Elinor Ostrom and Mary Beth Wertime
The International Forestry Resources and Institutions (IFRI) research program is a long-term effort to establish an international network of Collaborating Research Centers (CRCs) who will:
This Research Strategy was originally drafted in the initial planning phases of the project in 1994. It is appended to this volume of papers from the IFRI research program so that readers can understand the design of the overall program as well as the findings from some of the initial studies.
Drastic measures to halt the alarming rates of deforestation, especially in the tropical forests of Central and South America, Asia, and Africa, are regularly proposed by officials, scholars, and those concerned with environmental issues. The term "crisis" often appears in the titles of scientific reports.64 Noted scholars speak about "catastrophes about to happen,"65 or "mass extinction episodes" (Myers, 1988: 28). Indeed, projected rates of population growth, deforestation, and species loss are startling:
These losses are often attributed to a set of causes that appear to vary depending on institutional affiliation, academic persuasion, or business/economic concern. Many individuals and environmental groups view commercial logging as the cause of deforestation.70 Shifting or new cultivation is viewed as the primary cause by scholars in other narratives.71 Excessive energy consumption is cited by others. Population increase is considered by many to be a prime candidate causing deforestation and other environmental harms.72
A singular view of the cause is frequently paired with a singular view of the solution. Preservationists have often addressed the problem through "save and preserve" solutions. Maintaining the position that strict actions must be taken to preserve the old-growth forests and the diversity of plant and animal life, proponents of this argument push for protected areas where certain activities, such as logging, are prohibited and species such as the spotted owl are protected.
Policy analysts often recommend changes in international agreements or shifts in national policy as a solution. At the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) held in Rio de Janeiro in June of 1992, three major policy documents were produced at the conference (the Rio Declaration, Agenda 21, and the Forest Principles) and two conventions released for signature (the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Convention on Climate Change). All of these documents proposed the adoption of international standards to regulate the use and management of natural resources-particularly forest resources, so as to enhance their diversity and sustainability over time.73
National governments have adopted government and industry reforestation schemes, forest-based industrial developments, and forestry action plans. National policies range from changing forest commons into private land, assigning governments the responsibility of managing reserves and severely limiting access to these reserves, or prescribing community nurseries of pre-determined tree species in rapidly changing environments-without regard for indigenous people, their changing environments, and methods of management of forest resources.
Agreement seems to exist about the need for immediate action. Less agreement exists about which policies will lead to actual improvements. A common theme in the evaluations of national and international efforts to stem the rates of deforestation is that many of these programs actually "accelerate the very damage their proponents intend to reverse" (Korten, 1993: 8).74
If the programs that are supposed to stem deforestation tend to accelerate it, something is wrong! The IFRI research program will attempt to ascertain what is wrong and provide better answers to the question of how to reduce deforestation and loss of biodiversity in many different parts of the world. In our efforts to understand what is wrong, we have identified three problems: (1) knowledge gaps, (2) information gaps, and (3) the need for greater assessment capabilities located in countries with substantial forest resources.
1. Knowledge gaps refer to the lack of an accepted scientific understanding about which variables are the primary causes of deforestation and biodiversity losses, and how these variables are linked to one another. Policies that suggest ways to improve the effects of deforestation are often based on a model or theory about why deforestation is accelerating. However, the current status of theoretical explanations of the causes of deforestation and biodiversity losses is in flux. No agreement exists within the scientific community concerning which of multiple contending models of deforestation and biodiversity loss are empirically valid.
2. Information gaps refer to a lack of reliable data about specific policy-relevant variables in a particular time and location. In other words, the data needed to test competing theories of deforestation and biodiversity losses are not generally available. Detailed data about forest conditions within a country that are important for policy making are also not available.
3. Assessment capability is the presence of permanent in-country centers with interdisciplinary staffs trained in rigorous forest mensuration techniques, participatory appraisal methods, institutional analysis, statistics, qualitative analysis, geographic information systems (GIS), and database management.
Within the U.S., the Committee on Environment and Natural Resources (CENR) of the National Science and Technology Council focused on the need for a better scientific foundation for future policy initiatives. CENR held a National Forum on Environment and Natural Resource R&D at the National Academy of Sciences in late March of 1994 in Washington, D.C. The Forum brought together representatives from industry, academia, nongovernmental organizations, Congress, and state and local governments to articulate their views on the strategy and priorities for issues related to environmental change. The Forum reached several conclusions about critical research needs that are relevant to the design of the IFRI research program. These include:
1. the scientific basis for integrated ecosystem management;
2. the socioeconomic dimensions of environmental change;
3. science policy tools;
4. observations, and information and data management; and 5. environmental technologies (ibid.).
When focusing on the socioeconomic dimensions of environmental change, the Forum identified specific research that needed substantial augmentation and emphasis. These included efforts to:
These critical research needs are challenging and require diverse approaches. One approach is that of global monitoring, relying primarily on national inventories and satellite imagery. Major progress to implement this approach has been taken by FAO (1993). A second approach is to link permanent forestry and agro-forestry Research Stations to foster more rapid exchange of scientific findings about how ecological systems are affected by (and affect) climate changes, increased pollution levels, and other environmental threats. Efforts of the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) to create such linkages have been successfully initiated.
