Reformulating the Commons

Found at: https://hdl.handle.net/10535/8228
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Type:	Conference Paper
Author:	Ostrom, Elinor
Conference:	Background paper on Common Property Rights, Natural Resources and Sustainability, at the Fifth Biennial Conference of the International Society for Ecological Economics
Location:	Santiago, Chile
Conf. Date:	November 15-19
Date:	1998
URI:	https://hdl.handle.net/10535/8228
Sector:	Theory
Region:
Subject(s):	Workshop design principles common pool resources--theory
Abstract:	"The conventional theory used to predict and explain how local users relate to resources that they share makes a general prediction that users will be unable to reformulate the rules that they face and extricate themselves from the tragedy of the commons. Using this theoretical view of the world, there are no self-organized groups. Without externally imposed government ownership or privatization, jointly used natural systems will be destroyed. Empirical studies have provided data, however, that considerable variance in performance exists. Many more local users self-organize and are successful than is consistent with the conventional theory. The beginnings of an alternative theory are presented in this paper."

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