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Abstract:
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"Considerable empirical research has demonstrated the conditions that result in effective management of CPRs. Less is known about how rules and practices evolve after CPRs are privatized, although a number of studies suggest that property rights transitions often lead to multiple, overlapping and contested sets of rights and obligations in the same resource. In this ethnographic case study, the emergence of new grazing rules and practices is examined in the aftermath of the privatization of a pastoral commons in Kenya. Privatization opens up a new set of possible land uses such as rental and sale of land, and simultaneously it challenges Samburu notions of reciprocity and shared responsibility with those of individual rights. Now, almost twenty years after privatization, these tensions are not resolved. One result is that multiple and contradictory property rights co-occur on the same land, a situation that often leads to disputes as well as lack of consensus about rules. In this social climate of uncertainty regarding rights and responsibilities, and where leadership seems to be weak, people appear to be relying more on localized social networks to meet their pragmatic needs for pasture."
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