A third approach-the one taken by the IFRI research program-complements the first two approaches and generates policy-relevant information not available from other strategies. The IFRI program provides an interdisciplinary set of variables about forest management and use that are assessed near the forest in relationship to the local communities utilizing and governing the forest. The effects of district, national, and international policies as they impact on a local setting can be assessed through this effort. The results of IFRI studies provide in-country information for policymakers at the local, district, regional, and national levels. This information will be collected by researchers who are deeply familiar with the local settings rather than collected from secondary sources that are compiled by international organizations or by national agencies drawing on various sources of externally compiled information. The IFRI research program relies on the building of a permanent international network of CRCs. Each CRC will:
The goals of the IFRI program are to (1) address the issue of knowledge gaps by seeking ways to enhance interdisciplinary knowledge, (2) to address information gaps by providing a means to ground-truth aerial data and spatially link forest use to deforestation and reforestation, and (3) to address the need for greater assessment capabilities by building capacity to rigorously collect, store, analyze, and disseminate data in participating countries.
Any system of interaction involving a relatively large number of variables that relate to one another overtime with complex feedback loops is immensely more difficult to understand and control than simple systems tackled in more mechanistic areas, such as in classical physics. Human uses of forest resources involve a large number of potentially relevant variables that operate over time with complex feedback loops. Effective policy interventions are elusive until an empirically warrantable consensus is attained about the set of important variables that impinge on deforestation and biodiversity losses.
Recent attempts to understand processes leading to general environmental harms involve multivariable models. Paul and Anne Ehrlich (1991: 7), for example, propose a three-variable causal model:
I = P x A x T, where,
I = impact on the environment,
P = population size,
A = affluence (as measured by levels of consumption), and
T = technologies employed.
An alternative model developed by Grant (1994) for UNICEF to capture processes occurring primarily in developing countries is the PPE spiral where poverty and population pressures are viewed as reinforcing one another and jointly impinging on environmental conditions while all three factors-population, poverty, and environment-affect and are affected by political instability.
The extent of the knowledge gap becomes apparent upon careful examination of these two recent and respected models. They disagree on the size of the relationship between poverty on environmental variables.75 The Ehrlichs include population size in their model, which is a state variable operationalized by either population density or the total number of people. The UNICEF model identifies population growth rather than current size. Technology appears in the Ehrlich model but not in the UNICEF model. Political instability appears in the UNICEF model but not in the Ehrlich model. The logical places to intervene are different depending on which model best describes the world. If one accepts the Ehrlichs' view, one should focus attention on the most affluent countries ignoring political instability. Accepting the UNICEF view, one would focus on the poorest countries and stress the impact of political instability.
The effect of opening a region to increased market pressures is also a matter of debate in the literature. Many scholars presume that integrating local resource systems into larger markets by building roads and market centers increases the temptation that local users face to overharvest (see, for example, Agrawal, 1994). On the other hand, William Ascher (1995) argues that providing the poor in remote regions with better access to income-earning activities reduces their need to overuse forest resources and encourages a longer time horizon in making decisions about the use of local resources (see also Fox, 1993).
The knowledge gap is illuminated further by an important study by Robert T. Deacon (1994) on "Deforestation and the Rule of Law in a Cross-Section of Countries.76 Using FAO estimates of forest cover in 1980 and 1985 to measure the proportionate rate of deforestation between 1980 and 1985, Deacon first examines the impact of population growth. He finds, in support of the UNICEF model, that a "one percent increase in population during 1975-1980 is associated with a proportionate forest cover reduction of 0.24 - 0.28 percent during 1980-85" (Deacon, 1994: 8). Supportive of the Ehrlich model, Deacon also finds that a "given rate of population growth is associated with a higher deforestation rate if it occurs in a high income country than in a low income country" (ibid.). While Deacon finds significant relationships, population change accounts for only a small proportion of the variance of deforestation (R2 between .08 and .14).
The primary reason that Deacon undertakes this analysis, however, is to examine the impact of unstable or weakly enforced legal systems on deforestation. The decision to consume forest resources rapidly or to conserve them so as to yield a perpetual stream of future returns is an investment decision. Deacon argues that investments will only be made when those who make a sacrifice not to harvest immediately are assured they will receive the future benefits of their actions. "When legal and political institutions are volatile or predatory, the assurance is lowered and the incentive to invest is diminished" (ibid.: 3). Consequently, Deacon analyzes variables that reflect political instability and the presence of centralized national governments. These variables are positively associated with deforestation, and the proportion of the variance explained rises (R2 between .19 and .2 1). Political and institutional variables account for as much or more variance in deforestation as population density. In the 120 countries included in his analysis, the size of the association between population growth and deforestation is reduced when political and institutional variables ate included. The association falls substantially in low- and middle-income countries.77 Deacon's analysis is pathbreaking because it is a rare effort to undertake a systematic analysis of the relative role of population density and institutional variables. He demonstrates that both have an impact on rates of deforestation. What his analysis also shows, however, is that factors affecting 80 percent of the variance in deforestation at a national level are not accounted for. This is a substantial knowledge gap.
