| <-- | 6. GOVERNMENT GIS | CONTENTS | 8. CONCLUSION | --> |
Following are exerpts from interviews with Will Freeman, Gary Gill, and Shannon McElvaney of the Nature Conservancy, people for whom access to digital information about the land, and access to the GIS technology to view it are of primary importance with respect to the social consequences and potentials of GIS in Hawai`i. As one might expect, we learned that information and technology access is foundational in supporting or limiting public awareness and potential for discussion and critique of important ecological, hydrological, and other information. We also found once again that data and information, far from being neutral, is intimately connected with politics and power.
One of our primary informants was Will Freeman, a private citizen who has been involved in GIS environmental activism for several years. Throughout our interviews in Hawai`i, Will was often mentioned as a key figure in the local grassroots GIS community. When we reached him we learned that he was actually living within only a few miles of us, and that one of his main projects was working toward the creation of a public water quality GIS for the windward (eastern) side of Oahu. We were excited to meet with Will one Sunday afternoon under a large tree in his yard, which shaded us from the hot (early March) Hawaiian sun.
In a very easy going manner, Will began to describe his experiences working with GIS in Hawai`i. Almost immediately the issue of public access was brought up in the context of the State, because as we have already discussed, it is State personnel who have assembled the bulk of the geospatial data in existence on Hawai`i. Freeman's GIS initiative is to create a small venture to monitor the state of current water quality on the Islands and make this information accessible to environmental groups and the public at a low cost. As indicated in the previous section, Freeman's positions seriously question the policies of the State, and can be most clearly summarized by excerpting from his proposal, which was written in 1995.
This proposal is aimed at developing a system for efficient public access of the information necessary for the community to do environmental research and community planning while addressing agency concerns for data accuracy and integrity.... Public access to GIS data and water quality (especially GIS) is not a given. The County and State are both skeptical about releasing much of their data at all. Ken Schmidt (County Department of General Planning (DGP)) says that the DGP will charge $40 per tile per GIS database layer (when they get around to offering it!). This proposal has been around for years and they still haven't offered it to the public at all yet. I don't know the exact size of each tile, but it is quite small. This could be quite expensive to get the entire island of Oahu. The point here is that they will be selling this information as a commercial operation. These data have already been collected and compiled for their own planning use at taxpayer expense. There is no reason that we should have to pay for it twice! (Freeman and Niederer 1995: 1, 10)
Freeman stated the goal of his proposal is "to ensure community access at a reasonable cost." And since data acquisition amounts for 80% of the cost of GIS, the State's prohibitive data sharing policies proves to be an arena for showing its power through control of its data. He criticized the State by suggesting that beyond essentially denying the public access to the GIS information it has paid the State to collect, he feels that access is made easy for certain developers; perhaps even `under the table' access.
When asked about the possibility of creating a community-based GIS in the near future Freeman's voice lowered as he stated,
It has become a nightmare getting anything off the ground. GIS has grown so fast and furious over the last 5 years they (the government) see this as a great way to make money because GIS is expensive and it is costing the State and County a fair amount of money to do it. But they did this so they could do their work more efficiently and better by having this technology to begin with so they already justified in terms of charging all of us for it. They want us to further pay for it. So I am at a loss with the whole thing right now because it is so hard to battle the people who want to make money off it. (Freeman, personal communication)
We found that Freeman has worked in many instances for free, written proposals, given testimonies to the State, and is trying to support better environmental planning, only to meet a consistent resistance from the major data supplier on the Islands, the State government. Freeman put it bluntly when he stated: "The participatory process in Hawai`i is a joke, basically, because the political process is totally corrupt" (Ibid: personal communication).
The disempowering experience Freeman has encountered is what Professor Goss talks about when he says that "the (larger) community is being divided by the GIS technology, the haves and have nots, and the technology reinforces that" (Goss, personal communication). Freeman himself has the skills and technological equipment to make a living doing GIS projects and consulting, but the community projects he is trying to support are marked by continued resistance.
While not speaking directly about Freeman's initiative, University of Hawai`i professor Jon Goss suggests that should such an initiative succeed, there may be the potential to confer certain new powers on community groups and the marginalized, as
(GIS) enables community groups to challenge the government, because they can produce their own view of the world, which is like producing a map or a piece of paper. Then the planning agency will take that seriously - because you now play the planners' game. Those who don't play the planners' game are marginalized. (Goss, personal communication)
Freeman's ultimate goal in relation to GIS is to create an environment of proactivity, as opposed to reactivity. "Environmental work is too often just fighting brush fires, instead of addressing the fundamental infrastructure of the problem" (Freeman, personal communication). He hoped that GIS created in the right way, could go a long way toward enabling private citizens and groups to not only track the results of government policy, but also to move toward the facilitation of sustainable environmental/community planning.
