Ms Claudia Baldwin
University of the Sunshine Coast
Eliciting values using photovoice for consensus building in water planning
Ms C Baldwin and Prof G Pretty
This paper outlines the difficulties of engaging communities in politically sensitive and value-laden issues such as water. It considers a central theme that arises when community engagement processes ‘get stuck’ as a result of the cultural divide between farmers and government - how to understand stakeholder values and then how to address these in a consensus building approach to community decision making. This paper describes the use of an innovative qualitative data generating technique - photovoice - to uncover deeply held interests and values related to water planning. Psychological processes underlying the methodological efficacy and interpretation of photovoice data are considered. We describe the richness of this method and how it was used to inform water planning processes in two case study sites in Queensland, Australia – the Lockyer valley and Lower Balonne catchment.
Biography
Claudia is a Lecturer in Planning and Environment at University of Sunshine Coast. She is completing her PhD thesis at University of Queensland on ‘Consensus building in water allocation and use’, with sponsorship by CRC Irrigation Futures.
Claudia has 25 years experience in natural resource and coastal planning, management, and monitoring; water and land use policy; and public participation in Queensland government and Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority. She was involved in water policy development in Queensland government prior to commencing work as a consultant in 2002. She has recently completed an assessment of stakeholder participation in dam projects globally for a Compendium on Best Practices for Dams and Development for UNEP. As part of her PhD and as a result of being an accredited mediator, she has facilitated a series of workshops between government and irrigators in the Lockyer Valley Queensland to resolve differences during the current water planning process. The Lower Balonne catchment is another case study site for her PhD.