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This paper analyzes the extent to which two factors—social networks and the severity of the scarcity of a common property resource—affect norm‐complying behavior that favors cooperation. It assumes that those who comply with the social norm exercise social pressure on defectors. We develop an analytical framework that allows us to determine the minimum (maximum) share of norm‐complying agents at which social networks start (stop) having an influence on cooperation. Knowing these shares allows policymakers to identify the conditions under which legal and/or informal enforcement policies for cooperation are effective and how different types of social networks affect the design of these policies. We find that stable steady states exist in which compliers and defectors coexist (partial cooperation), but the stability of such states requires that the costs of coordination among compliers to exercise social pressure are high. Full cooperation is another possible steady state but is unlikely to prevail if the agents do not perceive the scarcity of the common property resource as severe. A numerical study, empirically calibrated for an aquifer in Spain, shows that subsidizing the compliers' costs of exerting social pressure may impede the attainment of a steady state based on partial cooperation. Although social networks can promote cooperation, their influence is limited. The minimum share of compliers for attaining cooperation can be reduced by informal enforcement policies by not more than 26%. We show that combinations of different types of informal enforcement policies should be applied cautiously because they may cancel each other out. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article enquires into the construction of encroachment (of village pond) as an acceptable regular practice in the day-to-day discourse of village life, violating the norms of collective usages of common water bodies. Violation in this case is the outcome of a peculiar social understanding that emerged over a period of time (a) by ineffective functioning of state apparatus and the subsequent proliferation of corrupt network and (b) by the arrival of new technologies of development which replaced the collective action for local resource management and reversed social trust to support violation. While on the one hand this process led to obliteration of distinction between the agent and the victim of violation as a free rider condition exist vis-à-vis encroachment; on the other hand there is an increased sense of vulnerability to the effects of violation. The perception of encroachment in the village community as natural and unavoidable reality gives social legitimation to this violation which affects all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

SubSaharan Africa has experienced rapid market economy development in urban areas and in terms of road network systems connecting urban and rural areas. As the access to urban areas improves, the influence of economic development may alter local norms regarding the conservation of communal lands in rural areas. This study investigates how access from rural to urban areas affects individual and social norms regarding communal land conservation. We used interview data from 110 village leaders and 660 farmers' community group leaders in northern Ethiopia. Individual moral norms were estimated based on the respondents' willingness to participate in communal tree planting on communal lands as a means of halting and reversing land degradation. Social norms were estimated based on the proportion of exclosure in communal areas and the number of days a community member works without pay for communal land conservation. The relationships between the norms and urban access were investigated using probit and tobit regression models. The results reveal that access to urban areas positively affects the establishment of individual and social norms, suggesting that access to urban areas contributes to communal land conservation by facilitating intervention in rural areas, thus improving norms for natural resource management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article intends to showcase that land grabbing of gauchar (pastureland) at the village level affects women and men in differing ways, along the variables of gender and caste. The article uncovers the notion that the link among gender, caste and access to common property resources (CPRs) are deeply rooted in the power dynamics of the caste-based operating system at the informal level. Drawing on intersectionality perspective, the article explains through ethnographic data collected over a period of time, in a small rural community in Gujarat, India, that women's social location/standing leads them to have multiple identities, which defines and alters their gender relations, norms, negotiations and access to resources, in context to land grab of CPRs. Consequently, the article argues that group-based social differences and power structures ultimately determine access to natural resources and institutional base for women from different strata of society wherein the governance structure may fall short of addressing these issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Voluntary, incentive-based policies are often offered to resource users to address the overexploitation of common property resources. Spillovers from these policies have important implications for policy effectiveness. Considering different externalities that can affect producers' irrigation decisions, we investigate whether permanently retiring groundwater rights impacts groundwater use among active neighboring groundwater users. We find that enrollment in the retirement program causes neighboring wells to initially pump less groundwater on average. However, water use reductions are only temporary, due to relative increases in stock levels over time. The results imply that policies that retire water rights may conserve more water than anticipated in the short term, but, over time, higher resource stocks could lead to policy leakage. We also present evidence that the decrease in groundwater use is driven by the shared resource stock. Our results provide empirical evidence for the importance of spatial spillovers related to common property resource management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers have well established the critical role of Common Property Resources (CPRs) in