An institutional approach to appropriation and provision in the commons : a case study in the Highlands of Eritrea

[摘要] The natural resources mainly land, forests, and grazing lands in the Highlands ago-ecologicalzone of Eritrea are in a severely degraded state. And much of these common pool resourcescomprise commons i.e. they are managed under the common property rights managementregimes.'The tragedy of the commons, model suggests that all commons will inexorably sufferoverexploitation and degradation. Contrary to this deterministic proposition, however,common property theory argues that the 'tragedy' is not due to inherent flaws in the commonproperty rights management regimes, but because of institutional failure to control access toresources, and to make and enforce internal decisions for collective use. If the commonsdilemma situation exists- i.e. 'tragedy', then the underlying problem is the degeneration ofthe existing common property rights resource management regime into open-access-likeregime-a condition that can potentially trigger 'the tragedy of the commons. The questionof how to deal with the problem of the commons is, therefore, primarily an issue of theexistence of efficient institutions.The prevailing severe degradation of the common-pool resources in the Highlands of thecountry thus calls into question the robustness of the common property rights regimes that arein place for the governance of these resources. This thesis attempts to address this importantproblem specifically in relation to forest and grazing land common pool resources.A case study based on a single-case qualitative and exploratory-explanatory research designwas carried out in a village located in the Highlands of the country. Data were collectedthrough various forms of interviews (semi-structured interviews, in-depth interviews, keyinformants interviews, group discussions, and informal conversational interviews), directobservation, and document review. The data, gathered largely through using these separatelines of enquiry, were crosschecked to provide a triangulation of methods and to strengthenthe validity and reliability of the data.The empirical findings reveal that existing common property rights management regimes forthe management of the local common pool resources of the case study area have weakenedover time. These findings indicate that, there is a significant incongruence betweenappropriation and provision rules. And this is manifested in terms of appropriationexternalities and demand side and supply side provision externalities. This situation impliesthat existing local institutional arrangements i.e. common property rights managementregimes in the case study area are not sufficiently robust to solve common pool resourceappropriation and provision externalities.Though generalisation cannot be made beyond the case that was studied, there are severallessons that may be drawn from this field analysis, which may have valid implications for thenatural resources management challenges and opportunities of the entire Highlands agoecologicalzone of the country.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University