R (2005) Indigenous knowledge systems and Alaska Native ways of

knowing Anthropol Ed Q 36(1)8ndash23Berkes F (1999) Sacred ecology traditional ecological knowledge and resource

management Taylor amp Francis PhiladelphiaBiagioli M (1999) The science studies reader Routledge New YorkBrokensha DW Warren DM Werner O (1980) Indigenous knowledge systems and

development University Press of America Washington DCCajete G (1999) Native science natural laws of interdependence Clear Light

Books Santa Fe NMColwell-Chanthaphonh JS Ferguson TJ (2008) Collaboration in archaeological

practice engaging descendant communities AltaMira Lanham MDEisner WR Cuomo CJ Hinkel KM Jones BM Brower S Ronald H (2009)

Advancing Landscape Change Research through the Incorporation ofIntildeupiaq Knowledge Arctic 62(4)429ndash442

El-Hani C de Ferreira S Bandeira F (2008) Valuing indigenous knowledge to callit ldquosciencerdquo will not help Cult Stud Sci Educ 3(3)751ndash779 doi101007s11422-008-9129-6

Ellen R (2000) Indigenous environmental knowledge and its transformationscritical anthropological perspectives vol 5 Routledge New York

Fortmann L (2008) Participatory research in conservation and rural livelihoodsDoing science together vol 3 Wiley-Blackwell Hoboken

Gadgil M Berkes F Folke C (1993) Indigenous knowledge for biodiversityconservation Ambio 22(23)151ndash156

Goetze TC (2005) Empowered co-management towards power-sharing andindigenous rights in Clayoquot Sound BC Anthropologica 47(2)247ndash265

Gupta A (1998) Postcolonial developments agriculture in the making of modernIndia Duke University Press Durham NC

Harding S (1998) Is science multicultural postcolonialisms feminisms andepistemologies Indiana University Press Bloomington

Harding S (2011) The postcolonial science and technology studies reader DukeUniversity Press Durham NC

Harris G (ed) (2011) Northwest Forest Planmdashthe first 15 years [1994ndash2008]effectiveness of the federal-tribal relationship Tech Paper R6-RPM-TP-01-2011 US Department of Agriculture Forest Service Pacific NorthwestRegion Portland

Holmes E Lickers H Barkley B (2002) A critical assessment of ten years of on-the-ground sustainable forestry in eastern Ontariorsquos settled landscape For Chron78(5)643ndash647

Houde N (2007) The six faces of traditional ecological knowledge challenges andopportunities for Canadian co-management arrangements Ecol Soc 12(2)34

Huntington H (2000) Using traditional ecological knowledge in science methodsand applications Ecol Appl 10(5)1270ndash1274

Kimmerer R (2002) Weaving traditional ecological knowledge into biologicaleducation7 a call to action Bioscience 52(5)432ndash438 doi1016410006-3568(2002)052[0432WTEKIB]20CO2

Kimmerer R Lake F (2001) The role of indigenous burning in land managementJ For 99(11)36ndash41

Kofinas GP (2005) Caribou hunters and researchers at the co-managementinterface emergent dilemmas and the dynamics of legitimacy in powersharing Anthropologica 47(2)179ndash196

Leonetti C (2010) Indigenous stewardship methods and NRCS conservationpractices United States Department of Agriculture Natural ResourcesConservation Service Anchorage

McGregor D (2004a) Coming full circle indigenous knowledge environment andour future Am Indian Q 28(3amp4)385ndash410

McGregor D (2004b) Traditional ecological knowledge and sustainabledevelopment towards coexistence In Blaser M Feit HA McRae G (ed) In theway of development indigenous peoples life projects and globalizationZedIDRC Ottawa

McGregor D (2008) Linking traditional ecological knowledge and westernscience aboriginal perspectives from the 2000 State of the Lakes EcosystemConference Can J Nativ Stud XXVIII(1)139ndash158

Nadasdy P (1999) The politics of TEK power and the integration of knowledgeArct Anthropol 36(1ndash2)1ndash18

Nakashima DJ (1993) Astute observers on the sea ice edge Inuit knowledge as abasis for arctic co-management In Inglis J (ed) Traditional ecologicalknoweldge concepts and cases International Program on TraditionalEcological Knowledge and International Development Research CentreOttawa pp 99ndash110

Nakashima DJ Galloway McLean K Thulstrup HD Ramos Castillo A Rubis JT(2012) Weathering uncertainty traditional knowledge for climate changeassessment and adaptation UNESCO and Darwin UNU Paris

Pierotti R Wildcat D (2000) Traditional ecological knowledge the thirdalternative Ecol Appl 10(5)1333ndash1340

Reo N Whyte K (2012) Hunting and morality as elements of traditional ecologicalknowledge Hum Ecol 40(1)15ndash27 doi101007s10745-011-9448-1

Ross A Sherman R Snodgrass JG Delcore HD (2010) Indigenous peoples and thecollaborative stewardship of nature knowledge binds and institutionalconflicts Left Coast Press Walnut Creek CA

Salmon E (1996) Decolonizing our voices Winds Change 11(3)70ndash72Siegel H (1997) Science education multicultural and universal Interchange 28

(2)97ndash108Star SL Griesemer JR (1989) Institutional ecology Translations and boundary

objects amateurs and professionals in Berkeleys museum of vertebratezoology 1907ndash39 Soc Stud Sci 19(3)387ndash420

