Abstract
Recent scholars have found that collective action can be harnessed to sustainably manage common property, contrary to longstanding hypotheses that without effective external regulation community members will exploit communal resources. Researchers have also found that social capital, in addition to biophysical conditions and community attributes, is an important element of successful collective action. However, few studies exploring this topic have specifically examined communal grazing land, which is a critical component of rural livelihoods in many parts of the developing world. To address this gap, we explore the role that collective action plays in maintaining communal grazing lands through bridging, bonding, and linking social capital. In cases where the community does have communal grazing lands, we also explore the role of social capital in determining the condition of the land and the inclusiveness of access. Our analyses draw upon a community-level dataset composed of Uganda RePEAT survey data linked with high resolution gridded socio-environmental data. We observe that strong community bonds are associated with higher odds of successful collective action. However, increased links to external market forces may decrease the odds of successful collective action. These findings provide additional evidence for the complex relationship between social capital, collective action, and common property natural resource management.
Highlights
There has long been concern that without effective external regulation, community members will abuse communal resources, degrading the environment in order to gain as much of a resource as possible for themselves (Olson 1965)
Few of these studies have focused on communal grazing land, a vital component of rural livelihoods in many parts of the developing world (Hardin 1968; Mearns 1996; International Livestock Research Institute 1999; Sanginga et al 2007). Those studies that have explored social capital and communal grazing have generally employed descriptive statistics and qualitative methods rather than a robust quantitative approach. Addressing this gap in the literature, we explore the relationship between social capital and collective action, with the presence of a communal grazing land serving as a proxy for successful grazing land management
Structuring the analysis in this way allows us to observe the impact of theoretically important predictors on the relationship between social capital and collective action for communal grazing land maintenance
Summary
There has long been concern that without effective external regulation, community members will abuse communal resources, degrading the environment in order to gain as much of a resource as possible for themselves (Olson 1965). This ‘tragedy of the commons’ (Hardin 1968) scenario has been used repeatedly to hypothesize land degradation and loss of common property resources throughout the developing world, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa. In an attempt to explain some of this variation in outcomes, researchers have explored differences in biophysical conditions, attributes of the community and community members, and the rules and norms around communal resources (Ostrom 2011). Though these approaches have been able to explain some differences in communal resource management, they have not been able to fully account for all heterogeneity in communal resource management
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