Common Pool Resource (CPR)

國

立 政 治 大 學

‧

N a

tio na

l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y

The distribution of benefits is an important issue which can be accounted for the success or failure of CBT initiatives development. It was identified and has been discussed by most authors researching CBT. It is important to clarify that “benefits” do not mean only direct economic benefit from sales of products and services, but also other benefits in the social, cultural, and environmental spheres. This means that the visitors have another role besides their regular role of generating income and enhancing the pride and dignity of locals that see outsiders interested in their environment and culture: “tourism is helping to protect the local culture in two ways. First, seeing tourists attracted and interested in their culture is making locals proud of their identity and more engaged in traditional folk customs. Second, money generated from these events provides reasons for the governments to protect previously neglected or even discouraged ethnic minority cultures” (Nyaupane, Morais, & Dowler, 2006: 1379).

Although there are different ways to distribute incomes and benefits from CBT though the community, scholars agree that these distribution should be as far and as wide as possible (Lalayan 2014; Armstrong, 2012). Simpson (2008) explains that the way the community sees an increase in net benefits from the CBT, is very important for the success of CBT projects. According to Hipwell (2007: 880-881), scholars agree that for a successful CBT venture, “it must provide tangible benefits for the host as a whole, [and] it must bring about an equitable and (as nearly as possible) universal improvement in the quality of life of residents.” This means that every community members should feel they benefit from the CBT venture.

Fair distribution is mostly achieved by community earnings and employment, but can also be achieved in variety of ways, for example, contributions to a community development fund which allows sharing of financial benefits among community members regardless of their level of involvement in the CBT. (Schipani, 2008; Armstrong, 2012). “Failure in this respect can generate hostility and resistance from those who feel excluded” (Armstrong, 2012: 13).

1.4.3. Common Pool Resource (CPR)

Common Pool Resources (CPR) refer to “a natural or man-made resource system that is sufficiently large as to make it costly (but not impossible) to exclude potential beneficiaries from obtaining benefits from its use" (Ostrom 1990, 30). Unlike pure public goods, common pool

‧

resources face problems of congestion or overuse, because they are subtractable. A common pool resource typically consists of a core resource (e.g. water or fish), which defines the stock variable, while providing a limited quantity of extractable fringe units, which defines the flow variable.

While the core resource is to be protected or entertained in order to allow for its continuous exploitation, the fringe units can be harvested or consumed (Ostrom 1990). In other words, CPR is characterized by high subtractability, meaning that one individual’s use of it detracts significantly from another person’s ability to use it, and by low excludability, meaning that it is difficult to prevent any particular individual from using it.

CPRs are different from the three other types of goods: (1) public goods (e.g. national defense services), that have low excludability but low subtractability; (2) toll goods (e.g. toll roads), that have low subtractability but high excludability; and (3) private goods (most products) that have both high subtractability and high excludability (Ostrom et al. 1994; Cronk & Steadman, 2002)

Table 1: Types of Goods and Services

The most common example of a CPR is a plot of grazing land shared by a group of farmers. When a farmer adds an additional livestock to the common land it reduces its usefulness to the rest of the farmers. However, it is difficult to exclude any particular individual farmer or its livestock from the land.

Ostrom, who reshaped the way we look at the term Common Pool Resource, has debunked Garrett Hardin’s important essay on “The Tragedy of the Commons” (Hardin, 1968). Hardin’s key take was that CPRs are inherently prone to overexploitation. This is because, according to him, each individual will eventually try to exploit the CPR to the fullest, even though the ideal thing for all involved individuals might be to restrain themselves from doing so. Hardin’s essay gave the study of CPRs a pessimistic understanding. The common solution to the tragedy of the common problem was one of the following: (1) to turn the CPR into a private good by dividing it up, which was perceived to give the individuals an incentive to conserve the resource for the future; and (2) using

Exclusion

Jointness of Use or Consumption

Alternative Use Joint Use

Feasible Private Goods Toll Goods

Infeasible Common Pool Resources Public Goods

‧

立 政 治 大 學

‧

N a

tio na

l C h engchi U ni ve rs it y

the mechanism controlled by the power of the state to enforce conservation of the resource. For more than 20 years, this were the solutions that policy makers were familiar with and perceived as good solutions to the problem raised by Hardin (Cronk & Steadman, 2002).

Hardin concluded that valuable open-access common-pool resources would be overexploited, an inevitable tragedy. However, Ostrom showed that establishing effective governance arrangements on a local scale has proved as easier (Ostrom, 2008).

1.4.3.1. CPR Management

The message of Ostrom’s work was that groups are capable of avoiding the tragedy of the commons without requiring top-down regulation, at least if certain conditions are met (Ostrom 1990, 2010). In this case, it is needed to understand the importance of renewability of the resource units. When the resource units are renewable, it means that there is a way which they can be managed. This is what makes the management so important. Rosenbloom (2014: 12) writes that

“the common pool resource definition attempts to capture both the dynamic ecological system and the man-made system of rules and regulations, the complexity of the ramifications that stem from the intersection of these two systems, and the proper division of rights among those seeking to use natural capital.”

Ostrom’s (1990: 90) message is that groups are capable of avoiding the tragedy of the commons without requiring top-down regulation, if certain conditions are met. Ostrom had identified and defined several characteristics or “principles” descriptive of local communities that developed successful management institutions that allow individuals to achieve long-term productive outcomes in managing common-pool resources: (1) clearly defined boundaries; (2) congruence between appropriation and provision rules and local conditions; (3) collective-choice arrangements;

(4) monitoring; (5) graduated sanctions; (6) conflict-resolution mechanisms; (7) minimal recognition of rights to organize; and (8) nested enterprises.

In more details, these principles for successful CPR management are:

(1) Clearly defined boundaries: Individuals or households who have rights to withdraw resource units from the CPR must be clearly defined, as must the boundaries of the CPR itself. In short, these are rules set up by the community that uses the CPR.

‧

(2) Congruence between appropriation and provision rules and local conditions: Appropriation rules restricting time, place, technology, and/or quantity of resource units are related to local conditions and to provision rules requiring labour, material, and/or money.

(3) Collective-choice arrangements: Most individuals affected by the operational rules can participate in modifying the operational rules.

(4) Monitoring: Monitors, who actively audit CPR conditions and appropriator behavior, are accountable to the appropriators or are the appropriators.

(5) Graduated sanctions: Appropriators who violate operational rules are likely to be assessed graduated sanctions (depending on the seriousness and context of the offence) by other appropriators, by officials accountable to these appropriators, or by both.

(6) Conflict-resolution mechanisms: Appropriators and their officials have rapid access to low-cost local arenas to resolve conflicts among appropriators or between appropriators and officials. Provide accessible, low-cost means for dispute resolution.

(7) Minimal recognition of rights to organize: The rights of appropriators to devise their own institutions are not challenged by external governmental authorities.

(8) Nested enterprises: This is relevant for CPRs that are parts of larger systems.⁷ Appropriation, provision, monitoring, enforcement, conflict resolution, and governance activities are organized in multiple layers of nested enterprises.