overlapping jurisdictions. One upper level NMP manager noted “A key conflict between DNP and other government departments is that other agencies bring development.”
Lack of coordination may be partially due to the centralized and top-down governance structures and processes that participants felt had also resulted in a lack of consideration and participation during creation and ongoing management of the NMPs. In recent years, DNP policies did require that national parks create committees for participation in management to increase coordination with other agencies and inclusion of local people and values. Yet DNP managers and one academic who sit on a committee told us that these committees consisted largely of regional business people and politicians and included few people from local communities. Furthermore, one participant who was on one of these committees suggested that they were ineffective and that superintendents did “not know what to do with them.” In several instances, we learned that the DNP was trying to engage with communities more during creation and management but local elites and politicians in the communities would not allow NMP officials to enter their communities to meet and discuss ideas. Interviewees suggested that these individuals felt that their personal interests and-or those of their communities were threatened. On the other hand, in Koh Chang local leaders had allowed the DNP onto the island leading to a locally acceptable arrangement for land allocation. Overall, a somewhat negative perception ( 0.3) was held by survey participants about the impact of the NMP on levels of participation in management of natural resources (Fig. 3).