ABSTRACT
This chapter examines social forestry's (SF) performance in selected regions of south Asia from a review of literature. It shows that SF’s achievements lag far behind its stated goals. Accordingly, during the mid 1970s most south Asian countries witnessed a major shift in forest policy in the form of participatory approaches to forest management, more popularly coined as SF, which aimed “to redress past village exclusion and encourage rural development”. The southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu is one of the earliest states to launch SF, following the recommendations of the National Commission of Agriculture. The rural life in Tamil Nadu was no exception to a general south Asian village — a scenario characterized by diverse interests competing for limited resources; conflicting groups; party politics; and heterogenous and hierarchical social relations and power structures. Shah Ali Imam argues that public policies in general, and forest policies in particular, are “of major concern” to SF in any country.