While knowledge gaps about relationships at a national level remain immense, greater progress has been achieved in gaining a shared and empirically validated understanding of relationships at a more micro or sub-national level. In the mid-1980s, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) established a Panel on Common Property Resources. Since then, many theoretical and empirical studies of diverse institutional arrangements for governing and managing small- to medium-sized natural resources have enabled scientists to achieve a growing consensus.78 Scholars from diverse disciplines now tend to agree that the users of small- to medium-sized natural resources are potentially capable of self-organizing to manage these resources effectively, whether jointly with national governments or with considerable autonomy. Researchers have even identified localities within countries where local users have organized themselves effectively enough that they have improved forest conditions when faced with increasing population density.79
There are several reasons why local users may more effectively manage resources than national agencies. One reason is the immense diversity of local environmental conditions that exist within most countries. The variation in rainfall, soil types, elevation, scale of resource systems, and plant and animal ecologies is large, even in small countries. Some resources are located near to urban populations or a major highway system and others are remote. Given environmental variety, rule systems that effectively regulate access, use, and the allocation of benefits and costs in one setting, are not likely to work well in radically different environmental conditions. Efforts to pass national legislation establishing a uniform set of rules for an entire country are likely to fail in many of the locations most at risk. Users managing their resources locally may be a more effective way of dealing with immense diversity from site to site.
A second reason for the potential advantage of local organization in coping with problems of deforestation and biodiversity losses is that the benefits local users may obtain from careful husbanding of their resources are potentially greater when future flows of benefits are appropriately taken into account. At the same time, the costs of monitoring and sanctioning rule infractions at a local level are relatively low. These advantages occur, however, only when local users have sufficient assurance that they will actually receive the long-term benefits of their own investments.
While there is agreement that the potential for effective organization at a local level to manage some of the smaller- to medium-sized forests exists in all countries, local participants do not uniformly expend the effort needed to organize and manage local forests, however, even when given formal authority. Some potential organizations never form at all. Some do not survive more than a few months. Others organize but are not successful. Others are dominated by local elite who divert comunal resources to achieve their own goals at the expense of others (Arora, 1994). In some cases, the natural forest must be almost completely gone before local remedial actions are taken. These actions may be too late. Still others do not possess adequate scientific knowledge to complement their own indigenous knowledge. Making investment decisions related to assets that mature over a long time horizon (25 to 75 years for many tree species) is a sophisticated task whether it is undertaken by barely literate farmers or Wall Street investors. In highly volatile worlds, some organize themselves more effectively and make better decisions than others.
Thus, the romantic view that anything local is better than anything organized at a national or global scale is not a useful foundation for a long-term effort to improve understanding of what factors enhance or detract from the capabilities of any institutional arrangement to govern and manage forest resources wisely. Any organization or group faces a puzzling set of problems when it tries to govern and manage complex multispecies (including Homo sapiens), multiproduct resource systems whose benefit streams mature at varying rates. Any organization or group will face a variety of environmental challenges stemming from too much or too little rainfall to drastic changes in factor prices, population density, or pollution levels. Consequently, essential knowledge can be gained from a carefully designed, systematic study of how many different types of institutional arrangements, including nascent groups, indigenous communal organizations, formal local governments, NGOs, specialized forest and park agencies, and national ministries, cope with diverse types of forest resources. Much is to be learned from both successes and failures. And, since we intend to use multiple performance measures, we expect to find some forest governance and management systems that are evaluated positively in regard to some evaluative criteria (such as the maintenance of forest density and species richness), but not necessarily in regard to others (such as gender representation, financial accountability, adaptability over time, or transparency of decisionmaking processes).
Prior theoretical and empirical studies provide an initial set of hypotheses about general factors that we expect to find associated with the more successful forest governance and management systems (see E. Ostrom, 1990; McKean, 1992; Moorehead, 1994). Thus, the IFRI research program begins with an initial set of working hypotheses that will be revised, added to, and refined over time.
Our initial working hypotheses are that more effective organization to cope with the long-term sustainable management of forest resources will occur where:
The variables in these hypotheses are all operationalized using multiple indicators in the IFRI research instruments. Further, we have included other variables noted in the literature as being of importance in explaining processes of deforestation and biodiversity loss. Additional variables are included in the design of this study based on the Institutional Analysis and Development framework,82 which has served as the theoretical foundation for many of the successful prior studies of the governance and management of natural resource systems undertaken by colleagues at Indiana University.
In the design of this study, we have also been concerned with how national and regional governments can enhance or detract from the capabilities of local entities by the kind of information they provide, by the assurance that they extend to ensure autonomy over the long run, by the provision of low-cost conflict resolution mechanisms, and by policies that allow localities to develop and keep financial resources that can be used to make local improvements. Detailed information about why some national policies tend to encourage successful self-organization and othersdiscourage will be provided. These results will help to reduce knowledge gaps about policy impacts and thus facilitate the development of more effective policies.
The IFRI research program is designed to examine relationships among the physical, biological, and cultural worlds in a particular location and the de facto rules that are used locally to determine access to and use of a forest. During data collection, researchers will use ten research instruments. Examination of the physical world includes examination of the structure of forests and the species within. There are two research instruments that include rigorous forest mensuration methods in order to generate reliable and unbiased estimates of forest density, species diversity, and consumptive disturbances. Examination of cultural worlds includes gaining knowledge about patterns of socioeconomic and cultural homogeneity, number of individuals and groups involved, and diverse world views. Research conducted using a uniform set of variables using the best methods available for gaining reliable estimates of qualitative and quantitative data will enable scholars to analyze how different institutions work in the context of a large number of ecological, cultural, and political-economic settings. Diverse models of which variables and how they interact to affect behavior and outcomes will be posed, tested, and modified so that policies based on revised and tested models will have a higher probability of being successful than past efforts to reduce deforestation and stop biodiversity losses.
