Can community forest governance improve rural prosperity and well-being from forest restoration?

Forest restoration is a key environmental policy objective of the present era.

In the UN’s present “Decade of Restoration”, countries around the world have pledged to restore hundreds of millions of hectares of degraded forests — targeting rural areas of the global south where millions of rural and indigenous people live.

While these efforts have potential to support a range of environmental priorities, it remains unclear to what extent large-scale restoration efforts are compatible with rural needs and other development objectives.

Responding to recent calls for strengthening community rights and involvement, we ask: Under what conditions can community forest governance lead to improvements in rural livelihoods and human well-being from forest restoration?

Through an analysis of five decades’ forestry interventions in Himachal Pradesh, India, we study how shifts in restoration discourses and processes of subnational democratic deepening have reshaped restoration planning over time.

Our work will build theory and evidence on how more empowered local governance may come about through deeper changes in forest administrative practices and restoration’s impacts on multiple dimensions of well-being.

In so doing, we contribute to developing a paradigm of just forest restoration that can link global environmental priorities with diverse societal benefits in support of a broader vision of human thriving.