Coop, Phil, and David Brunckhorst. 2000. "Creating Contemporary Commons to Enhance Economic Productivity: A Grazing Commons in Rural Australia." Presented at Presented at: "Constituting the Commons: Crafting Sustainable Commons in the New Millenium", the Eighth Conference of the International Association for the Study of Common Property, Bloomington, Indiana, USA, May 31-June 4.

Abstract

"The loss of ecological function across landscapes and whole regions is clearly a global priority, not only because of the direct impacts on biodiversity and the processes it sustains but also the social consequences arising in communities whose very existence is dependent on this natural capital. Conventional attempts to address these issues invariably fail to capture appropriators wholes and are hampered through; narrowly focused programmes, entrenched property rights, institutional impediments, economic incentives and inappropriate spatial and temporal scales.

"The enduring resource systems of Common Property Resources (CPR), collectively managed appear to contribute ecological and social resilience within an external context of high risk and uncertainty. The sustaining vigour of successful common property regimes (CPR) has provided the interface through which the demands placed on the natural environment by these communities were more closely matched to the broader scale natural processes that supplied these environmental goods and services, both spatially and temporally. We need to revisit these institutional forms and determine, through application, if these social organisational arrangements are socially and ecologically robust, to deliver sustainable rural futures.

"A critical step in this endeavor and one of the greatest challenges facing researchers undertaking this type of study is to strategically commence adoption of CPR concepts utilising the experience gained by institutional and political theorists and applying them to on-ground scenarios, in a variety of contexts including those in western federated nations. Once demonstrated through application, the CPR approach, with its unique qualities of flexibility, collaboration and scale, may evolve into a powerful tool capable of addressing critical issues that have to date evaded the institutional constraints of conventional paradigms.

"This paper outlines the early development of one such model and details the efforts of a group of graziers in Australia who are developing a contemporary CPR from private parcels of land in an attempt to address the degradational spiral that continues to challenge them, and their rural counterparts worldwide."