Important steps have been taken in the last decade to increase the rigor and quantity of information known about forest cover and rates of deforestation and biodiversity losses in different parts of the world. In 1993, for example, the most "authoritative global tropical deforestation survey to be produced in more than a decade" (Aldhous, 1993: 1,390) was released by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO, 1993). This FAO report attempts to document the extent of deforestation in tropical countries in an accurate fashion but repeatedly stresses the problems that the project staff faced in obtaining reliable information for the task. After examining the current state of information about forest conditions in tropical countries, the project found that:
The report concludes its findings concerning information gaps by noting that "forest resource assessments are among the most neglected aspects of forest resource management, conservation and development in the tropics" (ibid.: 6).
The IFRI research program will immediately provide key information about variations in forest conditions and the incentives and behavior of forest users within countries participating in the IFRI network. This information is essential for policy analysis and to test theories addressing knowledge gaps. Focusing on a sample of forests located in diverse ecological regions and governed by different institutional arrangements greatly reduces the cost of monitoring as contrasted to national forest inventories. Further, it provides information about the variation of results achieved by different kinds of institutional arrangements.
Both quantitative and qualitative data will be collected about institutional arrangements, the incentives of different participants, their activities, and careful forest mensuration techniques will be used to assess consequences in terms of density, species diversity, and species distribution. The general type of information to be collected at each site is listed in Table Al. This information will immediately be made available to forest users and government officials, and used in regularized policy reports written by analysts who have a long-term stake in the success of the policies adopted. The results of projects adopted in one location can be compared with the results of other types of institutional arrangements in similar ecological zones within the same macro-political regime. The data will also be archived in an IFRI designed, relational database so that changes in institutions, policies, activities, and outcomes can be monitored over time and across regions within one or more than one country. Data will be collected, owned, assessed, stored, and analyzed by each countries' researchers. The IFRI research program fosters in-country development of information rather than sole reliance on the purchase of secondary data from international organizations. The program also encourages the development of "state-of-the-art" research conducted by researchers who have permanent roots in a country rather than coming in from the outside.
IFRI Form |
Information Collected |
Site Overview Form |
site overview map, local wage rated, local units of measurement, exchange rates, recent policy changes, interview information |
Forest Form |
size, ownership, internal differentiation, products harvested, uses of products, master species list, changes in forest area, appraisal of forest condition |
Forest Plot Form |
tree, shrub, and sapling size, density, and species type within 1, 3, and 10 meter circles for a random sample of plots in each forest, and general indications regarding forest condition |
Settlement Form |
socio-demographic information, relation to markets and administrative centers, geographic information about the settlement |
Forest-User Group Relationship Form |
products harvested by user groups from specific forests and their uses |
Forest Product Form |
details on three most important forest products
(as defined by the user group), temporal harvesting patterns, alternative
sources and substitutes, harvesting tools and techniques, and harvesting
rules |
Nonharvesting |
information about organizations that make
rules regarding a forest(s) but do not use the forest itself, including
structure, personnel, resource mobilization, and record keeping |
Arrangements Form |
information about all organizations (harvesting or not) that relate to a forest, including harvest and governance activities |
The third major goal of the IFRI research program is to build incountry capacities to conduct forest and institutional assessments on a continuing basis. As the FAQ (1993) Forest Resources Assessment report cited above indicates, developing sustained efforts to gain an accurate picture of forest conditions or to build a valid understanding of what factors affect forest conditions is impossible without building in-country assessment capabilities. There are extraordinary researchers in each country with substantial capabilities that could be utilized in a sustained assessment program. These scholars may be located in different research institutions and separated by disciplinary barriers. Recent developments in the use of computers may not have been made available. For whatever reason, few countries have brought together interdisciplinary teams with extensive training in biology, environmental science, social sciences, and the use of computers to conduct regular assessments that can be used to fill information gaps and gain more valid understanding of the variables that affect rates of deforestation and loss of biodiversity.
The IFRI research program will work with a growing group of in-country research centers who obtain funding from donors and their own institutions to build their capabilities to become a permanent assessment center.
In addition to addressing the problems of reducing knowledge and information gaps to enhance future forestry policy making, the IFRI research program will leave a legacy in each participating country of a core research team that is well-trained in social and biological research methods and the computers to do analysis and manage complex forestry data sets.
As a research program, we envision a process of policy-relevant theoretical development, data collection, analysis, policy reporting, and training that is ongoing for the next decade or more. The overarching plan for the IFRI program is that future research goals and objectives will be addressed by a network of CRCs and individual scholars who design and conduct studies within different countries in collaboration with colleagues at the Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis and the Center for the Study of Institutions, Population, and Environmental Change (CIPEC). An IFRI CRC could be a research group associated with a university, a private association, a government research laboratory, or a consortium of individuals and agencies that have agreed to work together to collect, analyze, and archive IFRI data in a particular country or specific region of the world. Individual researchers who are working at a university or research institution completing their doctoral research or working independently may also be associated with IFRI.
The IFRI program includes a training model for each CRC that is intensive in the first two years. Each CRC will send key research personnel for a one-semester training program conducted by staff at Indiana University. This will be followed up with an in-country training program of a month's duration where the initial core set of researchers from a particular country or region are provided classroom and experiential training opportunities by Indiana University staff and by the local researchers who have just completed the semester in Bloomington. Pilot studies will be conducted soon after this initial training program has been completed. During the pilot studies, the Bloomington staff will be prepared to respond to methodological queries as in-country researchers discover the many complex and unexpected relationships using the methods they have just learned. As local staff become experts in the field administration, analysis, and archival of the data, further training will be taken over by those heading each of the CRCs. We also see a role for staff from one CRC visiting and working with staff from a second CRC so that the reliability of field methods and interpretations is enhanced.
