Why Do We Need to Protect Institutional Diversity?

Abstract

In past decades, scholars have tended to recommend 'optimal' solutions for coping with common-pool resources. Examples exist of both successful and unsuccessful efforts to establish government property, private property, or community property. The absence of any property rightsopen access -related to valuable resources is associated with overuse. The resource institutions that research has documented as working well in the field differ substantially in their detailed design but can usually be characterised as adaptive, multilevel governance systems related to complex, evolving resource systems. We need to overcome the tendency to recommend panaceas and encourage, instead, considerable experimentation at multiple levels to reduce the threats of massive collapses of valuable resources.

Design principles for managing coastal fisheries commons in present-day Japan

“…Despite this, some scholars misperceive Ostrom's stance as anti-state and anti-privatization (Mansbridge, 2010). Careful reading of her works (Ostrom, 1990(Ostrom, , 1998(Ostrom, , 2007(Ostrom, , 2010, however, confirms that her approach is rather against a simple blueprint solution, be it state, privatization, or user self-governance, for resolving all CPR problems (Ostrom, 2007(Ostrom, , 2012. In other words, she emphasized that a complex, diagnostic approach that can accommodate the role of the state rather than a simple panacea can better resolve the commons dilemma (Basurto et al, 2013;Ostrom, 2007).…”

Evolution and future of urban ecological science: ecology in, of, and for the city

“…Special Feature: Urban ecology in, of, and for the city characterizations of population embodied in the decadal U.S. census have had to be complemented by the characterizations of human institutions, social norms, organizational networks, and power relations (Dow 2000, Ostrom 2012). Adding to this complexity of social organization is the fact that all of these components change over time and have different spatial extents (Machlis et al 1997, Cadenasso et al 2006.…”

Community based forest enterprises in Britain: Two organising typologies

“…Our approach uses a framework to systematically manage diverse information about CF and is published as Lawrence and Ambrose-Oji (2013). The framework organises evidence and data around a set of 'design principles' widely found to support successful common property management (Ostrom, 2012), including context and history which are important keys to understanding CF (Danks, 2009). This generates a descriptive point-in-time 'profile' of each case using a common set of 'variables'.…”