Before we knew of Gary Gill's role in GIS activism, we had met him at a public meeting organized by a local environmental organization called Ka Iwi Action Alliance, a group trying to stop a large development effort at Queen's Beach in eastern Oahu. At this meeting Gill was leading the effort to create a public park at the site, rather than let it go to hotels, golf courses, and luxury homes. At this meeting we found out that he had been elected to the city council over a period of eight years, in the footsteps of his father, who was also a politician of Hawai`i.
Prior to our meeting with Mr. Gill we had been advised about Gill's work to distribute the State GIS information to government agencies and the public at a reasonable fee. So when we came to speak with him, we were quite interested to hear more about his plans. In our meeting, Gill warmly received us and gave us an introduction to the work of his office. Eventually we proceeded to one of the office's computers where he showed us some sampled data layes in the State GIS system. As we were browsing through different layers of information he came back to our question "How can the public access the State's information?" With a faint smile he began to tell us of his project to create a complete compact disc (CD) of all the State and GIS information layers, for free distribution to the people of Hawai`i.
(I am trying) to find an easy way to connect the State's data layers from the State's UNIX system to PC. We tried and we know how to do it. We have technical problems putting it on CD because I am trying to do it for free. I'm using existing State resources and I'm dependent on the kindness of people in other agencies to help make this work. To take the State data layers you have to copy, export, or make a shape file of it and then put it on to a PC on the States network and then copy it of from that, on to a tape and take that tape on to another guy in the State who has a CD-ROM burner through his PC and then he gives it back to me. I plug it in here, and after it has been through all conversions, it ain't working!!! It's often a little glitch that is in the way. We're very close to making it work.We make it technological feasible and inform the public of its availability in this office, and then the public says "we want this" and that forces the State to respond.
I get a lot of support. If everything had gone well it would have been done last year in the summer. Last week I thought I had it !!!! (Gill, personal communication)
We were moved to learn about this action which was intended by Gill to create a significant public interest and demand for the State's information. When asked about what the State thinks about his work, he just laughed and said "They will just have to respond to the demands of the citizens!"
Gill suggests that the result of breaking the State monopoly on data may be to create a more participatory process of decision making, planning and policy formation. With a freer flow of information it becomes possible to ask questions, present new ideas, and to criticize proposals: to become more than just disaffected voters subject to policies that they have not helped create, and which may not be in their best interests.
As a former politician and now public official Gary Gill took pride in these initiatives supporting a more participatory process on the Hawaiian islands. He made it clear to us that "GIS is the next major tool the public will have to really decentralize the planning process and decentralize the review process so the public themselves will become experts. It happens all the time, in many cases such as the Ka Iwi, etc." In other words empowerment happens when communities have access to information about their place. When access to information shifts, the power relations involved change.
Craig (1996), of the University of Minnesota, would probably support the spirit behind Gary Gill's initiative and proposes that the inherent power in the access to information derived from GIS must be the backbone of urban America's rejuvenation. He writes:
There is hope for urban America, but only if we are willing to give more power to the people with the biggest stake in its success: neighborhood and community groups. Information can provide that power and information can be derived from data and GIS technology. The problem is that community groups don't have access to any of these resources. (Ibid: *)
In a discussion of their GIS community activism in the Appalachian mountains region of the US, Brooks and Hatley (1996) quote an important critic of modern society:
The importance of grassroots activity like ours was underscored in a recent Clemson University lecture by Leo Marx (MIT emeritus professor; author of Machine in the Garden). He reiterated the postmodern domination and abstraction of nature and space by the modern mega-organization, and said "Wise GIS use by the grassroots is truly the only way in which GIS and space will not be dictated and dominated totally by these forces." (Ibid: *)
As we print this thesis (6/96), Mr. Gill has finally succeeded in putting nearly all the State's data layers on one CD. This will be helpful for his office's work in tracking Environmental Impact Statements and related information, he says, and he will now work with people in the State government system to press for its release to the public. In a second interview with Mr. Gill just a few days after the completion of the CD Gill had the following to say.