India's rural economy. The present study focuses on the impact of degradation and depletion of resources on women's livelihoods in the rural parts of Rajasthan. The depletion of CPRs has a direct adverse impact on the poor people's livelihood, and among them, women are the worst victims of this depletion. Women are responsible for collecting fuel, fodder, and bringing water from outside premises for their families' sustenance. Due to the gender division of labour, the impact is most felt by the women in particular. The study investigated the change in rural women's work pattern in Rajasthan due to the depletion of these natural resources from the 1980s to 2011, using the unit-level data from the various Round of Employment and Unemployment Situation in India (NSSO); across five regions in Rajasthan. Various socio-economic parameters, such as education, Monthly Per Capita Expenditure, Operational Holdings and social groups, were used to find the most vulnerable section among the women. The study finds that some regions show a reasonable reduction in CPR area while dependence on CPRs has substantially increased. These are the highly vulnerable regions in terms of both resource condition and poverty implications since the increased dependence is now catered to by a reduced CPR area thus increasing the pressure on increasingly scarce resources pushing the poor and marginalised population to the brink of sustenance. Dependence on firewood remains highest out of all the three activities related to Common resources. The collection of fruits and fish, is high for the Aravali and Hadoti region of Rajasthan, showing that the importance of CPRs also depends on their availability. The study also reflects that the most marginalised groups are illiterates, Landless, social groups (ST, SC and OBC) and rural women belonging to the lowest two MPCE groups. Their dependency on CPRs is highest across their respective parameters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Common property resources (CPR) are central for the sustenance of biodiversity and rural communities in India. Weak institutional governance and the lack of tenure rights for local communities over CPRs is resulting in degradation and over-exploitation of resources making rural communities vulnerable across India. Climatic variabilities further exacerbate existing socio-ecological imbalances multifold. Within the broader area of vulnerability and adaptation to climate change, this paper explores how restoration of CPRs through local environment stewardship initiatives contributes to the resilience of rural livelihoods in the face of climate change. A mixed-methods approach was employed to study this aspect in six villages in two districts in Rajasthan. It was found that secure property rights and collective management of CPRs enhances household resilience and improves ecological health. It concludes that processes supporting local self-governance need to be central to local adaptation to climate change, as they naturally create resilient and sustainable rural livelihoods.

Though innovations for sustainable management of natural resources have emerged over time, the rising demand for nature based health solutions and integration of endemic flora into global value chains could have adverse impacts on ecosystems. The ecological risks in the exploitation of the wild endemic medicinal plant resources are exacerbated by a myriad of agrotechnological risks and challenges that highly constrain their domestication. Successful exploitation and commercialisation of medicinal plants thus require a clear understanding of their demand and production systems or value chain analysis. Accordingly there is need for innovative approaches towards their integration into global value chains. Since quality and safety, traceability, certification, as well as consumer tastes and preferences are critical drivers in purchasing decisions by global consumers, they are inadvertently exploited to weaken Indigenous knowledge (IK), undermine common property rights and entrench value chains that favour a few elite buyers. This tend to create pervasive incentives for overexploitation of medicinal plant resources and environmental degradation. Potential solution lies in the recognition of drivers of vulnerability to environmental degradation and the innovative use of policy bricolage, feedback loops and interactions between knowledge, power and agency on one hand, and collective action and property rights institutions on the other hand. We conceptualise a framework that can mediate a transformational agenda and enhance systematic understanding of sustainability lenses in endemic medicinal plant resources value chains. This could strengthen IK, enhance collective action and promote participation of local actors with positive impact on the utilisation and integration of endemic medicinal plant resources into global value chains.

The transmission of pro‐socialness across generations is modeled using the warm‐glow approach. The parent generation seeks to cultivate pro‐social values in their children as this would improve their material well‐being when they grow up as cooperative adults. I show that communities endowed with more productive resources have a stronger incentive to teach their children social cooperation. Thus, there is a correlation between a village's level of material well‐being and villagers' steady‐state level of pro‐socialness. When the cost of moral education is directly dependent on the parent generation's level of pro‐socialness, the multiplicity of steady states may emerge. If a community's initial level of pro‐socialness is high, the system will reach an interior steady state; in contrast, if this initial level is low, eventually the level of pro‐socialness will approach zero in the long run. Thus communities that start with similar initial levels of pro‐socialness may end up at drastically different steady states. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we analyze the effects of wealth inequality on the provision of public goods and management of common-property resources (CPR) when there are market imperfections in inputs that are complementary in production to the collective good. We show that for public goods inequality impedes efficiency, while for use of CPRs there is an inverse U-shaped relationship between inequality and efficiency. We discuss the implications of these theoretical results for redistributive policies such as land reform.

