Irrigation and collective action: A study in method with reference to the Shiwalik Hills, Haryana

Abstract

In recent years decentralized development approaches have gained prominence in the agricultural

Leadership on the Commons: Wealth Distribution, Co-provision and Service Delivery

“…Likewise, irrigation could increase the number of people fed from one acre of land by a factor of two. In determining weights for: 1) area irrigated by the dam, 2) alternative sources of irrigation for dam-irrigated land, and 3) land area outside dam command, we allocated weights that differed by a factor of two (Kurian & Dietz, 2004).…”

Rural Forest Management in Sierra Leone: The Role of Economic (In)Equality in Facilitating Collective Action

“…Baland and Platteau (1996) make a convincing classification between three main categories of heterogeneity: identity, interests and endowments. It is also often the case that individuals are homogeneous in one respect but heterogeneous in another, giving rise to a number of combinations (Kurian & Dietz, 2004).…”

To Cooperate or not to Cooperate...? : Collective action for rehabilitation of traditional water tunnel systems (qanats) in Syria

“…Somanathan et al (2002) do not find any correlation between c a s t e o r e t h n i c h e t e r o g e n e i t y and collective action on forest management in the Indian Himalayas. In their development of key measuring variables for heterogeneity Kurian & Dietz (2004) in India and Adhikari & Lovett (2006) in Nepal find that there is no straightforward impact of group heterogeneity on collective action for irrigation. They argue for a greater importance of contextualization and flexibility in governance to allow local adaptation of management regimes.…”

“…How conflicts can be avoided and cooperation achieved is the main focus of hydropolitics (Mollinga, 2001). Kurian (2004) highlights the importance of historically defined power and social relations in the development of collective action at local level. In our case studies we saw that the power bases, educational background and social relations of initiators of collective action are vital 325 in the success and failure of the renovation.…”

“…Hence the body of literature on collective action is tremendous. Specifically cooperation for environmental management emerged as a major subject for research over the last two decades (Adhikari & Lovett, 2006;Abraham & Platteau, 2000Baland & Platteau, 1999;Gillinson, 2004;Katon, Knox & Meinzen-Dick, 2001;Kurian, 2003;Kurian & Dietz, 2004;Marshall, 2003;Meinzen-Dick, 1984Mollinga, 2001Mollinga, , 2004Nelson & Wright, 1995;Olson, 1965;Ostrom, 1986Ostrom, , 1990Ostrom, , 1998Ostrom, , 2000Somanathan, et al 2002;Uphoff, 1996Uphoff, , 1998Uphoff, , 2000Vermillion, 2001Vermillion, , 2004. Recent developments within that field stress the importance of history, situation and context and focuses on the relationship between collective action and heterogeneity, day-to-day politics, power and leadership (Adhikari & Lovett, 2006;Kurian & Dietz, 2003Somanathan, 2002;McCay, 2002).…”