Our goal here has been to try and utilize the existing information in a way that will provide easy access, as a first step, to State planners and agencies who are in the business of environmental planning, whether it is an appropriate way to build a roadway or reviewing environmental documents. We want to bring this information to the people who really need it, who are very busy and where theier departments don't have the money to put into a workstation or the time to take weeks of training.So, we have here, successfully, after having worked a year on it, managed to find a way to convert the State's GIS data layers into a format that can be read by a stand-alone PC (486 or pentium processor, 16 MB RAM) with a CD drive hooked up to a Hewlett Packard laser jet. We have basically complete read-only access to the entire GIS data base of the State of Hawai`i. We don't have some City covereages, which are quite extensive. The largest one is the Tax Map Key, so we don't have actual property lines. We can get those, they may take up an entire CD on their own and it will take a lot of data mangement to convert them over to CD.
So the total rig here in terms of cost and access is $2000 for a Pentium, $1000 for a laser printer, $600 for a program and the CD is free. (Gill, personal communication)
Mr. Gill has succeeded in showing that access to the State data doesn't have to be a costly endeavor, especially if the hardware and software is already available. Gill says that now it is up to Criag Tasaka, Office of State Planning, to respond to the public's demand. Gill argues that while the State does not currently have an information access policy, such a policy is required and long overdue.
Just as the government has made a substantial effort in collecting information about the land, utility and transportation infrastructure, demographics, and other information, the Nature Conservancy (TNC) has made a major effort to collect data on Hawai`i's native endangered plants and birds as part of their goal to protect ecologically significant habitat. TNC has become the central biological database on rare species in Hawai`i, where it has been in operation since 1980. We had a lengthy interview with their GIS coordinator, Shannon McElvaney, in their renovated, charming old Chinatown building in the middle of the old part of Honolulu. McElvaney discussed the massive amount of work that had gone into digitizing all of TNC's data, as well as the many complications that exist in such transfers. He then showed us their powerful hardware, and examples of present contracts with their primary contractor, the US military. We then began talking about some of the intricate issues that arise when information is collected, combined and displayed visually.
Interestingly, while very much aligned with the idea of public access to information generally, McElvaney is very much opposed to it with respect to the TNC data. He explains why:
This is private land (he points to a map), and those are endangered species on private land. When somebody sees that, like the owners themselves, they get very nervous. Most private landowners don't want to see an endangered species dot with a boundary showing on their land. So this information is all internal, we don't show this to the public because it would upset our partners and we wouldn't be able to get our work done. So, our data is really sensitive. A dot on a map may represent a third of a mile or a mile and a half radius, it might not even be on their land in reality, but because the dot is put on their land they get very nervous. If the dot is close to the boundary or on the other side of the boundary, it doesn't mean it's not on the other side of the boundary. Birds typically and insects cross everybody's boundaries all the time. ... So ... we have to be really, really careful.We are still trying to work out a policy of how to present this data in a generalized form that will allow people not to be so nervous, but it's still a big question.
I want to respond to the growing interest from the outside world. I want people to make their own maps - but it would have to be very generalized if it had to be made available on the Web. We can't tell people where the endangered species are; here are collectors and people who will destroy them if they were found. I would like it be an open GIS where the public can use the data and leave their VISA card number to pay for accessing the data. We have inverted the pyramid, rather than responding to each request, we would have it the other way around. That's how I think all GIS will go in the future as the Internet becomes bigger, with more available data. (McElvaney, personal communication)
The main issue landowners have with TNC data is that when an endangered species is identified on private land, all kinds of federal regulations and restrictions on the use of the land apply. McElvaney introduced us to the beginning of an extremely complex set of issues that arise in the context of information exchange or lack thereof. McElvaney himself was perplexed by the paradoxical need for information secrecy in the name of conservation and sustainability.
One of the active participants in the NCGIA debate on GIS and Society, Obermeyer explains the conflict that arises when specific information about endangered species and private land ownership are brought together. The conflict arises not because of the information but rather due to the values held by the people who interpret the information (Obermeyer, 1996: *). The reason private landowners are afraid of having an endangered species identified on their property is not because they are afraid of the particular species, (an insect, tree, flower or lizard...) but because they are afraid they might lose their water rights or development plans: in other words, it is an economic consideration. In contrast, the TNC seems to place a somewhat higher value on the life of particular endangered species than economic and private individual considerations, though they are savvy enough to know now that their own sustainability will be determined by their successful balancing of these considerations. Obemeyer's work addresses the complex implications of GIS:
My project, entitled "Spatial Conflict in the Information Age," explores the claim made by some advocates of GIS that the systems can help to minimize conflicts over land use by providing more and better (more accurate) information about the subject of the conflict. I argue that this claim overlooks an important source of conflict: the underlying value differences represented by conflicting parties. Furthermore, I hypothesize that GIS will tend initially to increase, rather than decrease, conflict, since geographic information and analyses made possible by GIS can be used selectively by conflicting parties to support their positions. However, I view this conflict as a positive feature in a democracy, because it represents open dialogue concerning differences of opinion that must be fully explored as a precondition for acceptable public policy resolution...The logic behind my suggestion that GIS will tend to increase conflict lies in research that identifies two sources of conflict: disagreement on facts (cognitive conflict) and disagreement regarding values (interest conflict). While GIS can influence facts in a particular conflict, by adding facts or presenting facts in a variety of ways, there is no reason to expect that the technology alone can or will do anything to mesh competing values. Value conflict, therefore will remain, regardless of the amount of information gathered to resolve it. At the same time, the greater quantity of information that GIS will make possible will very likely increase the number of "facts" that can then become the basis for further conflict. (Ibid: *)
How does McElvaney describe TNC's essential work? "TNC's Heritage Program does primarily three things. First they find out what is there, then they establish the boundaries, and then they determine how they can monitor that area. Sometimes we try to buy the area we want to protect, and other times make efforts to make partnerships."
