Resource Management Institutions Research Articles

Social-Ecological Scale Mismatches and the Collapse of the Sea Urchin Fishery in Maine, USA

Scale mismatches result in incomplete or ambiguous feedback that impairs the ability to learn and adapt and, ultimately, to sustain natural resources. Our aim is to examine the sea urchin fishery in Maine, USA to better understand the multiscale, social, and biophysical conditions that are important for the design of institutions that might be able to sustain the resource. During the late 1980s and 1990s, the Maine sea urchin fishery was a classic gold rush fishery. In the beginning, the fishery was characterized by an abundant resource with little to no harvesting activity, followed by a period of rapid increase in landings and effort that led to a subsequent and persistent decline in the sea urchin population and a significant reduction in effort. We conducted semistructured interviews with scientists and experienced fishermen to understand the multiscale, social, and biophysical conditions that influence fishermen’s harvesting strategies, and the implications of this for the design of institutions for successful resource management. The current co-management system includes an advisory body made up of industry members and scientists it also includes limited entry, and additional input control mechanisms. Many of these measures are implemented at a very broad scale; however, we find that the ecological conditions relevant to the sustainable processes occur at the scale of individual fishing sites or ledges, which is a much finer scale than current management. Therefore, the comanagement system maintains an open access system and leaves few incentives for the development of sustainable harvesting strategies among fishermen. The clear suggestion is that the appropriate management system would be one that directly addresses the fine scale ecological and social dynamics within this fishery and gives fishermen property rights over individual ledges (for example, leases). After having briefly reviewed experiences in Canada and Chile, we found that knowledge of the coupled natural and human system at the fine scale is necessary if we are to assess the feasibility of area management in this fishery, because what works in one fishery does not necessarily work in another.

Socio-Ecological Perspectives on Sustainable Livelihood and Environmental Management: A Multiple Case Study in Northern Thailand's National Park

Protected areas such as national parks play a crucial role in global conservation efforts and also provide a range of socio-economic benefits. This paper draws from preliminary findings from an ongoing research project to review the broad theoretical socio-ecological perspectives and applies multidisciplinary research to environmental management. The aim of the overall research program is to investigate the relationship between sustainable livelihood and natural resource management in northern Thailand’s national park communities, with a view to enhancing compatibility. Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) and qualitative research methods are used to develop an in-depth understanding of the governing institutions in natural resource management with regard to the context and perception of sustainable livelihoods. Our preliminary results show that sustainable livelihood activities are related to environmental conservation initiatives, such as annual forest restoration, the establishment of fire breaks, water resources management, and community-based ecotourism, which are the vital parts of natural resource management in northern Thailand’s national park communities. In addition, the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) is the pathway for national economic and tourism development, which will promote change in terms of socio-economic development in local, national and regional ASEAN countries. The recommendation of this study considers that community empowerment to participate in natural resource management decisions is the significant pathway to support both sustainable livelihood and environmental conservation efforts within northern Thailand’s national parks.

The Goldilocks Solution: Exploring the Relationship between Trust and Participation in Resource Management within the New Zealand Commercial Rock Lobster Fishery

Our understanding of the role natural resource users, and the governing institutions they create, has grown considerably in recent years. At the same time, our understanding of the role of trust in human interactions continues to grow. We use the case of New Zealand rock lobster (jasus edwardsii and Jasus verrauxi) to ask the question “What is the role of trust in an individual's decision to participate in natural resource management institutions?” Using data from a survey of constituents of the commercial rock lobster fishery, our analysis shows an inverted “U” relationship between trust and participation. We suggest that this may be described as a “Goldilocks solution” in which having both too much and too little trust is problematic; but a healthy level of is “just right.” Theoretical and policy implications of these findings and directions for future research are explored.