Story P Lickers F (1997) Partnership building for sustainable development a FirstNations perspective from Ontario J Sustain For 4(3ndash4)149ndash162

Turnbull D (2000) Masons tricksters and cartographers comparative studies inthe sociology of scientific and indigenous knowledge Taylor amp FrancisPhiladelphia

UNEP (1998) Report of the fourth meeting of the parties to the convention onbiodiversity UNEPCBDCOP Nairobi Kenya

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 11 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

governance (Goetze 2005)c Co-management invokes theidea of joint political relationships between indigenous andnon-indigenous institutions that work together accordingto standards of fairness to govern particular areas andbkresources Standards of fairness include norms like equalrepresentation and voting rights The concept of co-management is the basis of actual co-management boardsand committees that are composed of indigenous and non-indigenous participants and that are responsible for man-aging a fishery or forested area or particular species like acaribou population Indigenous and non-indigenous insti-tutions often rely on the term co-management as part of ashared language for bridging cross-cultural and cross-situation divides However there is also dialogue on howthe concept of co-management can be taken the wrongway and provide insufficient guidance for collaboration Itis often argued that the concept co-management impliesthat the nation-statersquos (eg Canada US) vision for envir-onmental governance is used to evaluate the collaborativeefforts between indigenous and non-indigenous institu-tions This is because the term ldquomanagementrdquo can connotea non-indigenous view of the appropriate relationshipamong humans other living beings and the environmentThis term can slant the meaning of co-management so thatnon-indigenous participants in a co-management boardfor example come in with expectations that their assump-tions about ldquomanagementrdquo should be prioritized and maynot listen to their indigenous colleagues The term thencan have the effect of silencing genuine negotiation ofcross-cultural and cross-situational differencesInstead the concept of co-existence is offered (McGregor

2004b) which suggests the importance of balancing indi-genous and non-indigenous aspirations of governance intothe evaluation of collaboration In this case one might beinclined to think cynically that it is all about labels Butthere is much more going on than preferences about labelsWe need to consider the role played by concepts likeco-management and co-existence in facilitating or discour-aging collaboration People who reject the concept of co-management based on the contexts they are familiar withsee in it problematic assumptions about how indigenousand non-indigenous institutions should work togetherNon-indigenous people may not see how the concept ofco-management might encourage these assumptions eventhough perhaps co-management is the preferred conceptin some contexts Those who reject the concept of co-management and wish to replace it with the concept of co-existence are inviting non-indigenous people to learn moreabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides This isthe role that concepts like co-management and co-existence play The concept of co-existence does not in it-self contain enough meaning for non-indigenous personsto suggest in advance exactly how a collaborative processshould play out What proponents of co-existence are

saying is that there is much learning to do The concept ofco-existence suggests a very different possibility for collab-oration than what non-indigenous peoples may be used toWork on co-existence expresses an invitation to learnabout cross-cultural and cross-situational divides so as toachieve better collaborations in particular contextsThere are two important points here regarding the role

of these concepts First co-management and co-existenceare invoked for better or worse by many different institu-tions in contexts where they are trying to collaborateacross cross-cultural and cross-situational divides Secondthe example of co-existence I gave is an example of howsome people seek to use concepts to improve collaborationby inviting people to consider alternatives that may nothave been on their conceptual radar before The conceptof TEK and its synonyms plays a somewhat analogous roleto the term co-existence As in the first point various defi-nitions of TEK are used in collaborative contexts for betteror worse As in the second point those who bring new def-initions of TEK into dialogue are inviting others to con-sider new possibilities for thinking about the function ofknowledge systems in environmental governanceHowever we need to be precise about what this meansmdash

because I am not arguing that there is a single definition ofTEK that can count for all This is impossible TEK nomatter how it is defined is not adequate for any indigenouscommunity The English articulation TEK is not an indi-genous word or concept and it is likely not used withinvery many communities unto themselves The terms trad-itional and ecological are awkward Traditional can havethe effect of putting knowledge in the past whereas TEK isoften supposed to mean contemporary knowledge Eco-logical aligns TEK with a particular discipline whereas TEKrefers to knowledge that does not stem from that disciplineTerms like indigenous knowledge and native science aresimilarly awkward when we unpack what associations anddissociations they may imply Moreover there may be manycontexts where an indigenous people does see the conceptas referring to accumulated observations for example orcontexts where TEK is viewed as a Western construct ir-relevant to environmental governance There are likelyother contexts where TEK needs to refer to systems of re-sponsibilities There are multiple possible scenarios Theconcept of TEK cannot possibly do justice to the know-ledge systems and articulations of knowledge systems be-longing to the thousands of indigenous peoples TEK is alsonot a concept that was an integral part of the education ofmost ecologists or foresters nor is it a concept that hasexisted for a long time in the federal policies of a nation-state This does not mean though that the concept shouldbe dispensed with Non-indigenous peoples may be equallyuncomfortable with referring to something they are not fa-miliar with as science or linked with a particular scientificdiscipline It may be no easier for them to change out terms

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 9 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

like TEK with even more general terms like Agrawalrsquos ldquous-able knowledgerdquod