McElvaney told us that "When I was younger I thought humans were different from the landscape," but as I have matured I see we are a part of the landscape; you can't separate the two. "How do we involve the community?" he pondered out loud toward the end of the interview. "One of the key questions for communities would be to help determine how to balance compatible development and sustainability," said McElvaney. "You can't separate the two" he said, as we were wrapping up our interview on the outside porch in the shade away from the intense Pacific sun. "That's why we need to involve the community in developing policies for the protection of plants and animals..." (McElvaney, personal communication).
As we will see in the next section, access is just the beginning of the many relevant issues to explore with regard to the use of GIS for sustainability and empowerment.
| CONTENTS | REFERENCES |
The second theme we bring forward is that of knowledge or data production. The ability to create digitized information which reflects local knowledge, social histories and actual community needs represents a complex and ill-defined process in which information flows from the communities and grassroots "up" or "out," compared to a top-down centralized data gathering process executed by a more distant government. The ability to successfully represent local knowledge gives groups at the grassroots level an ability to communicate their own story, their own knowledge, rather than the stories and knowledge systems of governments or business interests. Peter Poole (1995) emphasizes that the importance of the knowledge gathering process and local control of the information is more important than the power of the technology itself. He writes,
some groups have expressed concern that the mapping process enables outsiders to control information previously controlled by communities. The process by which traditional knowledge is gathered and applied remains the critical element that determines success, regardless of the degree of sophistication of the mapping technology. (Poole, 1995: ix)
In the following section we bring in voices from other communities than those we have been directly involved with to gain some perspective on the issues involved in information and GIS. We had to go to sources focusing on areas other than Hawai`i to get reflections on GIS initiatives which consciously pursued the use and integration of local knowledge. Since the Nation of Hawai`i's GIS initiative is still in a preliminary research phase it is our position that information production and local knowledge incorporation must be a central preoccupation, because the Nation's goal is to create a GIS system which empowers all the people of Hawai`i to participate in the reemergence of a fully sustainable, sovereign nation.
We begin by exploring a significant larger context of this discussion of knowledge, data, and information: the advent of the "information age." There is such widespread discussion of this subject as to make it a cliché of our time - but has there really been an "information revolution?" Perhaps it could be argued that there has been a digital revolution, in that much information is now digitally encoded and thereby manipulatable and transferable in new ways not possible with data in other formats. However some suggest that with regard to public policy the avalanche of geospatial information accessible today can command more respect than it deserves.
Friends of the Earth (FOE) is a self-described environmental watchdog group headquartered in the UK which has used GIS extensively to monitor government policy, and has written optimistically about the potential of GIS to help society coordinate and manage information toward sustainability. The "information revolution" for FOE has less to do with the amount of information currently available, as with the potential allowed by GIS to systematically compile, integrate, and interpret information deemed essential for sustainable management.
Friends of the Earth suggests that "the information revolution is a myth," and will continue to be because,
There is no scope for any long term investment into understanding how our life support system is changing. There is an enormous investment in new roads, but where is the information about the effects of that development on our environment, the long term health of a fossil-fuel economy or the social implications? Where it does exist is usually inaccessible, expensive or so patchy as to be of little use. (Atkinson, 1993: *)
As was suggested in the last section, access to GIS data and technology is the first step in empowering small users, local, governments, nonprofit community agencies, and non-mainstream groups in their ability to engage in the decision-making process. But as these groups get involved in the public decision-making process it also becomes apparent that the State agencies who have collected most data, have chosen certain data to collect before others. Michael Barndt (1996) from the University of Milwaukee has studied issues in data use by community groups.
