IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/jothpo/v6y1994i4p527-562.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

6. Constituting Social Capital and Collective Action

Author

Listed:
  • Elinor Ostrom

Abstract

Ignoring the impact of changes in physical capital on a form of social capital - the rules used in farmer-organized irrigation systems - can lead to the unintended consequence that the physical capital is not as productive as intended. Analysis focuses on the choice of rules made by farmers in homogeneous and heterogeneous situations. Using this analysis, it is possible to illustrate why many donor-funded improvements in physical capital have had counterproductive results.

Suggested Citation

  • Elinor Ostrom, 1994. "6. Constituting Social Capital and Collective Action," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 6(4), pages 527-562, October.
  • Handle: RePEc:sae:jothpo:v:6:y:1994:i:4:p:527-562
    DOI: 10.1177/0951692894006004006
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0951692894006004006
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0951692894006004006?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Small, L. E. & Adriano, M. S. & Martin, E. D., 1986. "Regional study on irrigation service fees: Section II," IWMI Books, Reports H002793, International Water Management Institute.
    2. Ambler, J. S., 1990. "The influence of farmer water rights on the design of water proportioning devices," IWMI Books, Reports H007275, International Water Management Institute.
    3. Hackett Steven & Schlager Edella & Walker James, 1994. "The Role of Communication in Resolving Commons Dilemmas: Experimental Evidence with Heterogeneous Appropriators," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 99-126, September.
    4. Alexander James Field, 1979. "On the Explanation of Rules Using Rational Choice Models," Journal of Economic Issues, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(1), pages 49-72, March.
    5. Hackett, Steven C, 1993. "Incomplete Contracting: A Laboratory Experimental Analysis," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 31(2), pages 274-297, April.
    6. Johnson, Ronald N & Libecap, Gary D, 1982. "Contracting Problems and Regulation: The Case of the Fishery," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 72(5), pages 1005-1022, December.
    7. Telser, L G, 1980. "A Theory of Self-enforcing Agreements," The Journal of Business, University of Chicago Press, vol. 53(1), pages 27-44, January.
    8. Elinor Ostrom & Roy Gardner, 1993. "Coping with Asymmetries in the Commons: Self-Governing Irrigation Systems Can Work," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 7(4), pages 93-112, Fall.
    9. Richard Cornes & Todd Sandler, 1994. "Are Public Goods Myths?," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 6(3), pages 369-385, July.
    10. Ostrom, Elinor & Walker, James & Gardner, Roy, 1992. "Covenants with and without a Sword: Self-Governance Is Possible," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 86(2), pages 404-417, June.
    11. Robert H. Bates, 1988. "Contra Contractarianism: Some Reflections on the New Institutionalism," Politics & Society, , vol. 16(2-3), pages 387-401, June.
    12. Bardhan, Pranab, 1993. "Analytics of the institutions of informal cooperation in rural development," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 21(4), pages 633-639, April.
    13. Snidal, Duncan, 1985. "Coordination versus Prisoners' Dilemma: Implications for International Cooperation and Regimes," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 79(4), pages 923-942, December.
    14. Easter, K. William & Palanisami, Kuppannan, 1986. "Tank Irrigation In India And Thailand: An Example Of Common Property Resource Management," Staff Papers 13888, University of Minnesota, Department of Applied Economics.
    15. Small, L. E. & Adriano, M. S. & Martin, E. M., 1986. "Regional study on irrigation service fees: final report," IWMI Research Reports H002244, International Water Management Institute.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Siegelman, Ben & Haenn, Nora & Basurto, Xavier, 2019. "“Lies build trust”: Social capital, masculinity, and community-based resource management in a Mexican fishery," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 1-1.
    2. Martin YELKOUNI, 2004. "Gestion communautaire et forêt de Tiogo au Burkina Faso," Working Papers 200415, CERDI.
    3. Maru, Yiheyis & Sparrow, Ashley & Stirzaker, Richard & Davies, Jocelyn, 2018. "Integrated agricultural research for development (IAR4D) from a theory of change perspective," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 310-320.
    4. Deshpande, Ashwini & Khanna, Shantanu, 2021. "Can weak ties create social capital? Evidence from Self-Help Groups in rural India," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 146(C).
    5. Saul Estrin & Tomasz Mickiewicz & Ute Stephan, 2013. "Entrepreneurship, Social Capital, and Institutions: Social and Commercial Entrepreneurship across Nations," Entrepreneurship Theory and Practice, , vol. 37(3), pages 479-504, May.
    6. Evgeny V. Popov & Anna Y. Veretennikova & Ksenia M. Kozinskaya, 2018. "Formal Institutional Environment Influence on Social Entrepreneurship in Developed Countries," Montenegrin Journal of Economics, Economic Laboratory for Transition Research (ELIT), vol. 14(4), pages 45-56.
