This research focuses on contemporary and historical relationships between landscape change and human impacts in southwest Yukon, Canada, in order to bring to light the nature of cumulative social effects, and culturally appropriate methodologies that may be used for their evaluation. Results were acquired through twenty eight semi-structured interviews with natural resource managers, health and social workers, First Nations, and non-First Nations residents, in which resource development, and other important local markers of change were topics of discussion. Social thresholds are also developed from these results for their use in supporting resource management decisions. Resilience theory plays a center role in...
Political ecology is a holistic mode of inquiry that applies political analysis to resource use and access by actors and organizations interacting in defined social and cultural contexts. This thesis uses a political ecology perspective to reveal how the Atna' Athabaskan people of South central Alaska use their knowledge of their environment to articulate a specific claim to Copper River salmon. Three case studies of Atna' public activism are presented demonstrating Atna' practice in governmental regulatory process. The position of the Atna' in the Copper River salmon fishery is contrasted with three other north Pacific Native American salmon regimes in order to demonstrate the special features of the Atna' context.