Criteria for selecting CRCs will be based primarily on level of interest in solving forest resource problems from the bottom up, previous work on forest issues, and capacity to use the database system in an environment that enables communication between nongovernmental policymakers, forest users, governmental policymakers, scholars, and grant-writing capabilities. Demonstrated commitment to continuing, long-term research efforts will also be a criteria for CRC selection.
We envision that each CRC will go through several phases of relating to the Workshop/CIPEC and to other CRCs in the IFRI network. During the first phase-normally about a year in duration-one or two researchers, who will take a major role in the development of the CRC, would spend at least one semester at Indiana University. They will participate in a general course of study that includes both the underlying theoretical foundations for the IFRI research program and a specific training program on forest mensuration, PRA methods, detailed review of all IFRI research instruments, and joint fieldwork in a site near to Indiana University.
Ideally during the summer following the above training program, researchers from the CRC and Indiana University will jointly train a larger group of researchers in data collection and entry methods and jointly conduct one to four pilot studies together. By working side-by-side in the conduct of the initial pilot studies, many of the problems that have faced earlier efforts to undertake multinational research efforts should be reduced. A key problem facing all such studies is how to establish and keep consistent data collection methods so that the data placed in the same fields in the database are actually comparable. No amount of classroom instruction can cope effectively with this problem. Working side-by-side in the initial studies in each country is one method of substantially increasing the reliability and validity of the data collection efforts. Further, working out data entry procedures and queries is equally important in developing a database that is robust and can be used over many years and by many participants.
After completing its first round of pilot studies, a new CRC will participate in a meeting of all CRCs. The. first such meeting took place at Oxford University in mid-December of 1994, the second at Berkeley in June of 1996, and the third at CIFOR in November of 1997.
During initial training and pilot studies, the person taking primary responsibility for the development of a CRC in a particular country or region will begin work, in consultation with his or her own colleagues and with colleagues at Indiana University, on a research design for a continuing assessment program using the IFRI research instruments. Each monitoring plan will identify major knowledge and information gaps that will be addressed if the program outlined in it were undertaken. Where there are specific questions of importance in a particular country or region not covered by the IFRI research instruments, these will be supplemented with new instruments designed by the CRC and shared with other members of the Network. The monitoring plan will be circulated among members of the IFRI network, to public officials and NGOs in the host country, and eventually to potential donors for funding. Once funding is received and the appropriate staff has been hired, the CRC will begin its own research program. Researchers from each CRC will visit other CRCs and undertake joint fieldwork with the researchers from other CRCs. This is another way that consistent data collection and interpretation can be undertaken in a multinational study.
The results of the IFRI research program will be disseminated in multiple ways that include:
Initial reaction of forest users and government officials to IFRI research reports has been enthusiastic. The volume, of which this appendix is a part, is also an effort to make the results known to public officials, forest users, and scholars throughout the world. Members of the IFRI teams involved will be glad to hear from readers and learn what has, or has not, been useful in our initial series of studies.
Abernathy, V. 1993. Population Politics: The Choices that Shape our Future. New York: Plenum Press.
Agrawal, Arun. 1994. `The Illogic of Arithmetic in Resource Management: Overpopulation, Markets and Institutions as Explanations of Forest Use in the Indian Himalayas." Paper presented at the conference "Workshop on the Workshop," Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis, Indiana University, Bloomington, June 16.
Aldhous, Peter. 1993. "Tropical Deforestation: Not Just a Problem in Amazonia." Science 259 (March 5): 1,390.
Alper, Joe. 1993. "How to Make the Forests of the World Pay Their Way." Science 260 (June-25): 1,895-896.
Apichatvullop, Yaowalak. 1993. "Local Participation in Social Forestry." Regional Development Dialogue 14(1) (Spring): 32-45.
Arnold, J.E.M., and W. C. Stewart 1989. Common Property Resources Management in India. Oxford: Oxford University, Oxford Forestry Institute.
Arora, Dolly. 1994. "From State Regulation to People's Participation: Case of Forest Management in India." Economic and Political Weekly (March): 691-98.
Ascher, William. 1993. "Political Economy and Problematic Forestry Policies in Indonesia: Obstacles for Incorporating Sound Economics and Science." Durham, NC: The Center for Tropical Conservation, Report.
_____1995. Communities and Sustainable Forestry in Developing Countries. San Francisco, CA: ICS Press.
Berkes, Fikret, ed. 1989. Common Property Resources: Ecology and CommunityBased Sustainable Development. London: Belhaven Press.
Blomquist, William. 1992. Dividing the Waters: Governing Groundwater in Southern California. San Francisco, CA: ICS Press.
CENR (Committee on Environment and Natural Resources). 1994. "Draft R&D Strategy." Washington, D.C.: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Chambers, Robert. 1994. "The Poor and the Environment: Whose Reality Counts." Paper prepared for the conference on Poverty Reduction and Development Cooperation held at the Centre for Development Research, Copenhagen, February 23-24.
Chichilnisky, Graciela. 1994. "Biodiversity and Economic Values. Summary of a paper presented at the conference `Biological Diversity: Exploring the Complexities," University of Arizona, Tucson, March 25-27.
Deacon, Robert T. 1994. "Deforestation and the Rule of Law in a Cross-Section of Countries." Discussion Paper no. 94-23. Washington, D.C.:. Resources for the Future.