Thus whenever the concept of TEK is invoked the rolethat it plays is to suggest that indigenous communitiesmay approach the very question of the nature of know-ledge and how it relates to environmental and natural re-source governance rather differently than disciplines likeecology or biology and the policy contexts in which theyare used By ldquorather differentlyrdquo I do not mean in somesense that applies to all communities For example theremay be some indigenous communities that invoke TEK tomean a radically different cultural paradigm one in whichit is not appropriate to speak of knowledge as distinct frompractice or belief But other indigenous communities wholive in different regions because of historical removal mayinvoke TEK to stand for the values that they believe disci-plines like ecology should serve even if they lack intimateexperiences with the environment they currently inhabitYet other communities might use TEK to suggest differentways in which multiple empirical techniques for gatheringknowledge from huntersrsquo observations to scientific fieldmethods can be used in harmony TEK could also refer toideas about how elders should be involved in the designand peer review of research in tribal environmental de-partments that collect their own data about the environ-ment and the condition of natural resources There aremany more scenarios of course These scenarios indicatethe diversity of how people at a philosophical level thinkabout the meaning of knowledge in relation to their livesAnd their thinking arises from multiple cultural historicalglobal social and personal sourcesThe significance of this point is that when the concept

of TEK is used it really points to the possibility thatthere are cross-cultural and cross-situational divides thatmake it so that non-indigenous parties cannot expecttheir own assumptions to apply to indigenous contextsThe concept of TEK should be invoked to invite non-indigenous parties to learn more about how particularindigenous communities approach fundamental ques-tions of the nature of knowledge and how it fits intotheir visions of environmental governance This invita-tion is not one that promises easy answers Rather it isan invitation to become a part of a long term processwhereby cross-cultural and cross-situation divides arebetter bridged through mutual respect and learning andrelationships among collaborators are given the oppor-tunity to mature Examples of long term processes in-clude ldquothe way of peacerdquo used among indigenous andnon-indigenous participants in the Ontario Model Forest(Holmes et al 2002 Story and Lickers 1997) There aremany other examples We need not only be concernedwith striking the right definition of TEK Rather we needto cultivate attitudes of awareness that the concept ofTEK plays a role as a collaborative concept which is

what I call a concept that invites people to engage in aprocess of respectful learning about significant differ-encese

ConclusionsTEK and its synonyms indigenous knowledge and nativescience have been defined mainly based on two kinds ofassumptions how knowledge is to be mobilized and whatTEKrsquos relation to science is The different assumptionsmake it tricky to come to a consensus definition that satis-fies all stakeholders This makes us interrogate what therole of TEK is in a world of relationships among differentinstitutions of environmental governance for whom TEKis an issue TEK must play the role of inviting cross-cultural and cross-situational learning for indigenous andnon-indigenous policy makers natural resource managersscientists activists elders and youthAn important implication of this is that science and

policy literatures that invoke TEK should discuss it as acollaborative concept That is care must be taken toshow that the concept invites participation to a longterm process of mutually respectful learning And moreeffort needs to be taken to understand what these pro-cesses should look like Already of course there is workthat exemplifies this interpretation of TEK (Barnhardt2005 Ross et al 2010) Yet the point has not beenbrought out that TEK is playing the role of a collabora-tive concept in this work This point should figure morein natural resources and policy literatures Differencesover the meaning of TEK should be seen as invitationsto learn more in circumstances where the possibility ofgenuine collaboration is a relatively recent development

EndnotesaIndigenous peoples refer to the pre-invasion inhabi-

tants of lands now dominated by others examples beingthe Maori in New Zealand or the Anishinaabe in theUnited States and Canada (Anaya 2004)

bI will use the term indigenous knowledge specificallywhen I refer to the work of these authors and shift backto the term TEK for my own analysis My analysis ofAgrawal later on in the same section will also use indi-genous knowledge when referring specifically to hiswork and TEK when referring to my own analysis

cOther collaborative literature includes Fortmann 2008and Colwell-Chanthaphonh and Ferguson 2008

dAgrawal too has considered the role of the concept ofTEK in cross-cultural and cross-situational collabor-ation He argues that

it is possibly the case that advocates of indigenousknowledge find in the term a particularly potent wayto summarize and invoke many of their concerns andhopes about peoples livelihoods life styles and

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 10 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

resource systems they view as disappearing Thephrase evokes embattled ways of living-in-the-worldthat real economic social and political pressures arenudging and frog-marching toward furthermarginalization and oblivion Because the indigenousscientific division of knowledge effectively representsdurable underlying social confrontations the studyand defense of indigenous knowledge continues toattract attention Indeed even as one questions theneed to contrast indigenous and scientificknowledges one underscores this contrastmdashin thevery use of the contrasting adjectives Indigenousknowledge is here to stay even if what it represents isforever and always disappearing (Agrawal 2009 158)

I hope to articulate in this paper that there are farmore reasons why people invoke concepts like TEK orindigenous knowledge than what Agrawal states

eCollaborative concepts also differ from boundary ob-jects (Star and Griesemer 1989) Boundary objects arecommonly shared by diverse stakeholders and serve tocoordinate their actions despite different interests Col-laborative concepts are invitations to learn more whichsuggest the need for a long term process of mutually re-spectful learning

Competing interestsThe author declares that there are no competing interests

AcknowledgmentsI wish to thank Kristie Dotson Michael ORourke Nicholas Reo and theanonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on this paper

Received 11 December 2012 Accepted 17 January 2013Published 5 April 2013

ReferencesAgrawal A (1995) Dismantling the divide between indigenous and scientific

knowledge Dev Change 26(3)413ndash439Agrawal A (2009) Why ldquoindigenousrdquo knowledge J R Soc N Z 39(4)157ndash158Anaya SJ (2004) Indigenous peoples in international law 2nd edition Oxford

