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Conference Paper Property, Proprietorship and Politics: Law and the Structure of Strategic Opportunities in the California Water Industry(1963) Ostrom, Vincent"In any going society, the patterns of economic behavior are maintained by virtue of certain rule of conduct or law which formulate the range of strategic opportunities that are available to those who function within that society. Law places parameters upon conduct by indicating the boundaries of lawful and unlawful behavior, provides a basic structure of incentives for ordering the behavior of all persons in a society, and affords certain facilities for the pursuit of opportunities. Such legal concepts as 'rights' in relations to 'goods' and 'remedies' in relation to 'injuries' or 'wrongs' clearly reflect a structure of incentives with reference to an implicit moral order. The existence of arrangement for the negotiation and adjudication of interest, in relation to such concepts, constitute the institutional facilities that shape the strategic opportunities available in any society. "If law is to be effective, it must be enforceable. An unenforceable rule enunciating a 'Thou shall not' proposition is no more than a pious platitude. On the other hand, the imposition of unarticulated rile of conduct without recourse to the formal rules of law may be an exercise of irresponsible power, tyranny, or brute force. A rule of law exists only when enforceable rules of conduct are made explicit and when the behavior of all participants in a social structure can be held accountable in reference to the explicit standards of the law."Conference Paper Public Water, Private Land: Origins of the Acreage Limitation Controversy, 1933-1953(1978) Koppes, Clayton R."In 1976 the Ninth Circuit Court Appeals in San Francisco sent a series of shock waves along clearly defined fault lines of California agriculture. The court ruled that the federal reclamation laws dating to 1902 mean what they say: Heavily subsidized irrigation water can be distributed only to 160 acres per individual landowner, and anyone holding more than a quarter section must dispose of the excess land in order to receive reclamation water. The ruling occasioned surprise and consternation in some quarters, for it seemed to presage major alterations in the land-tenure pattern of the Central Valley of California, and potentially on reclamation projects throughout the West."Conference Paper Western Water Institutions in a Contemporary Perspective(1964) Ostrom, Vincent"The imperative necessity of today in considering western water institutions is a critical assessment of where we are and a careful identification of some of the problems which must be faced if we are to make intelligent use of the region's water resources. In this essay, I would like to begin a critical reconsideration of basic water policies and institutional arrangements by pointing up some of the incongruities between transitional formulations and contemporary requirements. I have the profoundest respect for the intelligence and imagination that went into the formulation of the institutional arrangements which have done so much to facilitate the development of the American West. But, the achievements of former generations do not remove the responsibility for using our best intelligence in analyizing contemporary developments and for using our most effective imagination in considering the future course of events. At the risk of oversimplification, I would like to challenge a few implicit assumptions and basic commitments which seem to pervade much of our traditional approach to contemporary water problems."Working Paper Institutional Arrangements for Water Resource Development(1971) Ostrom, Vincent"This report examines the structural elements that have entered into the development of the American water industry, with special reference to the California water industry. A variety of public and private enterprises engaged in water resource development and the rendering of water services are analyzed and evaluated in terms of the theory of organization used by public administration and administrative analysts, and the concepts of political economists. The level of productivity of the American water industry is examined as a consequence of opportunities for public entrepreneurship afforded by a system of overlapping jurisdictions and fragmentation of authority. The report sets forth problems in the assessment of organizational arrangements, examines the terms and conditions of political choice and reviews the choice of institutional arrangements in the development of the California water industry."Working Paper Exchange of Water Supply(1960) Ostrom, Vincent"California's water 'problem' arises from a personal preference congeries relevant to an area yielding limited water supplies. Semi-arid Mediterranean Southern California coastal regions provide climatic amenities attractive to population. These same weather conditions are expensive to water resources. By contrast, more abundantly supplied Northern California has not attracted large populations. Yet in the modern metropolis a relatively abundant water supply is essential to meet a variety of requirements. The resolution of this paradox is central to California water resource development. Marked contrasts in water yield and population distribution can be noted in comparisons of the south and north coastal areas of California. The south coastal area comprising Ventura basin and the Southern California coastal plain contains over one-half of the state's population with less than two percent of the state's natural run-off. By contrast, the north coastal area has less than three per cent of the state's population with nearly forty per cent of the state's water crop. The problem of geographic redistribution of water supplies is further complicated by extreme seasonal and cyclical variations in floods and droughts."Working Paper Socio-economic Survey of Lower