An important outcome of the experience of the Neighborhood Data Center program has been the opportunity to critique the potential and the limitation of existing public data systems as resources for neighborhood organizations. Rarely do existing data sets provide insights neighborhood leadership do not already understand. (Barndt, 1996: *)
If the neighborhood groups are not part of deciding what data to collect and how to present it they may not have the possibility to either use the data or be otherwise empowered by its use. The reason for the local indifference to State data may be connected to State indifference to local data.
The State is the collector of most GIS data. The State determines what questions can be asked and in what form. Generally the variety of knowledge and wisdom possessed by diverse individuals and social groups and gathered in course of their experiences is not considered worth collecting by large State agencies. (Scott and Cutter, 1996: *)
Another primary point that must be made here is that when considering maps, data layers, and geographic knowledge, it is essential to understand the contemporary transformation of the map production process. Recalling our discussion of Polynesian mapless long-distance navigation in which the territory became the map; and even the voyages of Captain Cook, in which he and his crew personally traveled thousands of miles to meticulously create maps of potential trading areas and routes; in each case there is a certain knowledge based on extensive experience which goes into ultimately creating the map. When maps became industrialized and mass produced, the mapmaker who directly related to a place to be mapped was converted to a technician in the assembly line process of map construction. Similar transformations have rocked many professions as life in this century has become more affected by mass-production and technological shifts. Such an experience is recalled in the following account of a forest ranger:
...(my grandfather) was a district ranger in the Forest Service, and "Go Bang" was his horse. He would ride through his district and to hear him tell it he knew every tree branch and blade of grass. Then the pickup truck arrived, and from then on the life was removed from the forest with only a windshield vignette of the pieces. He knew when forestry died. He felt all those damn aerial photos kept the foresters' head in the clouds. (Berry, 1993: 202)
Berry is suggesting that his grandfather carries a local knowledge that the aerial perspective will never capture. The forest ranger on horseback versus `aerial rangers' is one analogy of the transformation of what passes for knowledge in the twentieth century. A more dramatic example is to compare the difference in indigenous Polynesian versus European ocean-going navigation of the same era; the fourteenth century (See again section 2.1.2).
Today the shortcomings of a more and more depersonalized map production process are becoming clearer. Emerging theoretical and practical mapmaking initiatives are beginning to explore how to gather and represent information from local people's experience, rather than just from a machine's observations. In rural South Africa and industrial West Virginia, GIS are being developed which combine conventional socio-economic, environmental, and infrastructural data with non-conventional behavioral and cognitive information. A regional political ecology conceptual framework informs the GIS production process. The research is intended to contribute toward more democratic decision-making processes while also exploring the constraints and possibilities associated with alternative GIS production and use. Harris writes in Pickles (1995),
Our argument for a participatory GIS is intended to demonstrate a GIS application where local knowledge, community needs, and specific social histories are appreciated and incorporated into the development process, and "expertise" is viewed as interactive. In this way the production of information is viewed not solely as a top-down operation but one whereby local knowledge arising from social narratives is converted into data within a GIS for research and policy formation. (Pickles 1995: 197)
The GIS project in South Africa is exploring a process that places a value on complexity of information which comes from multiple settings through multiple perceptual filters. South Africa may be interesting to Hawaiians because both places share a long indigenous struggle for self-determination after a history of colonialism. (The primary goal of the South Africa GIS project is to support social equity and self-determination.)
In comparison with a clean "objective" streamlined knowledge that fits nicely into a GIS framework, the inclusion of an interactive data gathering process may seem "messy", to some. Yet it brings an increased complexity to the GIS framework, through a variety of information types. Harris continues:
With the inclusion of a combination of more than "one knowledge," it is likely that a GIS database will contain conflicting information and substantive fuzziness. Such was found to be the case in our study with the many differing interpretations by "experts," local participants, and the study team ... With the inclusion of locationally fuzzy local knowledge many issues begin to arise as to how multi-objective goals, based on multiple criteria, and using imprecise and possible conflicting data, might actually achieve what is assumed to be consensus decision-making. Indeed, greater quantities of information may promote social conflict. (Ibid: 219)
The possibility for increased social conflict supports what McElvaney told us about his experience combining information about endangered species and private land ownership, which challenged the popularly assumed potential GIS holds for support of conflict resolution. A GIS that can represent many views of reality may turn out to be a tool that will expose historical injustice to people and their places and thereby fuel conflict between different social groups. But as people gain experience in resolving social conflicts, GIS may in the future also encompass information about the resolution of social conflicts.
| <-- | 6. GOVERNMENT GIS | CONTENTS | 8. CONCLUSION | --> |