Collective action on the western range: coping with external and internal threats

Collaborative natural resource management institutions enable agents with diverse interests to come together to solve complex problems. These actors must overcome a series of collective action problems to create, maintain, and evolve these institutions. In addition to the challenge of heterogeneous actors, these commons social-ecological systems often face internal and external threats or disturbances. The institutional arrangements may be effective with problems that are internal to a social-ecological system – ones that they are designed to handle, but how do these arrangements cope with external disturbances, especially ones caused by large-scale political and economic decisions, events, and processes. Using ethnographic and archival data we conduct an institutional analysis outlining the existing and emerging collaboratives, the important actors, and ongoing efforts to cope with the five major challenges identified by rangeland actors. We trace the evolution of institutions on the western range with a focus on their ability to cope with challenges that are largely within the system – biodiversity, fire, and water management, and those that are driven externally by actors who are largely absent – border militarization and violence and exurbanization.

Assessing water resources adaptive capacity to climate change impacts in the Pacific Northwest Region of North America

Abstract. Climate change impacts in Pacific Northwest Region of North America (PNW) are projected to include increasing temperatures and changes in the seasonality of precipitation (increasing precipitation in winter, decreasing precipitation in summer). Changes in precipitation are also spatially varying, with the northwestern parts of the region generally experiencing greater increases in cool season precipitation than the southeastern parts. These changes in climate are projected to cause loss of snowpack and associated streamflow timing shifts which will increase cool season (October–March) flows and decrease warm season (April–September) flows and water availability. Hydrologic extremes such as the 100 yr flood and extreme low flows are also expected to change, although these impacts are not spatially homogeneous and vary with mid-winter temperatures and other factors. These changes have important implications for natural ecosystems affected by water, and for human systems. The PNW is endowed with extensive water resources infrastructure and well-established and well-funded management agencies responsible for ensuring that water resources objectives (such as water supply, water quality, flood control, hydropower production, environmental services, etc.) are met. Likewise, access to observed hydrological, meteorological, and climatic data and forecasts is in general exceptionally good in the United States and Canada, and is often supported by federally funded programs that ensure that these resources are freely available to water resources practitioners, policy makers, and the general public. Access to these extensive resources support the argument that at a technical level the PNW has high capacity to deal with the potential impacts of natural climate variability on water resources. To the extent that climate change will manifest itself as moderate changes in variability or extremes, we argue that existing water resources infrastructure and institutional arrangements provide a reasonably solid foundation for coping with climate change impacts, and that the mandates of existing water resources policy and water resources management institutions are at least consistent with the fundamental objectives of climate change adaptation. A deeper inquiry into the underlying nature of PNW water resources systems, however, reveals significant and persistent obstacles to climate change adaptation, which will need to be overcome if effective use of the region's extensive water resources management capacity can be brought to bear on this problem. Primary obstacles include assumptions of stationarity as the fundamental basis of water resources system design, entrenched use of historical records as the sole basis for planning, problems related to the relatively short time scale of planning, lack of familiarity with climate science and models, downscaling procedures, and hydrologic models, limited access to climate change scenarios and hydrologic products for specific water systems, and rigid water allocation and water resources operating rules that effectively block adaptive response. Institutional barriers include systematic loss of technical capacity in many water resources agencies following the dam building era, jurisdictional fragmentation affecting response to drought, disconnections between water policy and practice, and entrenched bureaucratic resistance to change in many water management agencies. These factors, combined with a federal agenda to block climate change policy in the US during the Bush administration have (with some exceptions) contributed to widespread institutional "gridlock" in the PNW over the last decade or so despite a growing awareness of climate change as a significant threat to water management. In the last several years, however, significant progress has been made in surmounting some of these obstacles, and the region's water resources agencies at all levels of governance are making progress in addressing the fundamental challenges inherent in adapting to climate change.

Agents’ beliefs and the evolution of institutions for common-pool resource management

The joint exploitation of open-access natural resources is often modeled as a social dilemma with no escape for rational actors. Nevertheless, real individuals are not helplessly trapped in this dilemma and are often able to sustainably manage their commons by building endogenous institutions. This paper proposes both a simple analytical model and a more complex agent-based one designed to study common-pool resource management problems with a specific focus on the relation between agents’ beliefs and institutions. The conditions where agents are allowed to build management institutions lead to much better outcomes than the ones where agents can only rely on individual beliefs in order to limit the resource consumption. This happens despite the fact that agents act in a competitive environment favoring high resource consumers.