Reciprocal relations underscore the mutual caretaking obligations held between nature and society, as intertwining entities that are co-constituted with one another. In this paper, we draw from scholarship on human-nature relations, which emphasizes the intrinsic value and agency of non-human beings and the landscape. Building on this literature, we investigate the practice of reciprocal relations for exemplar communities in Hawai‘i, British Columbia (Canada), the Appalachian mountain region (U.S.), and Madagascar that are all actively cultivating stewardship of natural resources in the face of economic, political, and ecological pressures. Our cases illustrate the diverse ways individuals and communities enact reciprocal relations and examine how these acts may increase community access to land and water. We show how communities mobilize reciprocal relations through both formal governance actions (e.g. management planning and legislation) and informal avenues (e.g. daily human-environment interactions). Our findings expand upon Ribot and Peluso’s theory of access by considering the multi-directional flows of benefits and responsibilities between people and places exemplified by reciprocal relations. By reframing environmental governance around mutual responsibilities, we hope to increase recognition of existing reciprocal place-based relationships, and facilitate greater community access to land, water, and resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a theoretical model to explain the usage of time-inconsistent behavior as a strategy to exploit others when reputation and trust have secondary effects on the economic outcome. We consider two agents with time-consistent preferences exploiting common resources. Supposing that an agent is believed to have time-inconsistent preferences with probability p,  we analyze whether she uses this misinformation when she has the opportunity to use it. Using the model originally provided by Levhari and Mirman (Bell J Econ 11(1):322-334, 1980), we determine the optimal degree of present bias that the agent would like to have while pretending to have time-inconsistent preferences and we provide the range of present-bias parameter under which deceiving is optimal. Moreover, by allowing the constant relative risk aversion class of utility form, we characterize the distinction between pretending to be naive and sophisticated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most common property resource (CPR) collection in developing countries occurs in imperfect market environments, in which endogenous prices link the economic returns in non-resource activities (i.e., agriculture) with effort supplied to CPR collection. A model of an imperfectly integrated rural household demonstrates the theoretically ambiguous connection between agricultural productivity and resource collection. Using unique panel data from rural Mexico, we find evidence that households with higher agricultural efficiency supply less labor to CPR collection. Interventions that raise agricultural productivity thus may complement resource conservation efforts.

Common property resources are areas of land or water being used by a community or a group of communities. These have special significance to peoples and communities who depend on them for their livelihood. The commons in all arid districts of India include village pastures, community forests, wasteland, common threshing grounds, waste dumps, watershed drainage, village baoris1, talabs2, nadis3 and ponds, and tanks, rivers, rivulets, wetlands, riverbeds, community conserved areas, protected areas, Dhaam4 or Dhooni5, culturable wastelands, barren & un-culturable land, etc. The area under commons often ranged from 9 to 28% of total village area. Appropriation of the commons by the state for building essential infrastructure such as schools, clinics, veterinary hospitals, housing for government functionaries, SEZ and industrial corridors, etc. is a cause of serious concern. Presently the ownership rights over CPRs are not clear and there are many who claim ownership, some at State level but also like local bodies. The 12th plan of the Planning Commission of India recognized and highlighted the need for favourable land tenure arrangements, institutional design and programme architecture in order to achieve effective governance and management of the commons. The revitalization of CPRs is crucial for protecting livelihoods, as well as for biodiversity conservation and for the improvement in arid microclimatic conditions. Dialogue continues on the status of common property resources, the available legal framework and some policy related issues for its conservation through strengthening of local institutions and capacity building for stakeholders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Few grazing themes so endure yet are so difficult for outsiders to document with certainty as historical and current-day livestock grazing routes: stock driveways. Excursions from one biome, ecotone, or landscape to another—in general, undertaken to seasonal cues — allow livestock owners and their hired herders to exploit different environments that offer notable advantages in terms of freeing livestock from unvarying diet, overtaxed grazing grounds, common diseases, and cycles of drought or drenching rain. Movement at whatever scale permits herders or shepherds an escape from monotony when they shift grazing grounds to montane-woodlands or back to lowland environments in travel that benefits both jaded humans and husbanded