Institutions and Resources Elinor Ostrom Common-pool resources are the resources which are very large in quantity

and excluding the potential beneficiaries from using them for consumptive or non-consumptive purposes is nontrivial. Ones consumptive use reduces the resource units that are available to others. Common-pool resources are often overharvested and destroyed if there are no effective institutions to limit its use. In the article Institutions and Resources, institutions refers to the rules that human use when interacting within a wide variety of repetitive and structured situations at multiple levels of analysis. Individuals generally use rules designed by the government authorities as relevant for situations of a particular type but they may also develop and enforce their own rules. Individual may also get influenced by the action of others and adopt norms regarding their behavior and individual may also adopt strategies leading to consequences for themselves and others. As the individual learn more about the outcome of their own and others actions within a particular situation, they may change norms and strategies, leading to better or worse outcomes for themselves and the relevant environment. Open-Access Problems Common-pool resource is limited and it will be overharvested if no effective rules limit entry or withdrawals. The static model of fishery published by Scott Gordon in 1954 is one of the earliest, most powerful and long-lasting model of a common-pool resource. In an open-access fishery, Gordon posited that each fisher would invest effort in harvesting until they reached equilibrium where individual revenue equaled their cost. More and more harvester wants to enter the resource, and eventually they can destroy it. With the widespread acceptance of the Gordon model, policy analysts recommend that government ownership, private property, or community control of the common-pool resource can be helpful to achieve more efficient short term results and sustain the resource over the long term. Government property and Common-Pool Resources Some scholars believe that public ownership is the only way to achieve sustained conservation which has led to a system of government-protected areas across the world but the performance of those protected areas varies substantially. Some of the protected areas are in excellent conditions where as in some extensive conflict, illegal harvesting as well as more vulnerable to deforestation and fire exists. Private Property and Common-Pool Resources Private property is frequently recommended as the only way to reduce the tragedy of the commons and some private property systems backed up by community and government institutions have worked

rather well but it becomes very much complex and effective monitoring system is very much essential for its success. Community Property and Common-Pool Resources Some scholars believe that the community ownership involvement as a solution to overharvesting of common-pool resource but strong community participation of the community members are required and there is always chances of biasness in the distribution of the resources. Comparing Farmer-Managed to Agency-Managed Irrigation System in Nepal Farmer managed irrigation system (FMIS) is not a new concept. Farmers had knowledge about various complex irrigation system and they had been engaged in agricultural production without the guidance of the central government. But, with the establishment of Department of Irrigation and Series of Five Year Plan various donors have invested very large sums, agency-managed irrigation systems (AMIS) was established in some regions of Nepal. While comparing FMIS and AMIS, it was found that FMIS were more effective than AMIS. Farmers follow the rules of their system to greater extent on FMIS than on the AMIS and they also tend to achieve a higher level of mutual trust. Studying Forests around the World The International Forestry Resources and Institutions (IFRI) research program was established in early 1990s and it is the only program studying forests owned by governments, by private organizations, and by communities in multiple countries. Through different research it was found that it is not the general type of forest governance that is crucial in explaining forest conditions but it is how a particular governance arrangement fits the local ecology and how specific rules are developed and adapted over time, and whether users consider the system to be legitimate and equitable. Self-Organized Forests in Nepal According to the study conducted by George Varughese (1999) on eighteen self managed forests in the Middle Hills of Nepal, it was found that the uses of the forest product depend on difference in the wealth, individuals occupation, even their ethnicity and socio-cultural difference. Varughese also observed very much difference in socio-cultural composition and found that forest user had designed some ingenious rules to specifically take into account the heterogeneity they faced. Variety of outcome can be found when forest resources have been decentralized in a centralized manner. When the forest users do have a voice in the design of the rules they will be using related to forest and other resources, they can frequently devise rules well matched to the complexity of the ecological system involved.

From Optimal Solutions to Adaptive Multilevel Governance One solution cannot be applied to all the problems; one rule which has worked very well in one part of the world has failed in another part. There are no optimal solutions that can be applied to all the systems. Thinking about Policy and Recommendations Even after number of repeated studies no specific rules that have a statistically positive relationship to performance in a large number of common-pool resources was found. According to the Ostrom we must think about ways to analyze the structure of common-pool resources, how these changes over time, and adopt a multilevel, experimental approach rather than a top-down approach to the design of effective institutions. Experimenting with Rule Changes There is always a probability of error when adding, changing or adopting someone elses proposed rule and its complexity increases with the changing surrounding. Rules for one type of ecosystem may not be appropriate for another. So, instead of developing models that generate optimal outcomes, we need to understand what level of redundancy overlap, and autonomy help to adapt rules that work for particular resources under specific social-economic conditions and then we need to focus on how to enhance the robustness of these institutions to diverse disturbances that will hit them overtime