Ehrlich, Paul R., and Anne H. Ehrlich. 1981. Extinction: The Causes of the Disappearance of Species. New York: Random House.
Ehrlich, Paul R., and Anne H. Ehrlich. 1991. Healing the Planet: Strategies for Resolving the Environmental Crisis. Reading, MA: Addison Wesley.
Fairhead, James, and Melissa Leach, with Dominique Millimouno and Marie Kamano. 1992. "Forests of the Past? Archival, Oral and Demographic Evidence in Kissidougou Prefecture's Vegetation History." COLA Working paper no. 1. Conakry, Guinea: Connaissance et Organisation Locales Agro-ecologiques.
FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization) of the United Nations. 1993. Forest Resources Assessment 1990. Rome, Italy: FAO.
Fischer, G. 1993. "The Population Explosion: Where Is It Leading"? Population and Environment 15(2):139-53.
Fortmann, Louise, and John W. Bruce. 1988. Whose Trees? Proprietary Dimensions of Forestry. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.
Fox, Jefferson. 1993. "Forest Resources in a Nepali Village in 1980 and 1990: The Positive Influence of Population Growth." Mountain Research and Development 13(1):89-98.
Grant, James P. 1994. The State of the World's Children 1994. Oxford, NY: Oxford University Press for UNICEF.
Holdren, C. 1992. "Population Alarm." Science 255:1,358.
Kiser, Larry L., and Elinor Ostrom. 1982. "The Three Worlds of Action: A Metatheoretical Synthesis of Institutional Approaches." In Strategies of Political Inquiry, ed. Elinor Ostrom, 179-222. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage.
Korten, Frances F. 1993. "The High Costs of Environmental Loans." Asia Pacific Issues No. 7. Hawaii: East-West Center.
Lovejoy, Thomas E. 1980. "A Projection of Species Extinctions." In The Global 2000 Report to the President: Entering the 21st Century, G. O. Barney (Study Director), 328-31. Washington, D.C.: Council on Environmental Quality, U.S. Government Printing Office.
McCay, Bonnie J., and James M. Acheson. 1987. The Question of the Commons: The Culture and Ecology of Communal Resources. Tucson: University of Arizona Press.
McKean, Margaret A. 1992. "Success on the Commons: A Comparative Examination of Institutions for Common Property Resource Management." Journal of Theoretical Politics 4(3) (July): 247-82.
McNeely, Jeffrey A. 1988. Economics and Biological Diversity: Developing and Using Economic Incentives to Conserve Biological Resources. Gland, Switzerland: IUCN.
Meihe, S. 1990. "Inventaire et Suivi de la Végétation dans les parcelles pastorales à 1990 et évaluation globale provisoire dl'essai de pâturage controlé après une période de 10 ans." Eshborn, Germany: GTZ, Research Report.
Moorehead, Richard. 1994. "Policy and Research into Natural Resource Management in Dryland Africa: Some Concepts and Approaches." London: International Institute for Environment and Development.
Myers, Norman. 1988. "Tropical Forests and Their Species: Going, Going...." In Biodiversity, ed. E. O. Wilson and Frances M. Peter, 28-35. Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press.
Ness, G., W. Drake, and S. Brechin. 1993. Population -Environment Dynamics: Ideas and Observations. Ann Arbor University of Michigan Press.
Netting, Robert McC. 1993. Smallholders, Householders: Farm Families and the Ecology of Intensive, Sustainable Agriculture. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
Norton, B. J., ed. 1986. The Preservation of Species. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Oakerson, Ronald J. 1992. "Analyzing the Commons: A Framework." In Making the Commons Work: Theory, Practice, and Policy, ed. Daniel W. Bromley et al., 41-59. San Francisco, CA: ICS Press.
Ostrom, Elinor. 1986. "An Agenda for the Study of Institutions." Public Choice 48:3-25.
_____. 1990. Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action. New York: Cambridge University Press.
_____. 1992. Crafting Institutions for Self-Governing Irrigation Systems. San Francisco, CA: ICS Press.
Ostrom, Elinor, Roy Gardner, and James Walker. 1994. Rules, Games, and CommonPool Resources. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Ostrom, Vincent, David Feeny, and Hartmut Picht, eds. 1993. Rethinking Institutional Analysis and Development: Issues, Alternatives, and Choices. 2d ed. San Francisco, CA: ICS Press.
Pimental, D., R. Harman, M. Pacenza, J. Pecarsky, and M. Pimental. 1994. "Natural Resources and an Optimal Human Population." Population and Environment 15(5):347-69.
Pinkerton, Evelyn, ed. 1989. Co-operative Management of Local Fisheries: New Directions for Improved Management and Community Development. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.
Reid, Walter V., and Kenton R. Miller. 1989. Keeping Options Alive: The Scientific Basis for Conserving Biodiversity. Washington, D.C.: World Resources Institute.
Repetto, Robert. 1988. The Forest for the Trees? Government Policies and the Misuse of Forest Resources. Washington, D.C.: World Resources Institute.
Repetto, Robert, and Malcolm Gillis. 1988. Public Policies and the Misuse of Forest Resources. Washington, D.C.: World Resources Institute.
Rowe, R., N. Sharma, and J. Browder. 1992. "Deforestation: Problems, Causes, and Concerns." In Managing the World's Forests, ed. N. Sharma, 33-46. Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt.
