Contributions of Intercultural Socioenvironmental Justice to the 2030 Agenda in the Colombian Caribbean

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors have improved this manuscript significantly. With that being said, I think the following revisions necessary:

Most importantly, while most of the content is now in the revised manuscript, the writing still needs some work as the paper is a bit sprawling and not always as focused as it could be. This is very important in the front end (introduction) of the paper as the authors need to clearly articulate the research gaps and why the paper is important: What are the central research goals of this paper? This is stated but it could be written more clearly and earlier in a streamlined introduction. The literature review is also quite long and sprawling and could be streamlined as well.

The abstract needs to be more clearly written to articulate what was done, why, and how it contributes to academic literature to fill research gaps. 

Also the results need to be presented in a way so that it is clear how they were produced and what the data are - in this way, the connection between the methods and results should be clearer.

Overall, this is a better paper and is getting closer to publication quality.

 

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 1

Thank you very much for all the input in the review rounds we have had. We are responding to your comments below. In the attached document we respond to your comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

First, thank you for this iteration of your article, with whose aims and conclusions I find myself in great sympathy. Second, I believe this version is clearer than your prior work. Third, however, I believe you make clear that the present situation confronting the Barú people is ultimately the product foremost perhaps of a lack of political will on the part of the state to ensure matters are otherwise. This is reflected in the government's acceptance of the dominant neoliberal imaginary to which you allude, in its "inexplicable"  (your word) unwillingness to respond to historic inhabitant claims to ecological and economic claims and to the continuing privatization of property on the island. Your response to this deeply unjust situation, helpful I believe, has been to chronicle this bitter reality and to show how the state is falling short of its own nominal sustainability-related aspirations and rhetoric. So far, as the saying goes, so good. But your response to this scenario is to offer an analytic framework that includes intercultural justice explicitly as a mechanism to set matters right.  As in previous readings of your effort, while I do not quibble with you that this is a matter at issue, I again see no evidence that it will make any difference whatsoever to policy-makers who have thus far ignored such claims as a practical matter for decades. So, if the underlying issue is a social imaginary that does not value such claims coupled broad acceptance as a consequence of the the avarice implicit in capitalist privatization of these lands and waters, I find myself asking what difference this new frame might make? As your interest is in policy and praxis, why is this a sufficient step as opposed say, to more effective policy advocacy or efforts to create a broad scale social movement to set matters on a different course? Would it help such efforts, however apparently unlikely those may be? if so, how? I think what I am struggling with as your reader is not that in principle the claims of this indigenous population should be recognized, but how, and why adding criteria to an existing framework for evaluating the morass you describe will move matters closer to securing that result. I would like to see you address that core concern head on and perhaps also grapple with the alterity that underpins state policy too  given that this is a minority and black population. Why would lawmakers suddenly respond to your analysis when they have not responded to like claims for decades?

Apart from this concern, I would certainly be willing to agree in the abstract that justice is multi-faceted and that adding to the existing analytic frame in the way you do is helpful. What you have not shown is that it will in any way alleviate the eventual (in your terms) de facto extirpation of this population.  As you put it, the problematique seems to be "How can native communities be valued in this way?" Just so. Can you shed any light on this apart from capitalist want to make money from willing tourists and politicians like the same irrespective of its ecological, social, cultural and economic opportunity costs?

Author Response

Dear Reviewer 2

Thank you very much for all the input on this and previous reviews. Your questioning has taught us a great deal. In the attached document we respond to your comments.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

This manuscript is a resubmission of an earlier submission. The following is a list of the peer review reports and author responses from that submission.

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Review of the revised manuscript ”Contributions of Intercultural Socioenvironmental Justice to the 2030 Agenda in the Colombian Caribbean”.

Thank you for the revised manuscript. Overall, I think the manuscript has improved considerably. I have the following suggestions for further improvements.

Line 47, remove "and senses"

The paragraph focusing on the Baru case (lines 60-72) seems to describe results and should therefore be moved to later sections. This would also help to reduce repetition since three first paragraphs of the intro appear to present more or less the same basic message with different wordings

Line 97. The first research question aims to assess the "degree of socioenvironmental justice" related to two cultural strategies. The second research question aims to assess the contributions of "intercultural socioenvironmental justice" in public policies. I still wonder if the formulation of research question is clear enough, or should these two questions be combined as they appear somewhat overlapping?  Focus on the perceptions of local people and use ecological, social and traditional/intercultural dimensions as analytical lenses is now well justified.

Section 1.1. provides an overall introduction on environmental challenges but I'm not sure if convincing the reader about the severity of environmental problems is needed in a scholarly journal focusing on sustainability issues. Some room for shortening here.

Also the section 1.2 could be shortened by focusing only on those aspects that help to understand how the present analysis is operationalised. Now the text contains too much general level descriptions that motivates the research but does not help to understand the analysis

Check technical problems with the references (lines 192, 198)

Line 364. Description could be more detailed, e.g. what materials or methods focused on what levels and scales?

Line 401. more detailed description of tensions with specific SDG targets could make the claim based on Table 1 more convincing.

Line 660. Graph 1 nicely summarises the key messages, but it probably should be labelled as a Figure, not Graph.

Reviewer 2 Report

Although the authors have reworked some elements of this paper, more work is needed as the authors have not adequately explained their research objectives, provided a sufficient framework for analysis, explained their methods, or showed how their data contribute to a unique perspective

Reviewer 3 Report

I read your revision with interest and have offered the editors several comments for their (and your, as they see fit) consideration.