University Press New YorkBarnhardt R (2005) Indigenous knowledge systems and Alaska Native ways of

knowing Anthropol Ed Q 36(1)8ndash23Berkes F (1999) Sacred ecology traditional ecological knowledge and resource

management Taylor amp Francis PhiladelphiaBiagioli M (1999) The science studies reader Routledge New YorkBrokensha DW Warren DM Werner O (1980) Indigenous knowledge systems and

development University Press of America Washington DCCajete G (1999) Native science natural laws of interdependence Clear Light

Books Santa Fe NMColwell-Chanthaphonh JS Ferguson TJ (2008) Collaboration in archaeological

practice engaging descendant communities AltaMira Lanham MDEisner WR Cuomo CJ Hinkel KM Jones BM Brower S Ronald H (2009)

Advancing Landscape Change Research through the Incorporation ofIntildeupiaq Knowledge Arctic 62(4)429ndash442

El-Hani C de Ferreira S Bandeira F (2008) Valuing indigenous knowledge to callit ldquosciencerdquo will not help Cult Stud Sci Educ 3(3)751ndash779 doi101007s11422-008-9129-6

Ellen R (2000) Indigenous environmental knowledge and its transformationscritical anthropological perspectives vol 5 Routledge New York

Fortmann L (2008) Participatory research in conservation and rural livelihoodsDoing science together vol 3 Wiley-Blackwell Hoboken

Gadgil M Berkes F Folke C (1993) Indigenous knowledge for biodiversityconservation Ambio 22(23)151ndash156

Goetze TC (2005) Empowered co-management towards power-sharing andindigenous rights in Clayoquot Sound BC Anthropologica 47(2)247ndash265

Gupta A (1998) Postcolonial developments agriculture in the making of modernIndia Duke University Press Durham NC

Harding S (1998) Is science multicultural postcolonialisms feminisms andepistemologies Indiana University Press Bloomington

Harding S (2011) The postcolonial science and technology studies reader DukeUniversity Press Durham NC

Harris G (ed) (2011) Northwest Forest Planmdashthe first 15 years [1994ndash2008]effectiveness of the federal-tribal relationship Tech Paper R6-RPM-TP-01-2011 US Department of Agriculture Forest Service Pacific NorthwestRegion Portland

Holmes E Lickers H Barkley B (2002) A critical assessment of ten years of on-the-ground sustainable forestry in eastern Ontariorsquos settled landscape For Chron78(5)643ndash647

Houde N (2007) The six faces of traditional ecological knowledge challenges andopportunities for Canadian co-management arrangements Ecol Soc 12(2)34

Huntington H (2000) Using traditional ecological knowledge in science methodsand applications Ecol Appl 10(5)1270ndash1274

Kimmerer R (2002) Weaving traditional ecological knowledge into biologicaleducation7 a call to action Bioscience 52(5)432ndash438 doi1016410006-3568(2002)052[0432WTEKIB]20CO2

Kimmerer R Lake F (2001) The role of indigenous burning in land managementJ For 99(11)36ndash41

Kofinas GP (2005) Caribou hunters and researchers at the co-managementinterface emergent dilemmas and the dynamics of legitimacy in powersharing Anthropologica 47(2)179ndash196

Leonetti C (2010) Indigenous stewardship methods and NRCS conservationpractices United States Department of Agriculture Natural ResourcesConservation Service Anchorage

McGregor D (2004a) Coming full circle indigenous knowledge environment andour future Am Indian Q 28(3amp4)385ndash410

McGregor D (2004b) Traditional ecological knowledge and sustainabledevelopment towards coexistence In Blaser M Feit HA McRae G (ed) In theway of development indigenous peoples life projects and globalizationZedIDRC Ottawa

McGregor D (2008) Linking traditional ecological knowledge and westernscience aboriginal perspectives from the 2000 State of the Lakes EcosystemConference Can J Nativ Stud XXVIII(1)139ndash158

Nadasdy P (1999) The politics of TEK power and the integration of knowledgeArct Anthropol 36(1ndash2)1ndash18

Nakashima DJ (1993) Astute observers on the sea ice edge Inuit knowledge as abasis for arctic co-management In Inglis J (ed) Traditional ecologicalknoweldge concepts and cases International Program on TraditionalEcological Knowledge and International Development Research CentreOttawa pp 99ndash110

Nakashima DJ Galloway McLean K Thulstrup HD Ramos Castillo A Rubis JT(2012) Weathering uncertainty traditional knowledge for climate changeassessment and adaptation UNESCO and Darwin UNU Paris

Pierotti R Wildcat D (2000) Traditional ecological knowledge the thirdalternative Ecol Appl 10(5)1333ndash1340

Reo N Whyte K (2012) Hunting and morality as elements of traditional ecologicalknowledge Hum Ecol 40(1)15ndash27 doi101007s10745-011-9448-1

Ross A Sherman R Snodgrass JG Delcore HD (2010) Indigenous peoples and thecollaborative stewardship of nature knowledge binds and institutionalconflicts Left Coast Press Walnut Creek CA

Salmon E (1996) Decolonizing our voices Winds Change 11(3)70ndash72Siegel H (1997) Science education multicultural and universal Interchange 28