Sedjo, Roger A. 1992. "A Global Forestry Initiative." Resources no. 109 (Fall): 16-19.
Sen, D., and P. K. Das. 1987. 'The Management of People's Participation in Community Forestry: Some Issues." London: ODI, Social Forestry Network paper no. 4D.
Sengupta, Nirmal. 1991. Managing Common Property: Irrigation in India and the Philippines. London and New Delhi: Sage.
Shanks, E. 1990. "Communal Woodlots in Tanzania: Farmers' Response and an Evolving Extension Strategy." London: ODI Social Forestry Network paper no. 11 C.
Tang, Shui Yan. 1991. "Institutional Arrangements and the Management of CommonPool Resources." Public Administration Review 51(1) (Jan./Feb.): 42-51.
Task Force on Global Biodiversity, Committee on International Science. 1989. Loss of Biological Diversity: A Global Crisis Requiring International Solutions. Washington, D.C.: National Science Board.
Thomson, James T. 1992. A Framework for Analyzing Institutional Incentives in Community Forestry. Rome, Italy: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Forestry Department, Via delle Terme di Caracalla.
Tiffen, Mary, Michael Mortimore, and F. N. Gichuki. 1994. More People, Less Erosion: Environmental Recovery in Kenya. New York: John Wiley.
United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA). 1989. State of the World Population 1989. New York: UNFPA.
Wade, Robert. 1994. Village Republics: Economic Conditions for Collective Action in South India. San Francisco, CA: ICS Press.
Wilson, E. O. 1985. "The Biodiversity Crisis: A Challenge to Science." Issues in Science and Technology 2:20-29.
World Bank. 1993. World Development Report: Investing in Health. New York: Oxford University Press.
1. Household food security and forestry: an analysis of socio-economic issues, 1989 (Ar/E/F/S)
2. Community forestry: participatory assessment, monitoring and evaluation, 1989 (E/F/S)
3. Community forestry: rapid appraisal, 1989 (E/F/S)
4. Community forestry: herders' decision-making in natural resources management in arid and semi-arid Africa, 1990 (E°/F)
5. Community forestry: rapid appraisal of tree and land tenure, 1989 (E/F/S)
6. The major significance of `minor' forest products: the local use and value of forests in the West African humid forest zone, 1990 (E°)
7. Community forestry: ten years in review, 1991 (E/F/S°)
8. Shifting cultivators: local technical knowledge and natural resource management in the humid tropics, 1991 (E/F/S)
9. Socioeconomic attributes of trees and tree planting practices, 1991 (E/F*/S)
10. A framework for analyzing institutional incentives in community forestry, 1992 (E/F/S)
11. Common forest resource management: annotated bibliography of Asia, Africa and Latin America, 1993 (E/F*/S*)
12. Introducing community forestry: annotated listing of topics and readings, 1994 (E)
13. What about the wild animals? Wild animal species in community forestry in the tropics, 1995 (E)
14. Legal bases for the management of forest resources as common property, 1999 (E)
1. Guidelines for planning, monitoring and evaluating cookstove programmes, 1990 (E/F/S°)
2. The community's toolbox: the idea, methods and tools for participatory assessment, monitoring and evaluation in community forestry, 1990 (E/F/S)
3. Guidelines for integrating nutrition concerns into forestry projects, 1991 (E/F/S)
4. Tree and land tenure: rapid appraisal tools, 1994 (E/F/S)
5. Selecting tree species on the basis of community needs, 1995 (E/F*/S)
6. Marketing information systems for non-timber forest products, 1996 (E)
7. Crafting institutional arrangements for community forestry, 1997 (E)
1. Case studies of farm forestry and wasteland development in Gujarat, India, 1988 (E)
2. Forestland for the people. A forest village project in Northeast Thailand, 1988 (E)
3. Women's role in dynamic forest-based small scale enterprises. Case studies on uppage and lacquerware from India, 1991 (E°)
4. Case studies in forest-based small scale enterprises in Asia. Rattan, matchmaking and handicrafts, 1991 (E°)
5. Social and economic incentives for smallholder tree growing. A case study from Murang'a District, Kenya, 1993 (E)
6. Shifting cultivators of Indonesia: marauders or managers of the forest? Rice production and forest use among the Uma' Jalan of East Kalimantan, 1993 (E)
7. Peasant participation in community reforestation. Four communities in the Department of Cuzco, Peru, 1993 (E)
8. The impact of social and environmental change on forest management. A case study from West Kalimantan, Indonesia, 1993 (E)
9. Tree and land tenure in the Eastern Terai, Nepal. A case study from the Siraha and Saptari Districts, Nepal, 1993 (E)
10. Tree and land tenure: using rapid appraisal to study natural resource management. A case study from Anivorano, Madagascar, 1995 (E)
11. Shifting cultivation in Bhutan: a gradual approach to modifying land use patterns. A case study from Pema Gatshel District, Bhutan, 1995 (E)
12. Farmer experimentation and innovation. A case study of knowledge generation processes in agroforestry systems in Rwanda, 1996 (E)
13. Developing participatory and integrated watershed management. A case study of the FAO/Italy Interregional Project for Participatory Upland Conservation and Development (PUCD), 1998 (E)