コモンズとしての海洋保護区とその持続可能性

Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) have been established with the aim of conserving coral reefs and other marine habitats through the prohibition of fishing. Their establishment has brought about the following benefits: (1) the induction of the spill-over effect, increasing the fish stocks of adjacent coastal waters, (2) the creation of recreational resources, and (3) the maintenance of the ecosystem’s biodiversity.An MPA is similar to commons as a common-pool resource (CPR) management institution, i. e., both schemes intend to control natural resources for their sustainable use.The governance of commons requires three categories of cost for (A) enforcing the rule of utilizing natural resource and excluding violators in a certain area, (B) maintaining natural resources, and (C) organizing CPR institution. Managing MPAs requires similar costs.We adopted the above framework for analyzing the SMI MPA. We focused on the activities of the Sea Guard and Cost (A), analyzed the activities of Bicol University, associated with Cost (C), and evaluated the benefits of MPA in monetary terms. In conclusion, we found that the benefits exceed the costs.

Particular and wider interests in natural resource management: Organizing together but separately

The focus that scholars have put on mainstream institutions for resource management, i.e. those recognized by the community and development agents as the primary organizations for resource management, has tended to mask alternative, less visible, but equally robust, organizational forms in which resources are managed and development is carried out at the local level. Mainstream institutions are often inadequate as arenas for negotiating contested interests. By directing attention to women's organizing in contexts in the south (India) and the north (Sweden), it is argued in this paper that although inclusive and heterogeneous structures are essential for the sustainable and equitable management of natural resources such as forests, in order to be able to be so, mainstream institutions need to be able to relate to other structures and forms that are exclusive and represent particular interests. This study of institutional contexts in such different places informs thinking on resource management, development and gender equality, and has practical implications for sustainable and equitable resource management. Importantly, it draws attention to the need to redefine how we study institutions for natural resource management.

The livelihood impacts of the Namibian community based natural resource management programme: a meta-synthesis

SUMMARYCommunity based natural resource management (CBNRM) programmes aim to achieve the joint objectives of biodiversity conservation and improved rural livelihoods by providing incentives to sustainably manage relevant resources. Since 1998, more than 50 natural resource management institutions, known as conservancies, have been established in order to manage wildlife resources, on communal lands in Namibia. The national programme is often cited as a CBNRM success; however, despite its rapid spread, there are few systematically collected or analysed household-level data which demonstrate the long-term ecological, social and economic impacts of Namibian programme. A meta-synthesis was undertaken to determine the range of positive and negative livelihood impacts resulting from CBNRM programme activities in two key regions, and the factors affecting how these impacts have been felt by households or individuals. Impacts were categorized according to any changes in access to and/or returns from the five key assets of the sustainable livelihoods framework, namely financial, human, natural, physical and social assets. Positive and negative impacts were felt on financial, human, natural and social assets; only positive impacts were identified as affecting physical assets. Individual- and household-level impacts differed depending on the specific activities implemented locally and, according to the duration, frequency and timing of the impacts, the circumstances and preferences of households and their access to particular activities and consequent impacts. If a greater understanding of the extent and importance of different impacts is to be gained in the future, more rigorous and comprehensive data collection and analysis will need to be undertaken. Analyses will need to consider the whole range of activities implemented, both the benefits and costs associated with these different activities, and will also need to provide contextual information to allow the relative importance of impacts resulting from CBNRM activities to be better understood.

Local institutions for floodplain management in Bangladesh and the influence of the Flood Action Plan

