The evolution of elite and societal norms pertaining to the emergence of federal-tribal co-management of natural resources

摘要

Ostrom's contributions in 'Collective Action and the Evolution of Social Norms' have been highly influential in a number of areas and will likely continue to instigate further refinements for decades to come. In the area of co-management, I believe that the differentiation between elite and social norms in particular, and how different initial contextual variables impact the start-up conditions and subsequent evolution of collaboration, holds promise for explaining the emergence of federal-tribal co-management regimes. It is also apparent that the design principles first identified in Governing the Commons (1990) will continue to be refined for certain situations (see for instance Cox, Arnold, & Tomas, 2010), and that refinements specific to federal-tribal co-management are possible through rigorous comparative analysis of existing cases. Finally, I propose that clearly distinguishing co-management from self-governance, collaboration, and other modalities of natural resource management, and adapting the design principles accordingly, represents a potentially fruitful endeavor which will guide my future work in the area of co-management of protected lands.