Gary Kofinas (gpkofinas@alaska.edu) • Shauna B. BurnSilver (sburnsil@asu.edu) • James Magdanz (jmagdanz@alaska.edu)
This repository contains selected data from The Sharing Project. Data were collected in cooperation with the Alaska Native Villages of Kaktovik, Venetie, and Wainwright in accordance with the Principles for the Conduct of Research in the Arctic (https://www.nsf.gov/geo/opp/arctic/conduct.jsp). Researchers who wish to use these data in their own research must comply with these principles, must provide the principal researchers (above) with an opportunity to review any analyses of these data prior to publication, and must credit The Sharing Project (below). Researchers are encouraged to review the original project report (https://www.boem.gov/BOEM-2015-23/) for context.
Cooperating Organizations
Bureau of Oceans Energy Management • School of Natural Resources and Extension, University of Alaska Fairbanks • Institute of Arctic Biology, University of Alaska Fairbanks • School of Human Evolution and Social Change, Arizona State University • Division of Subsistence, Alaska Department of Fish and Game • U.S. National Park Service
Kofinas, Gary, Shauna B. BurnSilver, and James Magdanz. 2016. The Sharing Project. University of Alaska Fairbanks, Arizona State University, and Division of Subsistence, Alaska Department of Fish and Game.
The Sharing Project documented and analyzed social networks of sharing and cooperation that are part of Alaska Native subsistence-cash economies, and explored the potential vulnerability and resilience of Alaska rural communities to conditions of social and ecological change. The study was undertaken in response to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), formerly Mineral Management Services (MMS) Statement of Work NSL-AK-05-04. Research activities were initiated in spring of 2008 with the survey instrument administered from October 2010 to May 2011.
The study engaged two North Slope Alaska coastal communities, Kaktovik and Wainwright (Iñupiat), and one rural interior Alaska community, Venetie (Gwich’in), in partnerships to complete the research. Wainwright and Kaktovik were invited to participate because of BOEM’s mandate to study the potential impacts of offshore energy development. Venetie was included as a contrasting interior Alaska community that is not exposed to offshore development, and thus served as a “control.”
Primary goals of the study were to provide agencies and communities with quantitative and qualitative baseline data on patterns of cooperation and exchange in subsistence-cash economies, and the vulnerability of communities to social-ecological changes relevant to food security and well being. At a community level, the study provided documentation of behavior that reflected cultural traditions and social cohesion among Alaska Natives.
The study used survey research methods, ethnographic analysis, social network analysis, and group interviews to collect data. Research methods were developed and refined through close consultation with Local Project Advisory Committees in each community. Using survey research, we sought to interview the head or heads of every household in each community. Interview response rates were high: 82% in Kaktovik, 96% in Wainwright, and 94% in Venetie. Data were analyzed to describe household socio-economic conditions and provided general and specific characteristics of sharing and cooperation patterns among local and non-local households. The study’s analysis of persistence, vulnerability, and resilience assessed past-to-present patterns of the subsistence-cash economy and the implications of plausible future social-ecological changes.
Acknowledgments
This study is dedicated to residents of Kaktovik, Wainwright, and Venetie who are actively engaged in subsistence—to elders whose wisdom and guidance helped with our research, to harvesters, processors, and consumers who live a subsistence way of life, and to youth for their commitment to sustaining Alaska Native cultural traditions into the future
Original Project Report
Kofinas, Gary, Shauna B. BurnSilver, James S. Magdanz, Rhian Stotts, and Marcy M. Okada. 2016. Subsistence Sharing Networks and Cooperation: Kaktovik, Wainwright, and Venetie, Alaska.: Bureau of Oceans Energy Management. https://www.boem.gov/BOEM-2015-23/
Additional Citations
BurnSilver, Shauna, James Magdanz, Rhian Stotts, Matthew Berman, and Gary Kofinas. 2016. Are Mixed Economies Persistent or Transitional? Evidence Using Social Networks from Arctic Alaska. American Anthropologist 118(1):121–129. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/aman.12447
Baggio, Jacopo A., Shauna B. BurnSilver, Alex Arenas, James S. Magdanz, Gary P. Kofinas, and Manlio De Domenico. 2016. Multiplex Social Ecological Network Analysis Reveals How Social Changes Affect Community Robustness More Than Resource Depletion. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 113(48):13708-13713. http://www.pnas.org/content/113/48/13708.abstract
BurnSilver, Shauna and James Magdanz. [in press] Heterogeneity in Mixed Economies: Implications for Sensitivity and Adaptive Capacity. Hunter-Gatherer Research.