Abstract
Egypt, akin to many countries in the global South, has striven to promote collective management to overcome the challenges of irrigation management since the 1990s. Establishing shared pumping stations (SPSs) has been one of the cornerstones helping farmers better manage water for irrigation. Operating SPSs successfully poses collective action problems, for which there is no single set of solutions. This paper utilizes fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to identify which conditions or configurations are sufficient or necessary for well-operated SPSs. The study draws on empirical data gathered through semi-structured interviews from 45 cases, located in Kafr El-Sheikh Governorate in Egypt’s Nile Delta. Results show that three different paths are sufficient to ensure well-operated SPSs. These are: (1) the condition of effective rules related to allocation, monitoring, and sanctions; (2) the configuration of small group size of SPSs and large irrigated sizes of SPSs; or (3) the configuration of adequate water supply and appropriate location of the SPS command area. The paper concludes that neither group size nor resource size alone explains the outcome of collective action, while a combination of both factors does. Similarly, an adequate water supply is essential to enhance users’ engagement in collective actions only when resource location characteristics do not provide alternative water sources for irrigation.
Highlights
Accepted: 18 January 2021Over the past few decades, it has become clear that the performances of common pool resources (CPRs), such as irrigation systems, are shaped by the combinations of biophysical, social, and institutional factors [1,2,3,4,5,6]
The first condition, effective rules related to allocation, monitoring, and sanction (EFR), was evaluated by three measures as illustrated in Table 2: water allocation rule (WAL); monitoring rules for shared valves of irrigation network (MON); sanction rule (SAN)
We used the direct calibration method (DCM) to calibrate the measures of the conditions: effective rules related to allocation, monitoring and sanction (EFRs), adequate water supply (AWS), and location of shared pumping stations (SPSs) command area (LOC) and the outcome of well-operated SPSs
Summary
Over the past few decades, it has become clear that the performances of common pool resources (CPRs), such as irrigation systems, are shaped by the combinations of biophysical, social, and institutional factors [1,2,3,4,5,6]. Support the idea of applying these principles as a diagnostic tool to explore the core factors influencing a CPR setting. Yu et al [9] find that Ostrom’s design principles in a totalitarian context such as China are not enough to understand local irrigation institutions, and more attention should be paid to contextual factors. Wang et al [10] suggest that it is vital to examine the configuration between these principles in context when applying Ostrom’s design principles
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