Resumo

STORI, Fernanda Terra; NORDI, Nivaldo  e  ABESSA, Denis Moledo de Souza. Socio-ecological mechanisms and traditional fishery practices at the Ilha Diana caiçara community (Santos, Brazil) and their transformations. RGCI [online]. 2012, vol.12, n.4, pp.521-533. ISSN 1646-8872.

Aspects of resilience and sustainability in social-ecological systems to adapt to moments of crisis have been widely discussed in the scientific community. We chose to analyze the case of traditional caiçara community of Ilha Diana (Santos municipality, Brazil) that has been isolated of the commercial world until nowadays and now it passes through a considerable transformation due to the estuarine pollution, to the decline of artisanal fishery and to the expansion of the Santos’ industrial-port complex in this territory. In this paper we discuss which elements configure adaptability and resilience at Ilha Diana caiçara community, in order to promote sustainability in this social-ecological system. We focused this study in the identification of the aspects of caiçara culture, social mechanisms and the traditional practices of fishery resources management and their transformations. Through an ethnoecological approach, 20 inhabitants were interviewed (9% of the resident population), with ages between 18 and 90 years old and respecting the gender equity. One female expert answered an open interview about the history of the community, the history of the local fishing and about traditional fishery management practices. The others interviewees answered to a semi-structured questionnaire. Five of this interviewees, that declared itself currently fishermen (42% of the currently fishermen in Ilha Diana), also answered a questionnaire of traditional fishery management practices. Genuine aspects of caiçara culture were identified, mainly its social organization linked to fishery and the self-recognition of this culture, which endorse the traditional feature of this community as indicated by authors as Diegues (1983) ans Begossi et al. (1998). We also identified seven management practices based on the local ecological knowledge and four social mechanisms connected to those practices as proposed by Folke et al. (1998). Furthermore we identified three fishery innovations related to the geographical knowledge transmission and the loss of a sustainable fishery practice due to the imposition of vertical-descendent public policies. The changes in ecosystem induced by the economical development in Ilha Diana territory, as port expansion are making the inhabitants to abandon fishery and search new forms to obtain income, leading to the intergenerational loss of ecological knowledge and the loss of the social mechanisms linked to it - factor that can decrease resilience in this social-ecological system. However, the maintenance of come social mechanisms that can still be found, as their identity as caiçara, reciprocity, family relationship, religious tradition and the ability of re-organization before moments of crisis, can counterbalance to the negative aspects of changes and crisis, promoting the re-organization of the system. The ability of Ilha Diana inhabitants to interact with the commercial society and the flexibility of its interactions are elements that can increase the resilience in this social-ecological system.

Palavras-chave : Human Ecology; Culture; Port expansion; Social-ecological Resilience.

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