(2)97ndash108Star SL Griesemer JR (1989) Institutional ecology Translations and boundary

objects amateurs and professionals in Berkeleys museum of vertebratezoology 1907ndash39 Soc Stud Sci 19(3)387ndash420

Story P Lickers F (1997) Partnership building for sustainable development a FirstNations perspective from Ontario J Sustain For 4(3ndash4)149ndash162

Turnbull D (2000) Masons tricksters and cartographers comparative studies inthe sociology of scientific and indigenous knowledge Taylor amp FrancisPhiladelphia

UNEP (1998) Report of the fourth meeting of the parties to the convention onbiodiversity UNEPCBDCOP Nairobi Kenya

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 11 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

like TEK with even more general terms like Agrawalrsquos ldquous-able knowledgerdquod

Thus whenever the concept of TEK is invoked the rolethat it plays is to suggest that indigenous communitiesmay approach the very question of the nature of know-ledge and how it relates to environmental and natural re-source governance rather differently than disciplines likeecology or biology and the policy contexts in which theyare used By ldquorather differentlyrdquo I do not mean in somesense that applies to all communities For example theremay be some indigenous communities that invoke TEK tomean a radically different cultural paradigm one in whichit is not appropriate to speak of knowledge as distinct frompractice or belief But other indigenous communities wholive in different regions because of historical removal mayinvoke TEK to stand for the values that they believe disci-plines like ecology should serve even if they lack intimateexperiences with the environment they currently inhabitYet other communities might use TEK to suggest differentways in which multiple empirical techniques for gatheringknowledge from huntersrsquo observations to scientific fieldmethods can be used in harmony TEK could also refer toideas about how elders should be involved in the designand peer review of research in tribal environmental de-partments that collect their own data about the environ-ment and the condition of natural resources There aremany more scenarios of course These scenarios indicatethe diversity of how people at a philosophical level thinkabout the meaning of knowledge in relation to their livesAnd their thinking arises from multiple cultural historicalglobal social and personal sourcesThe significance of this point is that when the concept

of TEK is used it really points to the possibility thatthere are cross-cultural and cross-situational divides thatmake it so that non-indigenous parties cannot expecttheir own assumptions to apply to indigenous contextsThe concept of TEK should be invoked to invite non-indigenous parties to learn more about how particularindigenous communities approach fundamental ques-tions of the nature of knowledge and how it fits intotheir visions of environmental governance This invita-tion is not one that promises easy answers Rather it isan invitation to become a part of a long term processwhereby cross-cultural and cross-situation divides arebetter bridged through mutual respect and learning andrelationships among collaborators are given the oppor-tunity to mature Examples of long term processes in-clude ldquothe way of peacerdquo used among indigenous andnon-indigenous participants in the Ontario Model Forest(Holmes et al 2002 Story and Lickers 1997) There aremany other examples We need not only be concernedwith striking the right definition of TEK Rather we needto cultivate attitudes of awareness that the concept ofTEK plays a role as a collaborative concept which is

what I call a concept that invites people to engage in aprocess of respectful learning about significant differ-encese

ConclusionsTEK and its synonyms indigenous knowledge and nativescience have been defined mainly based on two kinds ofassumptions how knowledge is to be mobilized and whatTEKrsquos relation to science is The different assumptionsmake it tricky to come to a consensus definition that satis-fies all stakeholders This makes us interrogate what therole of TEK is in a world of relationships among differentinstitutions of environmental governance for whom TEKis an issue TEK must play the role of inviting cross-cultural and cross-situational learning for indigenous andnon-indigenous policy makers natural resource managersscientists activists elders and youthAn important implication of this is that science and

policy literatures that invoke TEK should discuss it as acollaborative concept That is care must be taken toshow that the concept invites participation to a longterm process of mutually respectful learning And moreeffort needs to be taken to understand what these pro-cesses should look like Already of course there is workthat exemplifies this interpretation of TEK (Barnhardt2005 Ross et al 2010) Yet the point has not beenbrought out that TEK is playing the role of a collabora-tive concept in this work This point should figure morein natural resources and policy literatures Differencesover the meaning of TEK should be seen as invitationsto learn more in circumstances where the possibility ofgenuine collaboration is a relatively recent development

EndnotesaIndigenous peoples refer to the pre-invasion inhabi-

tants of lands now dominated by others examples beingthe Maori in New Zealand or the Anishinaabe in theUnited States and Canada (Anaya 2004)

bI will use the term indigenous knowledge specificallywhen I refer to the work of these authors and shift backto the term TEK for my own analysis My analysis ofAgrawal later on in the same section will also use indi-genous knowledge when referring specifically to hiswork and TEK when referring to my own analysis

cOther collaborative literature includes Fortmann 2008and Colwell-Chanthaphonh and Ferguson 2008

dAgrawal too has considered the role of the concept ofTEK in cross-cultural and cross-situational collabor-ation He argues that

it is possibly the case that advocates of indigenousknowledge find in the term a particularly potent wayto summarize and invoke many of their concerns andhopes about peoples livelihoods life styles and

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 10 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

resource systems they view as disappearing Thephrase evokes embattled ways of living-in-the-worldthat real economic social and political pressures arenudging and frog-marching toward furthermarginalization and oblivion Because the indigenousscientific division of knowledge effectively representsdurable underlying social confrontations the studyand defense of indigenous knowledge continues toattract attention Indeed even as one questions theneed to contrast indigenous and scientificknowledges one underscores this contrastmdashin thevery use of the contrasting adjectives Indigenousknowledge is here to stay even if what it represents isforever and always disappearing (Agrawal 2009 158)

