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Book Chapter Public Choice Analysis of Institutional Constraints on Firewood Production Strategies in the West African Sahel(Resources for the Future, Inc, 1979) Thomson, James T.; Russell, C. S.; Nicholson, Norman"This essay presents a public choice policy analysis of firewood production possibilities in the West African Sahel, the arid southern fringe of the Sahara Desert."Working Paper African Villages and Public Services(1978) Thomson, James T."This paper presents an analysis of the theories underlying the efforts at development in the Sahel, and then examines some of the probable consequences of what appear to be existing orientations. In particular, the paper will focus on consequences of current state political orientations for village ability to participate effectively in programs designed to improve the management of renewable natural resources. Elements of public choice theory are used to clarify implications of questions raised by the analysis."Working Paper International Food and Renewable Energy Programs in the Sahel: The Effect on Implementation of Local Institutional Structures(1977) Thomson, James T."I propose to investigate the part local governments ought to play in implementation of internationally-organized attempts to increase production of food and renewable energy resources in the drought-stricken West African Sahel. Scholars and practitioners agree that four critical public good problems must be resolved if food and energy production goals are to be achieved. They are: (1) forest conservation, (2) range management, (3) bottom land improvement and (4) associated land tenure issues. My prior research in a Hausa-speaking area of central Niger persuades me that effective management of international efforts to solve these problems hinges upon the capacity of local communities to mount and maintain various forms of collective action. Without such local institutional capability, incentives necessary to encourage individual and group efforts at the rural grass roots are lacking. Absent those incentives, international programs designed to enhance production of food and energy resources and involving the expenditure of literally billions of dollars will be critically, perhaps fatally, undermined."Book Chapter Trouble Case Investigation of a Problem in Nigerien Rural Modernization: Forest Conservation(University of California Press, 1973) Thomson, James T.; Charlick, R."This paper assesses the trouble case methodology as a research tool in the study of Nigerien rural modernization processes. As a vehicle to illustrate the methodology, I take the government forest conservation program, a critical if somewhat neglected component of the overall Nigerien rural modernization effort. "The paper comprises three parts: history of the forestry problem and attempts to solve it (sections I and II); theoretical framework, including a public goods analysis of the problem, a model of legal relationships, and a description of the trouble case methodology (sections III-V); and data and conclusions, consisting of forestry trouble cases, estimates of the effectiveness of current attempts to solve the problem and of other possible approaches, and an assessment of the merits of the trouble case methodology in this type of study (sections VI-VIII). "It is argued here that the Nigerian forest, from the viewpoint of most users, is an unregulated common property. In the absence of regulation it will be destroyed, with disastrous consequences for the environment and the local human ecologies. Regulation is thus a necessary condition for Nigeriens to sustain mutually productive relationship with each other concerning their forest resources. But current enforcement procedures, rendered ineffective by corruption and rule manipulation, fail to curb the developing negative dynamic in which users have little incentive to reorganize their demand patterns and no incentive to generate new supplies as existing ones are exhausted. A tragedy is therefore in the making."