Economic Analysis, Sustainability and Environmental Commons

When confronted with market weaknesses and failures determining sustainability problems for environmental common-pool resources, economic analysis has proposed government intervention as the only alternative available. Elinor Ostrom showed that this dichotomy between market and government is not always helpful, and proposed a more complex approach to institutions focusing on an active role of communities, social norms and a polycentric system of governance. This paper summarizes the main factors at work in determining the role of institutions to deal with sustainability issues and explores the implications of this wider approach in dealing with environmental commons, particularly with global environmental commons, discussing two issues: climate change and biodiversity. Involvement of governments and a reference framework provided by intergovernmental agreements are necessary, but the difficulties of building a successful intergovernmental institutional framework require responsible and convinced actions at the level of consumers and firms, public opinion involvement in individual countries, and coordination between local and national levels of government: provided that some conditions are fulfilled, common resource management can be very helpful in achieving them

WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT TOOLS – WHAT’S IN YOUR TOOLBOX?

Airport managers of today are faced with a variety of choices of what tools to use to deal with their wildlife problems. The Airside Operations staff of the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP), has developed a “Wildlife Toolbox” which offers an assortment of programs, systems and devices to best deal with problem wildlife at a large northern tier hub airport. This “toolbox”, developed over time, includes not only the basics needed by an Airport Manager, but some rather unique tools that managers should consider when developing their own toolboxes

WILDLIFE MANAGEMENT TOOLS – WHAT’S IN YOUR TOOLBOX?

Airport managers of today are faced with a variety of choices of what tools to use to deal with their wildlife problems. The Airside Operations staff of the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport (MSP), has developed a “Wildlife Toolbox” which offers an assortment of programs, systems and devices to best deal with problem wildlife at a large northern tier hub airport. This “toolbox”, developed over time, includes not only the basics needed by an Airport Manager, but some rather unique tools that managers should consider when developing their own toolboxes

Visual Symbols as Aids to Worship

The ministry problem addressed in this dissertation is how can visual symbols become aids to worship, particularly in small churches with limited budgets and traditional architecture? Chapter One defines Christian Worship as the Body of Christ encountering and responding to God as revealed in Jesus Christ, and asks how visual symbols aid or hinder that encounter. A survey of leading authors on worship gives a basis from which to examine the place of visual symbols within the postmodern church. Chapter Two looks at the roles of the tabernacle, the ark of the covenant, and the Temple as visual symbols which were important in Hebrew Worship. The Second Commandment\u27s cautions call for consideration of the nature of worship and of God. Chapter Three examines the roles played by icons, the altar, and stained glass within Christian History. Chapter Four looks at a variety of ways in which visual symbols are aids to contemporary worship. These chapters demonstrate how such symbols have been important throughout the history of Christian worship. Concerns about idolatry and symbols as entertainment or decoration are also addressed. Chapter Five develops an incarnational theology after having looked at the biblical roots of such a theology, revealing the essential connection between the material and the spiritual. It concludes that the ultimate place of the material is to articulate God\u27s praise. Chapter Six turns to the fields of education and learning theory to show that the use of the visual speaks especially powerfully to some people and so the use of visual symbols may be particularly useful to such people in their encounter of God. Chapter Seven applies the conclusion that visual symbols can serve as aids to worship with two sermons using visual symbols, both of which do so in small churches with traditional architecture. A series of worship committee study sessions demonstrates the ways in which a deeper understanding of worship, idolatry, and incarnation can assist churches in deepening their appreciation of the roles of visual symbols in worship as means by which to encounter God

From farmers' fields to data fields and back: A Synthesis of Participatory Information Systems for Irrigation and other Resources: Proceedings of an International Workshop held at the Institute of Agriculture and Animal Science, Rampur, Nepal, 21-26 March 1993

Irrigation / Forestry / Natural resources / Farmer participation / Participatory rural appraisal / Rapid rural appraisal / GIS / Data collection / Databases / Field tests / Farmers' associations / Training / Water rights / Water law / Institutions / Non-governmental organizations / India / Nepal

Beyond the Tragedy of the Commons.

To move beyond Hardin’s tragedy of the commons, it is fundamental to avoid falling into either of two analytical and policy traps: (1) deriving and recommending “panaceas” or (2) asserting “my case is unique.” We can move beyond both traps by self-consciously building diagnostic theory to help unpack and understand the complex interrelationship between social and biophysical factors at different levels of analysis. We need to look for commonalities and differences across studies. This understanding will be augmented if the rich detail produced from case studies is used together with theory to find patterned structures among cases. In this paper, we briefly illustrate important steps of how we can go about diagnosing the emergence and sustainability of self-organization in the fishing context of the Gulf of California, Mexico. By doing so, we are able to move away from the universality proposed by Hardin and understand how two out of three fisheries were able to successfully self-organize, and why one of them continues to be robust over time

Advantages of a Polycentric Approach to Climate Change Policy

Lack of progress in global climate negotiations has led scholars to reconsider polycentric approaches to climate policy. Several examples of subglobal mechanisms to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions have been touted, but it remains unclear why they might achieve better climate outcomes than global negotiations alone. Decades of work conducted by researchers associated with the Vincent and Elinor Ostrom Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis at Indiana University have emphasized two chief advantages of polycentric approaches over monocentric ones: they provide more opportunities for experimentation and learning to improve policies over time, and they increase communications and interactions — formal and informal, bilateral and multilateral — among parties to help build the mutual trust needed for increased cooperation. A wealth of theoretical, empirical and experimental evidence supports the polycentric approach

Smart Antennas Made Practical: The SPIDA Way

Smart antennas are a specific type of directional antenna able to dynamically control the gain as a function of direction. This contrasts with more traditional directional antennas, where the dynamic ability is missing, and with omni-directional antennas, which are designed to have equal gain in all directions

Plasticity facilitates sustainable growth in the commons

In the commons, communities whose growth depends on public goods, individuals often rely on surprisingly simple strategies, or heuristics, to decide whether to contribute to the common good (at risk of exploitation by free-riders). Although this appears a limitation, here we show how four heuristics lead to sustainable growth by exploiting specific environmental constraints. The two simplest ones --contribute permanently or switch stochastically between contributing or not-- are first shown to bring sustainability when the public good efficiently promotes growth. If efficiency declines and the commons is structured in small groups, the most effective strategy resides in contributing only when a majority of individuals are also contributors. In contrast, when group size becomes large, the most effective behavior follows a minimal-effort rule: contribute only when it is strictly necessary. Both plastic strategies are observed in natural systems what presents them as fundamental social motifs to successfully manage sustainability