I hope to articulate in this paper that there are farmore reasons why people invoke concepts like TEK orindigenous knowledge than what Agrawal states

eCollaborative concepts also differ from boundary ob-jects (Star and Griesemer 1989) Boundary objects arecommonly shared by diverse stakeholders and serve tocoordinate their actions despite different interests Col-laborative concepts are invitations to learn more whichsuggest the need for a long term process of mutually re-spectful learning

Competing interestsThe author declares that there are no competing interests

AcknowledgmentsI wish to thank Kristie Dotson Michael ORourke Nicholas Reo and theanonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on this paper

Received 11 December 2012 Accepted 17 January 2013Published 5 April 2013

ReferencesAgrawal A (1995) Dismantling the divide between indigenous and scientific

knowledge Dev Change 26(3)413ndash439Agrawal A (2009) Why ldquoindigenousrdquo knowledge J R Soc N Z 39(4)157ndash158Anaya SJ (2004) Indigenous peoples in international law 2nd edition Oxford

University Press New YorkBarnhardt R (2005) Indigenous knowledge systems and Alaska Native ways of

knowing Anthropol Ed Q 36(1)8ndash23Berkes F (1999) Sacred ecology traditional ecological knowledge and resource

management Taylor amp Francis PhiladelphiaBiagioli M (1999) The science studies reader Routledge New YorkBrokensha DW Warren DM Werner O (1980) Indigenous knowledge systems and

development University Press of America Washington DCCajete G (1999) Native science natural laws of interdependence Clear Light

Books Santa Fe NMColwell-Chanthaphonh JS Ferguson TJ (2008) Collaboration in archaeological

practice engaging descendant communities AltaMira Lanham MDEisner WR Cuomo CJ Hinkel KM Jones BM Brower S Ronald H (2009)

Advancing Landscape Change Research through the Incorporation ofIntildeupiaq Knowledge Arctic 62(4)429ndash442

El-Hani C de Ferreira S Bandeira F (2008) Valuing indigenous knowledge to callit ldquosciencerdquo will not help Cult Stud Sci Educ 3(3)751ndash779 doi101007s11422-008-9129-6

Ellen R (2000) Indigenous environmental knowledge and its transformationscritical anthropological perspectives vol 5 Routledge New York

Fortmann L (2008) Participatory research in conservation and rural livelihoodsDoing science together vol 3 Wiley-Blackwell Hoboken

Gadgil M Berkes F Folke C (1993) Indigenous knowledge for biodiversityconservation Ambio 22(23)151ndash156

Goetze TC (2005) Empowered co-management towards power-sharing andindigenous rights in Clayoquot Sound BC Anthropologica 47(2)247ndash265

Gupta A (1998) Postcolonial developments agriculture in the making of modernIndia Duke University Press Durham NC

Harding S (1998) Is science multicultural postcolonialisms feminisms andepistemologies Indiana University Press Bloomington

Harding S (2011) The postcolonial science and technology studies reader DukeUniversity Press Durham NC

Harris G (ed) (2011) Northwest Forest Planmdashthe first 15 years [1994ndash2008]effectiveness of the federal-tribal relationship Tech Paper R6-RPM-TP-01-2011 US Department of Agriculture Forest Service Pacific NorthwestRegion Portland

Holmes E Lickers H Barkley B (2002) A critical assessment of ten years of on-the-ground sustainable forestry in eastern Ontariorsquos settled landscape For Chron78(5)643ndash647

Houde N (2007) The six faces of traditional ecological knowledge challenges andopportunities for Canadian co-management arrangements Ecol Soc 12(2)34

Huntington H (2000) Using traditional ecological knowledge in science methodsand applications Ecol Appl 10(5)1270ndash1274

Kimmerer R (2002) Weaving traditional ecological knowledge into biologicaleducation7 a call to action Bioscience 52(5)432ndash438 doi1016410006-3568(2002)052[0432WTEKIB]20CO2

Kimmerer R Lake F (2001) The role of indigenous burning in land managementJ For 99(11)36ndash41

Kofinas GP (2005) Caribou hunters and researchers at the co-managementinterface emergent dilemmas and the dynamics of legitimacy in powersharing Anthropologica 47(2)179ndash196

Leonetti C (2010) Indigenous stewardship methods and NRCS conservationpractices United States Department of Agriculture Natural ResourcesConservation Service Anchorage

McGregor D (2004a) Coming full circle indigenous knowledge environment andour future Am Indian Q 28(3amp4)385ndash410

McGregor D (2004b) Traditional ecological knowledge and sustainabledevelopment towards coexistence In Blaser M Feit HA McRae G (ed) In theway of development indigenous peoples life projects and globalizationZedIDRC Ottawa

McGregor D (2008) Linking traditional ecological knowledge and westernscience aboriginal perspectives from the 2000 State of the Lakes EcosystemConference Can J Nativ Stud XXVIII(1)139ndash158

Nadasdy P (1999) The politics of TEK power and the integration of knowledgeArct Anthropol 36(1ndash2)1ndash18