animals. Significant economic and ecological advantages accrue from the shifts of seasonal silvopastoralism, but the terrain, and in particular the routes animals travel, often stretch across varied land ownerships, and sifting out rights of passage is an ethnographic adventure requiring longstanding observation and consistent fieldwork. Formal scholarship about the road between is less established than literature of “the trail,” which is a staple feature of folklore, film, and fiction. As concern grows about the energy costs of using highways or railroads to move livestock, attention returns to traditional practices and legal accommodations that make possible trailing livestock under their own power. Across Europe are 4 million ha of land associated with livestock driveways, once widespread in the United States as an item of Spanish-Mexican heritage. This synthesis focuses on livestock driveway establishment in two landscapes: Spain and, secondarily, the western United States of America, with an overarching theme of how stock driveways can connect ecosystems and, by sustaining customary use, knit together silvopastoral society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cooperation becomes more difficult as a group becomes larger, but it is unclear where it will break down. Here, we study group size within well-functioning social-ecological systems. We consider centuries-old evidence from hundreds of communities in the Alps that harvested common property resources. Results show that the average group size remained remarkably stable over about six centuries, in contrast to a general increase in the regional population. The population more than doubled, but although single groups experienced fluctuations over time, the average group size remained stable. Ecological factors, such as managing forest instead of pasture land, played a minor role in determining group size. The evidence instead indicates that factors related to social interactions had a significant role in determining group size. We discuss possible interpretations of the findings based on constraints in individual cognition and obstacles in collective decision making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We systematically reviewed the literature on the tragedy of the commons and common-property resources. We segregated studies by legal management regimes (de jure regimes) and management that develops in practice (de facto regimes) to understand how the structure of regime formation affects the outcome of community management on sustainability of resource use. De facto regimes, developed within the community, are more likely to have positive impacts on the resource. However, de facto regimes are fragile and not resilient in the face of increased population pressure and unregulated markets, and de facto management regimes are less successful where physical exclusion of external agents from resources is more difficult. Yet, formalization or imposition of de jure management regimes can have complicated impacts on sustainability. The imposition of de jure regimes usually has a negative outcome when existing de facto regimes operate at larger scales than the imposed de jure regime. In contrast, de jure regimes have largely positive impacts when the de facto regimes operate at scales smaller than the overlying de jure regimes. Formalization may also be counterproductive because of elite capture and the resulting de facto privatization (that allows elites to effectively exclude others) or de facto open access (where the disenfranchised may resort to theft and elites cannot effectively exclude them). This underscores that although the global movement to formalize community-management regimes may address some forms of inequity and may produce better outcomes, it does not ensure resource sustainability and may lead to greater marginalization of users. Comparison of governance systems that differentiate between initiatives that legitimize existing de facto regimes and systems that create new de facto regimes, investigations of new top-down de jure regimes, and studies that further examine different approaches to changing de jure regimes to de facto regimes are avenues for further inquiry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Infinite time horizon linear quadratic differential games typically admit a linear Markov-perfect equilibrium as well as a continuum of equilibria with strategies that are nonlinear functions of the state variable. Using an experimental approach, we examine the empirical relevance of the nonlinear equilibriain a two-player common property resource game. We found, extraction behavior in response to evolving stock deviates significantly from the equilibrium strategies. However, long-term outcomes, in terms of steady states, predicted by both linear and nonlinear Markovian strategies are attained in significant proportions by the actual play. While 19% of participants’ play resulted in a steady state that coincides with the stable steady state supported by the linear Markov-perfect equilibrium strategy, 41.5% of all games resulted in steady states within the range supported by nonlinear Markovian strategies. Our results indicate that nonlinear equilibria cannot be ruled out as irrelevant on behavioral grounds. We also found evidence for the use of simple rule-of-thumb strategies, which consist of refraining from extraction until a threshold stock is reached and extracting at a positive constant rate after the threshold is reached. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]