Institutional arrangements are a key issue for sustainable natural resource management. Recent water and fisheries management projects in Bangladesh have established new local institutions for floodplain management based on community organizations. Although the Flood Action Plan (FAP) was the culmination of an earlier emphasis on technical and structural ‘solutions’ to managing floods and water in Bangladesh, the expected large engineering works were never built. One legacy of FAP lies in a contested process that accelerated emphasis on public participation, smaller scale hazard adjustments and maintaining a wider range of floodplain resource values including conserving and restoring fisheries. This paper compares institutional arrangements and outcomes in two fisheries and two water management projects taken up after FAP. Local organizations appeared generally successful in sustaining themselves and continuing floodplain resource management. Facilitation, the extent of consensus among different stakeholders, and fit between institutional arrangements and scale of resource were all important influences on effectiveness. Local organizations have sustained in smaller floodplains, but in larger areas co-management bodies were a key to effective coordination and troubleshooting among a series of linked community organizations. Local leaders tend to dominate after projects end, especially where planning was less participatory and organizational structures were determined from above. Participants stressed that for continued success formally recognized well-run organizations are needed with accountable and adaptable decision-making processes and good leaders. This process built on participatory guidelines from FAP but the local institutions have not addressed hazard risks. Community resource management institutions could develop a more integrated approach that internalizes the interactions between water, land and fishery management. So far, local planning for floods has been a notable gap in the activities of community institutions, but the enhanced social capital could be a basis for adaptation to climate change. For this, an enabling policy environment is needed, which could be facilitated by the open high-profile debate on floodplain issues that characterized FAP.

Urban water supply and local neoliberalism in Tagbilaran City, the Philippines

The aim of this paper is to explore the processes and outcomes of neoliberalism in relation to urban water supply in the city of Tagbilaran, the Philippines, in order to provide a nuanced account of (an) actually existing hybrid neoliberal space. Using Bakker's typology of market envi- ronmentalist reforms in resource management as a guiding frame to link this case to a bigger 'neoliberal' conversation, I distinguish how reforms to resource governance at the national level, coupled with changes in the ways in which resource management institutions and resource man- agement organisations function at the local level have acted to constitute local practices of neoliberal governance. Local articulations of (national and supranational) neoliberal and development dis- courses are revealed as a means for reconceptualising the role of the state and the emergence of new forms of hybrid governance in Tagbilaran. Analysis of the operation of BWUI, a public/private water utility, and the politics of privatisation/private sector participation enables a closer inspection of how water and water services are politicised and resisted by local publics.

Pursuing community forestry in Liberia

AbstractWhile Liberian forests are a biodiversity hotspot and integral to the livelihoods of indigenous communities, 14 years of conflict forestry turned this national asset into a source of economic inequality and corruption in an extreme example of a ‘natural resource curse’. Moreover, overharvesting of timber through the conflict period has endangered community livelihoods and raised concerns regarding resource sustainability from international conservation organizations. Since the end of conflict in 2003, the Liberian government has forged international partnerships to create a reformed policy framework balancing commercial, conservation and community (the three Cs) interests. In an effort to contribute to the larger body of work on the role of natural resource management institutions in the creation and fostering of the resource curse, this paper offers a case study of timber in Liberia. We feel that an in‐depth understanding of the Liberian case clarifies the challenge of timber as an extractive commodity and how the institutional framework can be shaped to provide a positive contribution to economic development. The discussion focuses on the historical development of Liberian land and forest tenure institutions that lead to poverty, ecological degradation and conflict. Tracing the more recent implementation of the three Cs, this paper analyzes the current conditions of community engagement and outlines critical steps to be taken for Liberia to escape further resource driven cycles of conflict. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.

Management of Alluvial Aquifers in Two Southern African Ephemeral Rivers: Implications for IWRM

