Abstract
Reindeer herding in Finnmark has been widely perceived during the last few decades as a perfect example of the tragedy of the commons. The present article claims that this discourse relies on flawed assumption regarding land tenure. Our historical analysis of the term ‘common’ in relation to resources in Finnmark shows the term to reflect a misunderstanding of local categories, practices, and concerns related to pastures, territories, and natural resources more generally. In this sense, it exposes a case of ‘mistaken identity’ between the formal legal conception of ‘commons’ and the customary rules and thinking of reindeer herders. We turn to different strands of critical institutionalism to analyse the processes of institutional change that have allowed these errors and misunderstandings to be formalised and naturalised in the current governance system. We show that a process of institutional bargaining between the Norwegian Parliament, the Sámi Parliament, and the International Labour Organisation has recently re-enforced an alien conception of a ‘commons’ to which ambiguous groups of people have equivocal rights. In parallel, a process of institutional layering of new regulatory actors and rules on top of existing ones has taken place. This regulatory ratcheting has resulted in the blurring of the authorities and jurisdictions intrinsic in the customary tenure system. Moreover, the new layers of regulations have actively overemphasized the Sámi customary obligation of sharing resources to legitimize the new, ambiguous, conception of commons. This process is explained as one of institutional bricolage based on naturalisation by analogy and authority processes that allow certain powerful actors to influence the production of institutional arrangements favourable to them. All three processes underline the negotiated, dynamic nature of institutional change. We propose this integrative analysis of institutional and general social dynamics is beneficial in studying commons as everyday practices affecting natural resource governance.
Highlights
Finnmark is the northernmost, largest and least populated county of Norway, where the indigenous Sámi population have been practicing mobile reindeer husbandry for hundreds of years
We show that a process of institutional bargaining between the Norwegian Parliament, the Sámi Parliament, and the International Labour Organisation has recently re-enforced an alien conception of a ‘commons’ to which ambiguous groups of people have equivocal rights
It may be an indication that the new layers of rules have managed to infiltrate Sámi herders’ patterns of thinking and practicing reindeer herding. We propose that this is a strategic behaviour of bricolage on the part of some of the herders drawing on two sets of ‘accepted behaviours’: One couched in the conception of the ‘commons’ introduced by the State administration, the other embedded in the Sámi culture and practice of herding
Summary
Largest and least populated county of Norway, where the indigenous Sámi population have been practicing mobile reindeer husbandry for hundreds of years. A widespread idea that has influenced resource governance and public perception about reindeer herding in Finnmark is the ‘tragedy of the commons’. This idea refers to Hardin’s (1968) argument that whenever pasture resources are commonly owned herders will act in order to maximize profits at the expense of all the other herders. In reindeer pastoralist systems in Sweden, Finland and Russia pasture degradation due to overgrazing is still being debated, and there is an emerging understanding that these areas are cultural landscapes created by the practice of pastoralism (Torp 1999; Forbes et al 2006; Kryazhimskii et al 2011). In other environments (e.g. Leach and Mearns 1996; Fratkin and Mearns 2003) these debates have led to detrimental institutional changes to local governance systems
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