Dr Mathilde Gouin-Bonenfant

PhD thesis

Knowing and Caring for the Mangrove Ecosystem: The epistemic life of a sustainable development NGO in the Saloum Delta (Senegal)

My thesis examines the epistemic life of a sustainable development NGO, based in the Saloum Delta, in Senegal. This coastal region is facing increasing environmental precarity. In response, a plethora of actors are undertaking multitudinous conservation and development projects. With them, different ways of knowing and caring for the ecosystem co-exist and sometimes conflict. The thesis is an ethnography of the work of one group of NGO agents, focusing on their day-to-day epistemic activities, as they are entangled with the NGO’s different relationships, and the broader politics of climate change mitigation. It highlights the NGO agent’s ethical ideals regarding what constitutes good knowledge, good relationships, and good care; as well as the disconnections between their epistemic practices and their ethical ideals.

After the PhD

I have moved back to Montreal (Canada) where I will soon start a postdoctoral position at the Medical Faculty of the University of McGill.