Nakashima DJ (1993) Astute observers on the sea ice edge Inuit knowledge as abasis for arctic co-management In Inglis J (ed) Traditional ecologicalknoweldge concepts and cases International Program on TraditionalEcological Knowledge and International Development Research CentreOttawa pp 99ndash110

Nakashima DJ Galloway McLean K Thulstrup HD Ramos Castillo A Rubis JT(2012) Weathering uncertainty traditional knowledge for climate changeassessment and adaptation UNESCO and Darwin UNU Paris

Pierotti R Wildcat D (2000) Traditional ecological knowledge the thirdalternative Ecol Appl 10(5)1333ndash1340

Reo N Whyte K (2012) Hunting and morality as elements of traditional ecologicalknowledge Hum Ecol 40(1)15ndash27 doi101007s10745-011-9448-1

Ross A Sherman R Snodgrass JG Delcore HD (2010) Indigenous peoples and thecollaborative stewardship of nature knowledge binds and institutionalconflicts Left Coast Press Walnut Creek CA

Salmon E (1996) Decolonizing our voices Winds Change 11(3)70ndash72Siegel H (1997) Science education multicultural and universal Interchange 28

(2)97ndash108Star SL Griesemer JR (1989) Institutional ecology Translations and boundary

objects amateurs and professionals in Berkeleys museum of vertebratezoology 1907ndash39 Soc Stud Sci 19(3)387ndash420

Story P Lickers F (1997) Partnership building for sustainable development a FirstNations perspective from Ontario J Sustain For 4(3ndash4)149ndash162

Turnbull D (2000) Masons tricksters and cartographers comparative studies inthe sociology of scientific and indigenous knowledge Taylor amp FrancisPhiladelphia

UNEP (1998) Report of the fourth meeting of the parties to the convention onbiodiversity UNEPCBDCOP Nairobi Kenya

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 11 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

resource systems they view as disappearing Thephrase evokes embattled ways of living-in-the-worldthat real economic social and political pressures arenudging and frog-marching toward furthermarginalization and oblivion Because the indigenousscientific division of knowledge effectively representsdurable underlying social confrontations the studyand defense of indigenous knowledge continues toattract attention Indeed even as one questions theneed to contrast indigenous and scientificknowledges one underscores this contrastmdashin thevery use of the contrasting adjectives Indigenousknowledge is here to stay even if what it represents isforever and always disappearing (Agrawal 2009 158)

I hope to articulate in this paper that there are farmore reasons why people invoke concepts like TEK orindigenous knowledge than what Agrawal states

eCollaborative concepts also differ from boundary ob-jects (Star and Griesemer 1989) Boundary objects arecommonly shared by diverse stakeholders and serve tocoordinate their actions despite different interests Col-laborative concepts are invitations to learn more whichsuggest the need for a long term process of mutually re-spectful learning

Competing interestsThe author declares that there are no competing interests

AcknowledgmentsI wish to thank Kristie Dotson Michael ORourke Nicholas Reo and theanonymous reviewers for their insightful comments on this paper

Received 11 December 2012 Accepted 17 January 2013Published 5 April 2013

ReferencesAgrawal A (1995) Dismantling the divide between indigenous and scientific

knowledge Dev Change 26(3)413ndash439Agrawal A (2009) Why ldquoindigenousrdquo knowledge J R Soc N Z 39(4)157ndash158Anaya SJ (2004) Indigenous peoples in international law 2nd edition Oxford

University Press New YorkBarnhardt R (2005) Indigenous knowledge systems and Alaska Native ways of

knowing Anthropol Ed Q 36(1)8ndash23Berkes F (1999) Sacred ecology traditional ecological knowledge and resource

management Taylor amp Francis PhiladelphiaBiagioli M (1999) The science studies reader Routledge New YorkBrokensha DW Warren DM Werner O (1980) Indigenous knowledge systems and

development University Press of America Washington DCCajete G (1999) Native science natural laws of interdependence Clear Light

Books Santa Fe NMColwell-Chanthaphonh JS Ferguson TJ (2008) Collaboration in archaeological

practice engaging descendant communities AltaMira Lanham MDEisner WR Cuomo CJ Hinkel KM Jones BM Brower S Ronald H (2009)

Advancing Landscape Change Research through the Incorporation ofIntildeupiaq Knowledge Arctic 62(4)429ndash442

El-Hani C de Ferreira S Bandeira F (2008) Valuing indigenous knowledge to callit ldquosciencerdquo will not help Cult Stud Sci Educ 3(3)751ndash779 doi101007s11422-008-9129-6

Ellen R (2000) Indigenous environmental knowledge and its transformationscritical anthropological perspectives vol 5 Routledge New York

Fortmann L (2008) Participatory research in conservation and rural livelihoodsDoing science together vol 3 Wiley-Blackwell Hoboken

Gadgil M Berkes F Folke C (1993) Indigenous knowledge for biodiversityconservation Ambio 22(23)151ndash156

Goetze TC (2005) Empowered co-management towards power-sharing andindigenous rights in Clayoquot Sound BC Anthropologica 47(2)247ndash265

Gupta A (1998) Postcolonial developments agriculture in the making of modernIndia Duke University Press Durham NC

Harding S (1998) Is science multicultural postcolonialisms feminisms andepistemologies Indiana University Press Bloomington

Harding S (2011) The postcolonial science and technology studies reader DukeUniversity Press Durham NC

