Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - Resource Economics

Support of Democracy in the Ukraine

Workshop “Developing multi-level and decentralized implementation capacity for natural resource management and environmental policies: A contribution to polycentric governance in an emerging democracy”, in the framework of DAAD programme “Support of Democracy in the Ukraine”.

Start: May 2009

End: Novermber 2009

In the framework of DAAD programme “Support of Democracy in the Ukraine”, the Division of Resource Economics is going to organise a Workshop “Developing multi-level and decentralized implementation capacity for natural resource management and environmental policies: A contribution to polycentric governance in an emerging democracy”. Ukraine is one of the former socialist countries which in 1990 experienced the break up of the Soviet Union followed by the radical institutional change. The transition from autocracy required replacement of Soviet centrally planned and implemented practices. Instead, new institutions were to be introduced in all spheres of human activities, which would be based on democratic principles of participation. Environment and natural resources is a sphere which in particular experienced the impacts of Soviet centrally planning regime. With independence Ukraine inherited a number of environmental problems and significant degradation of vital natural resources such as water and soil. New environmental policies were introduced, which were oriented towards the European environmental standards. However, almost twenty years after transition, the enforcement of these policies still remains centralized. The local population in rural areas is not recognised as a primary user of natural resources and an important actor in the implementation of environmental policies. General ignorance of rural participation in environmental and natural resource management results in continuing environmental problems and resource degradation in spite of all efforts on the political level. The workshop intends to demonstrate the need for democratic principles of rural participation in implementation of environmental policies, and discuss the potential for decentralized governance of natural resources with the senior and young scientists of the partner universities, and representatives of the Ministry of the Environment of Ukraine. The objectives of the workshop are:

  • To learn what is natural resource regime and its types;
  • To consider about natural resource management under different political regimes;
  • To look at the impacts of political changes on the management of natural resources on the example of Poland;
  • To analyse the current natural resource management and environmental policies in the Ukraine and their development within the last decade;
  • To discuss the opportunities for the Ukrainian natural resource management and environmental policies to adapt to the political uncertainty, and the role of rural participation in their implementation.

Researcher: M.Sc. Nataliya Stupak

Project Partners: National University of Life and Environmental Sciences of Ukraine; Institute for Agricultural and Forest Environment, Polish Academy of Sciences

Lead: Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Konrad Hagedorn

Funding: DAAD