Rufiji Flood Plain: Rufiji Delta Agricultural System(1974) Sandberg, Audun"This report has been prepared by BRALUP researchers for planning officers and TANU cadres at the district and regional level, and for members of the Rufiji Basin Development Authority. It deals with the specific problem: how to implement the policy of ujamaa in the Rufiji Delta, which is the lower part of the Rufiji Flood Plain. (The upper part of the flood plain is called the Rufiji Valley.) Now that the Rufiji Flood Plain has been made a special National Development Area, there is a great need for data on natural and human resources. This report aims at providing such background data which can enable the planners to make realistic plans to further the development of peasants in the Rufiji Delta."Conference Paper Deep-Sea Mining: Comments from the Floor(1968) Goldie, L.F.E."This Association has, since its foundation, participated honorably and effectively in the 'progressive development of international law and its codification'. Thus, long before the United Nations General Assembly was given this function, the International Law Association was called into being as a scientific group above the contest of sectional interests and as an entity whose deliberations would clarify problems both de lege lata (questions of legal analysis and codification) and de lege ferenda (questions of law reform and justice)."Conference Paper Institutional Failure and Reform: A Problem in Economic and Political Analysis of Water Resource Development(1967) Ostrom, Vincent(From pp. 1, 2, & 8): "The purpose of this conference is to consider the question of what special contribution, if any, can political scientists make to the analysis and formulation of public policy? At an earlier time, essentially the same question might have been posed by inquiring about What special contribution can political scientists make to political reform? More recently, the reform motif has become something of an anathema to the more scientifically rigorous political scientists. Yet, we keep returning to the problems of reform like moths drawn to a candle flame. Perhaps we will be able to make a special contribution as political scientists to the analysis and formulation of public policy only when we develop the capability for analyzing the issue of reform with some measure of professional competence. "My invitation to participate in this meeting was to direct attention to the tangible and practical problems of public policy associated with water resource development and not to discourse about political reform as such. Yet, contemporary studies of water resource development persistently turn to allegations of institutional failure among resource development and management agencies and conclude by either explicitly or implicitly proposing a program of reform. Most of these studies have been made by economists, those done by political scientists have a similar, albeit, variant approach to institutional failure and reform. The studies by economists are both more systematic and more consistent in their critique, and I shall use their work as the principal point of departure. "There are quite tangible and practical reasons, unrelated to the wiles of politicians, for problems of water resource development to become deeply involved in the political process. The water problem is, in fact, a multitude of problems, but most of these are problems of fluidity. Whenever water behaves as a liquid, it has the characteristics of 1) a common pool, flow resource involving; 2) a complex bundle of potential goods and bads which sustain; 3) a high level of interaction or interdependency among the various joint and alternative uses. The interrelationships among all three of these characteristics of a water resource situation simply compounds the difficulties in settling upon stable, long-term institutional arrangements for the economics development of water resources."Conference Paper Water Resource Management: Regional Planning(1963) Ostrom, Vincent"An analysis of American experience in water resource management and regional planning afford a useful opportunity to examine the development of American institutions in an important segment of American society. The ways that resources are exploited for human purposes is an important key to an understanding of institutional arrangements and public policies in any society. New institutional arrangements and accommodations are initiated as new problems and opportunities arise in the development of water resource potentials. At the same time, many of the earlier institutional arrangements maintain their continuity of operation within the changing social scene. "This analysis will first turn to a consideration of patterns of local development undertaken by individual proprietors, private agencies, and by local government agencies. These developments largely involved single- purpose projects concerned with the consumptive use of water for on-the-land developments. The fullest development of water resource management by local agencies can be illustrated by reference to the experience of the Southern California metropolitan region. Efforts to develop regional solutions in some of the large inter-state watershed basins will then be explored. Specific references will be made to experience in the Tennessee valley and in the Columbia basin."Conference Paper Economics of Competition for Water(1965) Davis, Robert K."Each day something like 300 billion gallons of fresh water is withdrawn for use in homes, factories, businesses, or on irrigated farmland. These quantities are withdrawn from water courses, kept in circulation sometimes for several cycles of re-use, and then either returned to a water course, which may be a ground water aquifer, or depleted into the atmosphere. Some water is, of course, embodied in the products of manufacture. There is both immensity and great diversity in the uses we make of the water we withdrawn from our lakes, streams and underground aquifers."