Harris G (ed) (2011) Northwest Forest Planmdashthe first 15 years [1994ndash2008]effectiveness of the federal-tribal relationship Tech Paper R6-RPM-TP-01-2011 US Department of Agriculture Forest Service Pacific NorthwestRegion Portland

Holmes E Lickers H Barkley B (2002) A critical assessment of ten years of on-the-ground sustainable forestry in eastern Ontariorsquos settled landscape For Chron78(5)643ndash647

Houde N (2007) The six faces of traditional ecological knowledge challenges andopportunities for Canadian co-management arrangements Ecol Soc 12(2)34

Huntington H (2000) Using traditional ecological knowledge in science methodsand applications Ecol Appl 10(5)1270ndash1274

Kimmerer R (2002) Weaving traditional ecological knowledge into biologicaleducation7 a call to action Bioscience 52(5)432ndash438 doi1016410006-3568(2002)052[0432WTEKIB]20CO2

Kimmerer R Lake F (2001) The role of indigenous burning in land managementJ For 99(11)36ndash41

Kofinas GP (2005) Caribou hunters and researchers at the co-managementinterface emergent dilemmas and the dynamics of legitimacy in powersharing Anthropologica 47(2)179ndash196

Leonetti C (2010) Indigenous stewardship methods and NRCS conservationpractices United States Department of Agriculture Natural ResourcesConservation Service Anchorage

McGregor D (2004a) Coming full circle indigenous knowledge environment andour future Am Indian Q 28(3amp4)385ndash410

McGregor D (2004b) Traditional ecological knowledge and sustainabledevelopment towards coexistence In Blaser M Feit HA McRae G (ed) In theway of development indigenous peoples life projects and globalizationZedIDRC Ottawa

McGregor D (2008) Linking traditional ecological knowledge and westernscience aboriginal perspectives from the 2000 State of the Lakes EcosystemConference Can J Nativ Stud XXVIII(1)139ndash158

Nadasdy P (1999) The politics of TEK power and the integration of knowledgeArct Anthropol 36(1ndash2)1ndash18

Nakashima DJ (1993) Astute observers on the sea ice edge Inuit knowledge as abasis for arctic co-management In Inglis J (ed) Traditional ecologicalknoweldge concepts and cases International Program on TraditionalEcological Knowledge and International Development Research CentreOttawa pp 99ndash110

Nakashima DJ Galloway McLean K Thulstrup HD Ramos Castillo A Rubis JT(2012) Weathering uncertainty traditional knowledge for climate changeassessment and adaptation UNESCO and Darwin UNU Paris

Pierotti R Wildcat D (2000) Traditional ecological knowledge the thirdalternative Ecol Appl 10(5)1333ndash1340

Reo N Whyte K (2012) Hunting and morality as elements of traditional ecologicalknowledge Hum Ecol 40(1)15ndash27 doi101007s10745-011-9448-1

Ross A Sherman R Snodgrass JG Delcore HD (2010) Indigenous peoples and thecollaborative stewardship of nature knowledge binds and institutionalconflicts Left Coast Press Walnut Creek CA

Salmon E (1996) Decolonizing our voices Winds Change 11(3)70ndash72Siegel H (1997) Science education multicultural and universal Interchange 28

(2)97ndash108Star SL Griesemer JR (1989) Institutional ecology Translations and boundary

objects amateurs and professionals in Berkeleys museum of vertebratezoology 1907ndash39 Soc Stud Sci 19(3)387ndash420

Story P Lickers F (1997) Partnership building for sustainable development a FirstNations perspective from Ontario J Sustain For 4(3ndash4)149ndash162

Turnbull D (2000) Masons tricksters and cartographers comparative studies inthe sociology of scientific and indigenous knowledge Taylor amp FrancisPhiladelphia

UNEP (1998) Report of the fourth meeting of the parties to the convention onbiodiversity UNEPCBDCOP Nairobi Kenya

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 11 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

Voggesser G (2010) The tribal path forward confronting climate change andconserving nature Wildlife Prof 4(4)24ndash30

Warren DM Slikkerveer LJ Brokensha D (1995) The cultural dimension ofdevelopment indigenous knowledge systems Intermediate TechnologyPublications London

Watson-Verran H Turnbull D (1995) Science and other indigenous knowledgesystems In Jasanoff S Markle G Petersen J Pinch T (ed) Handbook ofscience and technology studies Sage London pp 115ndash139

Wildcat DR (2009) Red alert Saving the planet with indigenous knowledge(Speakers corner) Fulcrum Golden CO

Woodard S (2005) Blending science and tradition in the Arctic Indian CountryToday 590 Madison Avenue New York 10022

doi1011862192-1709-2-7Cite this article as Whyte On the role of traditional ecologicalknowledge as a collaborative concept a philosophical study EcologicalProcesses 2013 27

Submit your manuscript to a journal and benefi t from

7 Convenient online submission

7 Rigorous peer review

7 Immediate publication on acceptance

7 Open access articles freely available online

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Submit your next manuscript at 7 springeropencom

Whyte Ecological Processes 2013 27 Page 12 of 12httpwwwecologicalprocessescomcontent217

• Abstract
• • Introduction
  • Methods
  • Results
  • Conclusions
  • • Introduction
    • Methods
    • Results and discussion
    • • TEK and knowledge mobilization
      • The relation between TEK and science
      • The role of TEK as a collaborative concept
      • • Conclusions
        • Endnotes
        • Competing interests
        • Acknowledgments
        • References