Hekia Bodwitch, Ph.D.

In my research, I work to support Indigenous co-governance of coastal and marine resources. I have worked with Māori, Native American, Inuit, and First Nations community members and leaders, to examine relationships between: Indigenous rights and community economic development; resource users’ motivations for compliance and regulators’ enforcement strategies; and Indigenous knowledge systems and environmental governance.

In New Zealand (where my mom is from!), I worked on a Māori fishing boat and lived in a fishing community, to document how harvest and trade regulations limit tribes’ abilities to use collectively-held property rights to support Māori fishers. In California, I examined processes to increase farmers’ compliance with policies designed to support Indigenous salmon fisheries downstream. In Nunatsiavut, Canada, I have explored how Indigenous knowledge holders and scientists can co-produce knowledge about climate change.

Currently, in Southeast Alaska, I am examining how Indigenous knowledge can become authoritative in state and federal decision-making. I use ethnographic, interview, and survey-based methods, and I partner with transdisciplinary teams of social and natural scientists, community members, NGOs, as well as tribal, state, and federal policy makers.

If you are interested in collaborating, please reach out!