What makes Socio-Ecological Systems Robust? An Institutional Analysis of the 2000 Year-old Ifugao Society

Abstract

"Scholars have often puzzled over why ancient socio-ecological systems (SES) have collapsed or survived overtime. This paper attempts to explain the case of the 2,000-year old Ifugao SES and the contemporary challenges they now face. Five observations can be drawn. First, the Ifugao case does not fit some of the conventional theoretical explanations for the collapse or survival of SES. Second, the Ifugao’s primogeniture system of property rights along with the their customary laws and practices have played important roles in maintaining the robustness of their SES in the past 2,000 years through their effects on ecological integrity. Third, the Ifugao SES today is faced with contemporary challenges with varying effects on its robustness: integration into a postcolonial social order, the effects of tourism and agricultural development, migration, urbanization and the introduction of Christianity and mass education. Fourth, despite these changes, the collapse of the Ifugao SES is not a certainty (i.e. shift to a new domain of attraction that cannot support a human population, or that will induce a transition that causes long-term human suffering)."