Contents -- Foreword -- Preface -- Acronyms and Abbreviations -- I: The Land -- Arsaal -- Pastoralists at work -- The decline -- Flashback to agriculture -- The landscape today -- Where are the women? -- The Dryland Predicament -- De-developing the drylands? -- Arabesque -- What is new? -- The Lebanese Backdrop -- Back to Arsaal -- The Cactus Dream -- II: The Seed -- The Characters of a Comedy in the Making -- The Researcher -- The University -- The Funding Agency -- The Funding Officer -- The Local Community -- The Local NGO -- Play Synopsis (as told by the Researcher) -- Act 1: The Birth -- Act 2: Strange Encounters -- Act 3: Where North Meets South -- Epilogue -- Back to Cactus Dream World -- III: Germination -- In Context -- Different women, different roles -- Genesis -- The concept -- Incubation -- Evolution -- Tools -- LUN Special Features -- Conflict resolution -- Local agenda development -- Research capacity building -- Vehicle for development -- Power of attraction -- Flexibility -- The Dark Side of LUN -- Participation is politics -- Hidden agendas -- Focus on research rather than development -- Participation, a Myth? -- Cactus Participation -- IV: Blooming and Fallen Leaves -- Natural Resource Stories -- GIS-based methodology for soil degradation evaluation -- Participatory GIS in land use investigations -- Hydrospatial hierarchical method for siting water-harvesting reservoirs -- Improving Livelihoods -- Small ruminants under pressure -- Ripened fruits -- Scenarios -- Follow-up agenda -- Delivery -- The cooperative -- Cactus Technology Transfer -- V: Unexpected Fruits -- Policy Influence -- Capacity building for the community -- Evolving research and development capacity -- Ladies night: the empowerment of women -- A New Research Direction -- Putting people at the centre of development -- Livelihood strategies -- Cacti Elections.

VI: The Harvest -- More on the Participatory Approach -- Participatory GIS for Natural Resource Management -- Local Appropriation -- Embedded Research -- Natural Resource Management Research in a World of Uncertainty -- Policy Influence -- Gender Issues -- More Harvest -- Cactus Nightmare -- Bibliography -- About the Authors.