Public participation and willingness to cooperate in common-pool resource management: a field experiment with fishing communities in Brazil

The primary evidence about the factors determining successful self-governance of common-pool resources (CPR) has come from case studies. More recently, this observational evidence has been complemented by insights from economic experiments. Here we advance a third approach in which the role of local deliberation about the management of a fishery resource is investigated in a field experiment. Using three control and three treatment communities in a freshwater fishery, we tested if participation in developing specific measures for community-based sustainable CPR management increased the willingness to contribute to the implementation of these measures. Each community was also exposed to information about their community leader's advice about the proposed measures. Both participation and leader advice affected the willingness of participants to contribute to one of three concrete proposals. However, the strongest influence on individual willingness to contribute was exerted by the individual beliefs about the cooperation of others in CPR management. --local deliberation,participatory research,willingness to contribute,beliefs,fishing resources,field experiment

Messung der akademischen Forschungsleistung in den Wirtschaftswissenschaften: Reputation vs. Zitierhäufigkeiten

This article discusses the provision of sophisticated architecture from the perspective of welfare economics. Given that rational real estate investors do not take into account the external effects of building design quality on the neighborhood, there is a risk of underinvestment into the external appearance of buildings in the market equilibrium. Whether public interventions as well as recent attempts to promote urban economic development by architectural landmark projects are justified, however, essentially depends on the existence of significant spillovers. On this background, we discuss evidence on architectural externalities available for Berlin, Germany and provide fist estimates of aggregated external benefit

Landscape amenities and local development: a review of migration, regional economic and hedonic pricing studies

With rapid urban expansion and loss of open space, attractive local landscapes will continue to gain importance in location decisions and on political agendas. The present study reviews the evidence on the local economic role of landscape amenities from two major strands of empirical research, migration and regional economic models, and hedonic pricing models. Following common amenity definitions we identify 71 relevant peer-reviewed studies and systematically assess the reported effects of the landscape amenity variables. The migration and regional economic studies suggest that migrants are attracted by amenities nearly as often as by low taxes. Reported effects of amenities on income and employment are less consistent. The hedonic studies suggest that nature reserves and land cover diversity have mostly, open space and forest often, and agricultural land rarely positive effects on housing prices. Studies at larger geographic scales and studies involving urban areas were more likely to identify significant amenity effects. Some limitations of the evidence may be overcome with better datasets and modeling approaches. However, in line with other recent work, the limitations also highlight the need for complementary information from the analysis of political preferences for land-use management

It’s the Cost Credibility, Stupid! A Comment on “Consequentiality: A Theoretical and Experimental Exploration of a Single Binary Choice”

This comment takes up the discussion about the incentive compatibility of contingent valuation surveys revived by a recent paper of Carson, Groves and List (2014) in this journal. We feel that the conclusions the authors draw from their theoretical and experimental work cannot be generalized to contingent valuation (CV) surveys. We single out the lack of cost credibility as the principal obstacle to incentive compatibility and propose some amendments to the survey protocol that foster the cost credibility of random-bid CV studies

It’s the Cost Credibility, Stupid! A Comment on “Consequentiality: A Theoretical and Experimental Exploration of a Single Binary Choice”

This comment takes up the discussion about the incentive compatibility of contingent valuation surveys revived by a recent paper of Carson, Groves and List (2014) in this journal. We feel that the conclusions the authors draw from their theoretical and experimental work cannot be generalized to contingent valuation (CV) surveys. We single out the lack of cost credibility as the principal obstacle to incentive compatibility and propose some amendments to the survey protocol that foster the cost credibility of random-bid CV studies

Public participation and willingness to cooperate in common-pool resource management: a field experiment with fishing communities in Brazil

The primary evidence about the factors determining successful self-governance of common-pool resources (CPR) has come from case studies. More recently, this observational evidence has been complemented by insights from economic experiments. Here we advance a third approach in which the role of local deliberation about the management of a fishery resource is investigated in a field experiment. Using three control and three treatment communities in a freshwater fishery, we tested if participation in developing specific measures for community-based sustainable CPR management increased the willingness to contribute to the implementation of these measures. Each community was also exposed to information about their community leader's advice about the proposed measures. Both participation and leader advice affected the willingness of participants to contribute to one of three concrete proposals. However, the strongest influence on individual willingness to contribute was exerted by the individual beliefs about the cooperation of others in CPR management

How much does journal reputation tell us about the academic interest and relevance of economic research? Empirical analysis and implications for environmental economic research

Unlike in other disciplines, research output in economics is commonly measured based on the disciplinary reputation of the journals in which an author has published. Here, I examine how much output measures based on journal reputation tell us about the academic interest and relevance of economic papers as measured by frequency of citation. Using data from the 2008 Handelsblatt ranking of economists in German speaking countries and interdisciplinary citation data from the Web of Science, I find that researcher scores based on journal reputation explain only about 30 percent of the variation (variance) in article citations. When the top 10 (20) percent of the researchers according to journal reputation scores are excluded, the percentage of explained variation in citation frequency drops to 8 (3) percent. Furthermore, using environmental economics journals as an example, I show that the traditional output measures strongly discourage applied and interdisciplinary economic research. The findings confirm that the traditional output measures provide incentives for narrow economic work even if that work is of interest to only few other researchers. Responsible hiring committees and funding institutions should take these problems seriously and re-consider existing standards in the evaluation of economic research

Nutzenmessung bei öffentlichen Gütern: Konzeptionelle und empirische Probleme in der Praxis

Die Abwägung von Kosten und Nutzen spielt bei der Bereitstellung öffentlicher Güter eine zentrale Rolle. Mithilfe welcher Methode lässt sich der Nutzen öffentlicher Güter am besten schätzen? Welche typischen konzeptionellen und empirischen Probleme treten bei den einzelnen Schätzmethoden häufig auf

External Costs of Agriculture Derived from Payments for Agri-Environment Measures: Framework and Application to Switzerland

The costs of unintended side effects of agriculture such as water pollution cannot be directly observed in markets. However, the values society places on healthy agricultural environments are increasingly reflected in payments to farmers for measures to avoid or reduce environmental damage. This paper presents a framework for estimating external costs of agriculture from payment rates of agri-environment measures addressing specific externality issues. The framework is applied to the broad range of agri-environment measures implemented in Swiss agricultural policy. Estimates of external costs are derived for emissions of greenhouse gases, ammonia, nitrate and pesticides, soil erosion, habitat deficits, and animal suffering. The total external costs of Swiss agriculture are estimated at CHF 3.651 billion (CHF 3494 per hectare) when the calculations are based on the agri-environment measures’ average avoidance costs and of CHF 5.560 billion (CHF 5321 per hectare) when the calculations are based on highest observed avoidance costs. Potential applications include internalization policies, evaluations of agri-environment support, and integrated environmental and economic accounting

Inadequate Standards in the Valuation of Public Goods and Ecosystem Services: Why Economists, Environmental Scientists and Policymakers Should Care

Surveys of stated willingness to pay (WTP) are increasingly used to assess the value of public goods and ecosystem services. However, the currently dominant survey protocols and practices are inadequate. This is most evident from robust findings that the valuations are heavily influenced by the response options or response scales used in the valuation questions. The widely accepted survey guidelines do not require the validity tests and reporting standards that would be needed to make the uncertainty of the results transparent. The increasing use of inadequate survey results by policymakers threatens to undermine trust in environmental valuation, environmental policies, and political institutions. The objective of this paper is to explain the relevant issues and the available alternatives in survey-based valuation to a wider audience of non-specialized economists, environmental scientists, and policymakers