The University of Arizona Press
February 16, 2026
The University of Arizona Press podcast features an interview with Jason Roberts author of We Stay the Same: Subsistence, Logging, and Enduring Hopes for Development in Papua New Guinea. Roberts is a practicing anthropologist who currently works on subsistence policy and natural resource management issues in Alaska. His work and research engages interests in development, sustainability, climate change, hope, and environmental justice.
When asked what drew him to the South Pacific and questions of political ecology, Roberts replied, “I got my undergraduate degree in forestry, but there were questions that I didn’t think we were asking. So that led me to the political ecology framework. . . . In graduate school, I learned about the special agriculture and business leases in Papua New Guinea, especially on New Hanover Island, and that sounded like the perfect topic to explore. . . . After doing some pilot research in 2012, things got rolling, and I found the topics from a theoretical perspective and humanistic perspective to be very interesting, and the Lavongai people were very welcoming.”
Listen to the full podcast here, on Spotify, Apple, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
About the book (now available in paperback):
On a remote island in the South Pacific, the Lavongai have consistently struggled to obtain development through logging and commercial agriculture. Yet many Lavongai still long to move beyond the grind of subsistence work that has seemingly defined their lives on New Hanover, Papua New Guinea, for generations.
Following a long history of smaller-scale and largely unsuccessful resource development efforts, New Hanover became the site of three multinational-controlled special agricultural and business leases (SABLs) that combined to cover over 75 percent of the island for ninety-nine-year lease terms. These agroforestry projects were part of a national effort to encourage “sustainable” rural development by tapping into the growing global demand for agricultural lands and crops like oil palm and biofuels. They were supposed to succeed where the smaller-scale projects of the past had failed. Unfortunately, these SABLs resulted in significant forest loss and livelihood degradation, while doing little to promote the type of economic development that many Lavongai had been hoping for.
