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Abstract:
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"This paper summarizes the best that we now know about why, when, where, and how to create community-based rights or common property regimes in natural resources, which I conceive of as a shared form of private property rather than as an alternative to private property. The paper is based on twenty years of tracking both theoretical and empirical research on property rights and environmental outcomes, particularly community management and ownership of resource systems, as well as my own primary research on the history of commons in Japan, and includes a bibliography for the landmark works in the development of that field. It begins with a summary of conventional misperceptions and recent clarifications surrounding the issues of cooperation, free
riding and tragedies of the commons, and common properly arrangements that can prevent tragic depletion of resources and economic waste. The paper then uses the many well documented cases now available to us to (a) identify the reasons or the circumstances in which it appears to be more economically efficient to award property rights to groups rather than to individuals (the focus here is on why. when, and where to
create common property, and by extension when and where not to bother): (b) review the critical internal features (design guidelines) for a successful common property regime, one that can successfully manage resources conservatively for either ecological or economic reasons or both (the focus here is on the best practice or design guidelines
for common property institutions); (c) review the critical external features of a successful common property regime, or what governments and others need to do to support these regimes rather than undercutting them (though the other papers in this conference are much more specifically focused on the details of legal reform required in
Indonesia). The paper then concludes by articulating the case for creating common property in natural resources for communities where these conditions can be met. rather than vesting ownership in government or individuals. It lays out the advantages, as well
as risks that remain, to resources, communities, and governments. Finally, it uses the experience of the developed countries that have had the longest experience with successfully managed common property (these include Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, and Japan) — an experience that began in every instance with defining and legally protecting both individual and shared private property institutions before industrialization - to examine the role of community-based property rights in commons through different stages of economic development. Success is almost never a sure thing in social arrangements. But sometimes we know when failure is a sure thing and failing to create common property where both government and individual ownership are
unsuitable virtually guarantees unsustainable resource depletion by all involved and tragic waste of a country's natural assets."
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