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Catherine Benson
Catherine Benson is a PhD Pre-Candidate in the School of Natural Resources and Environment. Her dissertation research explores the role of non-state actors in marine environmental governance in Madagascar and Papua New Guinea. Catherine seeks to better understand how different governance arrangements result in different environmental outcomes. Her research draws on both natural and social science and includes institutional ethnography on different actors, including corporations and NGOs. Catherine has previously conducted research on the creation of marine protected areas in Papua New Guinea, the role of natural resource decentralization in biodiversity and poverty outcomes near protected areas in Uganda, and the implications of human-wildlife conflicts for Kenya?s protected areas. Catherine's previous professional experience includes working with the Papua New Guinea Mission to the United Nations, as a Research Associate at the Advocates Coalition for Development and Environment in Uganda, and with the Africa program at the World Resources Institute. Catherine has a Masters in Environmental Science from the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies and a BA from Colby College in Biology and Environmental Policy.
She is currently working on her dissertation, which investigates how international institutions, both government and non-government organizations (NGOs), design and implement marine conservation and the role of these initiatives in transforming individuals and institutions. By combining institutional ethnography in multiple locations and place-based rural ethnographic work in and near Koh Kong, Cambodia and Madang, Papua New Guinea (PNG), I seek to understand a) the processes of interactions among central and local actors surrounding marine conservation; b) how actors in these institutions govern themselves in ways that enable or constrain broader social interactions; and c) how marine conservation interventions in PNG and Cambodia interact with local community interests. My dissertation will answer the above questions through data-rich ethnographic analysis that considers the constitution of environmental institutions, constellations of power and knowledge, and individual subjectivities.
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