    7. Ingold, Karin, 2017. "How to create and preserve social capital in climate adaptation policies: A network approach," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 414-424.
    8. Ruben Weesie, 2019. "Towards Adaptive Commons: A Case Study of Agro-Pastoral Dams in Northern Ghana," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(2), pages 1-29, January.
    9. Matthew L. Hamilton & Mark Lubell, 2019. "Climate change adaptation, social capital, and the performance of polycentric governance institutions," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 152(3), pages 307-326, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Steven Hackett & Dean Dudley & James Walker, 1994. "5. Heterogeneities, Information and Conflict Resolution: Experimental Evidence on Sharing Contracts," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 6(4), pages 495-525, October.
    2. Takeshima, Hiroyuki & Edeh, Hyacinth, 2017. "Constraints for small-scale private irrigation systems in the North Central zone of Nigeria: Insights from a typology analysis and a case study:," NSSP working papers 47, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    3. De Janvry, Alain & Sadoulet, Elisabeth & Murgai, Rinku, 2002. "Rural development and rural policy," Handbook of Agricultural Economics, in: B. L. Gardner & G. C. Rausser (ed.), Handbook of Agricultural Economics, edition 1, volume 2, chapter 31, pages 1593-1658, Elsevier.
    4. Ostrom, Elinor, 2006. "The value-added of laboratory experiments for the study of institutions and common-pool resources," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 61(2), pages 149-163, October.
    5. Elinor Ostrom, 2010. "Analyzing collective action," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 41(s1), pages 155-166, November.
    6. Cavalcanti, Carina & Schläpfer, Felix & Schmid, Bernhard, 2010. "Public participation and willingness to cooperate in common-pool resource management: A field experiment with fishing communities in Brazil," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(3), pages 613-622, January.
    7. Matthew Osborne & Emma Sundström & Örjan Bodin, 2019. "Ecological interdependencies and resource competition: The role of information and communication in promoting effective collaboration in complex management situations," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 14(12), pages 1-22, December.
    8. McCarthy, Nancy & Sadoulet, Elisabeth & de Janvry, Alain, 2001. "Common Pool Resource Appropriation under Costly Cooperation," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 42(3), pages 297-309, November.
    9. Baland, Jean-Marie & Platteau, Jean-Philippe, 2003. "Economics of common property management regimes," Handbook of Environmental Economics, in: K. G. Mäler & J. R. Vincent (ed.), Handbook of Environmental Economics, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 4, pages 127-190, Elsevier.
    10. Baland, Jean-Marie & Platteau, Jean-Philippe, 1999. "The Ambiguous Impact of Inequality on Local Resource Management," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 27(5), pages 773-788, May.
    11. Elinor Ostrom & Vincent Ostrom, 2004. "The Quest for Meaning in Public Choice," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 63(1), pages 105-147, January.
    12. Robert Roßner & Dimitrios Zikos, 2018. "The Role of Homogeneity and Heterogeneity Among Resource Users on Water Governance: Lessons Learnt from an Economic Field Experiment on Irrigation in Uzbekistan," Water Economics and Policy (WEP), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 4(03), pages 1-30, July.
    13. Knox, Anna & Meinzen-Dick, Ruth Suseela, 2000. "Collective action, property rights, and devolution of natural resource management: exchange of knowledge and implications for policy," CAPRi working papers 11, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    14. Hanan G. Jacoby & Ghazala Mansuri, 2018. "Governing the Commons? Water and Power in Pakistan’s Indus Basin," Working Papers id:12933, eSocialSciences.
    15. Ariel Singerman & Pilar Useche, 2019. "The Role of Strategic Uncertainty in Area-wide Pest Management Decisions of Florida Citrus Growers," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 101(4), pages 991-1011.
    16. Tarui, Nori & Mason, Charles F. & Polasky, Stephen & Ellis, Greg, 2008. "Cooperation in the commons with unobservable actions," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 37-51, January.
    17. Bodo Sturm & Joachim Weimann, 2006. "Experiments in Environmental Economics and Some Close Relatives," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 20(3), pages 419-457, July.
    18. Fijnanda van Klingeren, 2020. "Playing nice in the sandbox: On the role of heterogeneity, trust and cooperation in common-pool resources," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(8), pages 1-36, August.
    19. Gangadharan, Lata & Nikiforakis, Nikos & Villeval, Marie Claire, 2017. "Normative conflict and the limits of self-governance in heterogeneous populations," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 143-156.
    20. Fijnanda van Klingeren & Nan Dirk de Graaf, 2021. "Heterogeneity, trust and common-pool resource management," Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences, Springer;Association of Environmental Studies and Sciences, vol. 11(1), pages 37-64, March.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:jothpo:v:6:y:1994:i:4:p:527-562. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.