This paper summarises innovative research into the assessment of long-term groundwater recharge from flood events in dryland environments of the Kuiseb (Namibia) and the Buffels (South Africa) rivers. The integrated water resource management (IWRM) policies and institutions affecting the exploitation of groundwater resources in each of these developing countries are compared. The relatively large alluvial aquifer of the Kuiseb River (∼240 Mm3) is recharged from irregular floods originating in the upper catchment. Reported abstraction of 4.6 Mm3 per year is primarily consumed in the town of Walvis Bay, although the groundwater decay (pumping and natural losses along the period 1983–2005) was estimated in 14.8 Mm3 per year. Recharge is variable, occurring in 11 out of 13 years in the middle Kuiseb River, but only in 11 out of 28 years in the middle-lower reaches. In contrast, the Buffels River has relatively minor alluvial aquifers (∼11 Mm3) and recharge sources derive from both lateral subsurface flow and floodwater infiltration, the latter limited to a recharge maximum of 1.3 Mm3 during floods occurring once every four years. Current abstractions to supply the adjacent rural population and a few small-scale, irrigated commercial farms are 0.15 Mm3 yr − 1, well within the long-term sustainable yield estimated to be 0.7 Mm3 yr − 1. Since independence in 1990, Namibia’s water resource management approach has focussed on ephemeral river basin management of which the Kuiseb Basin Management Committee (KBMC) is a model. Here, some water points are managed independently by rural communities through committees while the national bulk water supplier provides for Walvis Bay Municipality from the lower aquifers. This provides a sense of local ownership through local participation between government, NGOs and CBOs (community-based organisations) in the planning and implementation of IWRM. Despite the potential for water resource development in the lower Buffels River, the scope for implementing IWRM is limited not only by the small aquifer size, but also because basin management in South Africa is considered only in the context of perennial rivers. Since 2001, water service delivery in the Buffels River catchment has become the responsibility of two newly created local municipalities. As municipal government gains experience, skills and capacity, its ability to respond to local needs related to water service delivery will be accomplished through local participation in the design and implementation of annual ‘integrated development plans’. These two case studies demonstrate that a variety of IWRM strategies in the drylands of developing countries are appropriate depending on scales of governance, evolving policy frameworks, scales of need and limitations inherent in the hydrological processes of groundwater resources.

Water Scarcity and the Sustainability of a Common Pool Resource Institution in the Urban Andes

The Cochabamba Water War of 2000 was precipitated by Bolivians’ defense of common-pool water resources and institutions against privatization. This article examines the design of a water institution and its sustainability during periods of water scarcity in urban Cochabamba. Based on data collected via participant-observation and panel surveys conducted in 72 randomly selected households, I draw three main conclusions. First, the institution operated according to principles found in sustainable resource management institutions in the rural Andes (Trawick 2001) and across cultures (Ostrom 1990). Second, while the function of the common-pool resource institution was stable over the five study periods, the social structures that supported collective choice and operational rules were sensitive to external events including seasonal water scarcity. Third, while institutions with strong historical precedents for contingencies under resource stress may be sustainable, other forms of social organization on which the institution depends may be more vulnerable to water scarcity.

Path dependency and collective action in common pool governance

Collective action among resource users has long been identified as a basic element of successful common pool governance, and one of the main concerns of common pool research is the identification of factors that affect collective action. Among the most commonly identified factors are trust, social capital, common preferences, shared knowledge, collaborative experiences, focusing events and expectations of future interactions. Thus far, however, relatively little attention has been paid to the historical-institutional context of collective action and the constraining effects of path dependency. Path dependency suggests that investments and adaptations in early resource management institutions can make it difficult for actors to abandon these institutions, thereby influencing and shaping subsequent collective action efforts. This article examines the impact that path dependency can have on collective action in common pools, by examining transboundary water management in the Murray-Darling Basin of Australia, the Colorado Basin of the US and the Saskatchewan-Nelson Basin of Canada. In all three cases, early transboundary water apportionment institutions have proven strongly path dependent, significantly shaping subsequent collective action efforts at transboundary water conservation.

Path dependency and collective action in common pool governance

Collective action among resource users has long been identified as a basic element of successful common pool governance, and one of the main concerns of common pool research is the identification of factors that affect collective action. Among the most commonly identified factors are trust, social capital, common preferences, shared knowledge, collaborative experiences, focusing events and expectations of future interactions. Thus far, however, relatively little attention has been paid to the historical-institutional context of collective action and the constraining effects of path dependency. Path dependency suggests that investments and adaptations in early resource management institutions can make it difficult for actors to abandon these institutions, thereby influencing and shaping subsequent collective action efforts. This article examines the impact that path dependency can have on collective action in common pools, by examining transboundary water management in the Murray-Darling Basin of Australia, the Colorado Basin of the US and the Saskatchewan-Nelson Basin of Canada. In all three cases, early transboundary water apportionment institutions have proven strongly path dependent, significantly shaping subsequent collective action efforts at transboundary water conservation.