1. The role of alternative conflict management in community forestry, 1994 (E)
2. Participatory approaches to planning for community forestry, 1995 (E)
3. Forest resources and institutions, 1998 (E)
1. Women in community forestry: a field guide for project design and implementation, 1989 (E/F/S).
2. Integrating gender considerations into FAO forestry projects, 1994 (E/F*/S)
1. Food for the future, 1990 (Ch/E/F/SBahasaBurmese/Hindi/Lao/Malaysian/ Portuguese/Sinhala/Vietnamese)
2. Our trees and forests, 1992 (Ch/E/F/S)
3. I am so hungry I could eat a tree, 1992 (Ch/E/F/S) 4 Fabulous forest factories, 1993 (Ch/E/F/S)
7 Forestry for local community development, 1978 (Ar/E/F/S)
64 Tree growing by rural people, 1985 (Ar/EQ/F/S°)
79 Small-scale forest-based processing enterprises, 1987 (E/F°/S°)
90 Forestry and food security, 1989 (Ar/E/F/S°)
136 Managing forests as common property, 1998 (E)
Ar - Arabic Ch - Chinese E - English |
F - French S - Spanish |
* in preparation ° out of print |
Our publications and videos are available from your regional focal point: | |
Anglophone Africa: |
FTPP/FAN
|
Central America: |
Facilitador subregional para Centroamérica
|
Europe: |
The Editor, 1 I P Newsletter
|
Francophone Africa: |
Facilitateur régional pour l'Afrique francophone
|
|
Latin America and Caribbean (Spanish): |
Revista bosques, árboles y comunidades rurales |
64 For example, see Wilson (1985), Task Force on Global Biodiversity, Committee on International Science (1989).
65 Bruce Cabarle, Manager of the Latin America Forestry Program at the World Resources Institute, recently commented: "There really is a catastrophe waiting to happen, both for the forests and the people who live off them" (in Alper, 1993).
66 United Nations Population Fund (1989) projections based on current levels of birth control use. The estimated population in the World Bank's World Development Report (1993: 268-69) for 2025 is, however, a more modest 8.3 billion. It is not unusual to find discrepancies this large in projected population figures given different assumptions about initial starting conditions and rates of change.
67 Task Force on Global Biodiversity (1989: 3)
68 Chichilnisky (1994: 4).
69 See Lovejoy (1980), Ehrlich and Ehrlich (1981), and Norton (1986). Reid and Miller (1989: 37-38) estimate that between 1990 and 2020, between 5 to 15 percent of all species would be lost.
70 Task Force on Global Biodiversity (1989: 3); see also discussion in Ascher (1993).
71 "It is this broad-scale clearing and degradation of forest habitats [by communities of small-scale cultivators] that is far and away the main cause of species extinctions" (Myers, 1988: 29).
72 For very recent views stressing the primary and simple role of population increases see Rowe, Sharma, and Browder (1992: 39-40), Abernathy (1993), Fischer (1993), Holdren (1992), Ness, Drake, and Brechin (1993), and Pimental et al. (1994).
73 The "Houston Communique" issued in 1990 is also relevant. See description in Sedjo (1992: 16).
74 Korten is summarizing her evaluation of the impact of a "showcase loan" by the Asian Development Bank to support the reforestation of 358,000 hectares of land in the Philippines. Similar evaluations have been made of many national and international efforts (see, for example, Arnold and Stewart, 1989; Sen and Das, 1987; Apichatvullop, 1993; Shanks, 1990; Chambers, 1994; McNeely, 1988; Repetto, 1988; Repetto and Gillis, 1988).
75 This may be due to the fact that UNICEF focuses primarily on the developing world, but then is the Ehrlich model limited primarily to the industrialized world?
76 Deacon did not set out to test either of the models proposed by the Ehrlichs or by UNICEF and made no reference to either of them. Deacon (1994: 2) stresses that the "causes of deforestation are not well understood" and that the causes posited by some analysts are absent in the discussions of others. Deacon's own view is that the insecurity of property rights is a major contributing factor to deforestation.
77 In low- and middle-income countries, a I percent increase in population during 1975-1980 Is associated with a proportionate forest cover reduction of 0.07 - 0.13 percent during 1980-85.
78 Among the books that have been written since the NAS report that provide a foundation for this growing consensus are: McCoy and Acheson, 1987; Fortmann and Bruce, 1988; Wade, 1994; Berkes, 1989; Pinkerton, 1989; Sengupta, 1991; V Ostrom, Feeny, and Pick, 1993; Netting, 1993; E. Ostrom, 1990,1992; E. Ostrom, Gardner, and Walker, 1994; Blomquist, 1992; Tang, 1991; and Thomson, 1992.
79 These include the work of Fairhead and Leach (1992) in Guinée; Agrawal (1994) in India; Tiffen, Mortimore, and Gichuki (1994) in Kenya; Fox (1993) in Nepal; and Meihe (1990) in Senegal.
80 Fire-riding behavior occurs when individuals do not contribute to the provision and/or production of a joint benefit in the hopes that others will bear the cost of participating and that the free-riders will receive the benefits without paying the costs. Rent-seeking occurs when individuals obtain entitlements that enable them to receive returns that exceed the returns they would receive in an open, competitive environment. Asymmetric information occurs when some individuals obtain information of strategic value that is not available to others. Corruption occurs when individuals in official positions receive personal side payments in return for the exercise of their discretion.
81 These hypotheses are obviously stated in a very general manner. We are presently developing a working paper that specifies how more specific versions of these hypotheses could eventually be analyzed using the IFRI database
82 See Kiser and Ostrom, 1982, Oakerson, 1992; E. Ostrom, 1986; E. Ostmm, Gardner, and Walker, 1994.