Norms, institutions, and collective action: the changing face of inland fisheries in Kerala

This paper examines the continuity and change in the governance of inland fisheries in Kerala. It analyses the transformations taking place in riverine fisheries management due to social, technological, and policy changes. Further, it discusses the significance of contextual factors in the sustainable management of riverine fisheries. The findings of this paper show that contextual factors such as family structure, technological changes, intervention by state government, market, and resource scarcity have significantly influenced sustainable fishing practices. Exploring the dynamics of norms and sanctions that facilitate sustainable resource use, this paper also signifies the limitations of static models of institutions in natural resource management. This paper is based on ethnographic fieldwork among two fishing communities along the Pamba-Achankovil River basin in Kerala, South India. Interview guides and focused group discussion were the primary tools of data collection.

Comparing the Effectiveness of Informal and Formal Institutions in Sustainable Common Pool Resources Management in Sub-Saharan Africa

This article compares the effectiveness of informal and formal institutions for sustainable common pool resources (CPRs) management in Sub-Saharan Africa and investigates the social, political and demographic conditions that influence the institutions' effectiveness. By focusing on publications addressing micro-level CPR management, a comprehensive literature review was conducted. Articles were grouped, based on the main themes of the study, including types of institutions and conditions that influence their effectiveness. A qualitative meta-analysis was conducted using a deductive coding approach. The results revealed that informal institutions have contributed to sustainable CPR management by creating a suitable environment for joint decision-making, enabling exclusion at low cost for CPR users and using locally agreed sanctions. Although the published evidence suggested less support to formal institutions under decentralised governmental reforms, they played an important role in implementing technologies for sustainable CPR management. Conditions that influence the effectiveness of both types of institutions include high population growth on limited CPRs, the growing scarcity of CPRs due to land use change and the lack of human and financial capacities. Improving the conditions that hinder the contributions of both types of institutions is crucial to enhance the institutions' effectiveness in sustainable CPR management. Moreover, policies and development interventions should strengthen the involvement of well-functioning informal institutions in decision-making so that sustainable CPR management can be achieved.

The Potentials for Co-Management Approaches in Western Serengeti, Tanzania

Co-management arrangements are increasingly gaining popularity as an intervention to overcome the shortcomings of centralized management that impede harmonization of conflicting interests among the diverse stakeholder groups. The success of these arrangements depends, among other things, upon capitalizing on potentials existing in the area where they are intended to be implemented. This study was conducted in the western part of Serengeti National Park to analyze some potential for adopting the co-management approaches. We employed local communities' opinions, experience, knowledge, and attitudes to analyze these factors. The paper is framed around the premises that, among other things, co-management arrangements have the potential to work if: (i) the local communities have an outstanding level of awareness on the rationale of, and legal aspects pertaining to, wildlife conservation; (ii) the traditional institutions for management of natural resources exist and local communities have the ability to evaluate their performance, establish causes for inadequate performance and propose some workable solutions; (iii) local communities have the ability to evaluate different options for resource ownership and give valid reasons for opposing or supporting them. In conclusion we underscore the need for co-management approaches as an alternative intervention and a complement for current resource management approaches. We recommend promotion of local awareness on legal aspects of resource management, strengthening of traditional institutions for resource management and honoring people's choices of the types of resource ownership or rectifying the situations making them unpopular.

Institutional configurations around forest reserves in Zimbabwe: the challenge of nested institutions for resource management

This paper examines how state institutions seek to change values placed on forest resources by forest users. Its key focus is on how the members of forest user groups –collectively and as individuals – influence structures and relations between the state and local people in their utilisation of forestry resources. It also examines how a variety of institutional configurations influence the development of co-management approaches and the implications of these for natural resource management. The paper highlights the importance of contexts, resource values, identity and social relations in gaining access and control over resources. These issues have implications beyond the Zimbabwean case studies from which the insights are drawn. The paper will attempt to profile institutions at multiple levels that provide challenges for co-management of resources not only in the case studies analysed, but also for other contexts around the world.