Basics of qualitative research: Grounded theory procedures and techniques

With the publication of The Logic of Collective Action in 1965, Mancur Olson challenged a cherished foundation of modern democratic thought that groups would tend to form and take collective action...

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Collective Action and the Evolution of Social Norms

In a seminal paper, Garrett Hardin argued in 1968 that users of a commons are caught in an inevitable process that leads to the destruction of the resources on which they depend. This article discusses new insights about such problems and the conditions most likely to favor sustainable uses of common-pool resources. Some of the most difficult challenges concern the management of large-scale resources that depend on international cooperation, such as fresh water in international basins or large marine ecosystems. Institutional diversity may be as important as biological diversity for our long-term survival.

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Revisiting the Commons: Local Lessons, Global Challenges

Capitals and Capabilities: A Framework for Analyzing Peasant Viability, Rural Livelihoods and Poverty

Contemporary research on the outcomes of diverse institutional arrangements for governing common-pool resources (CPRs ) and public goods at multiple scales builds on classical economic theory while developing new theory to explain phenomena that do not fit in a dichotomous world of “the market” and “the state.” Scholars are slowly shifting from positing simple systems to using more complex frameworks, theories, and models to understand the diversity of puzzles and problems facing humans interacting in contemporary societies. The humans we study have complex motivational structures and establish diverse private-for-profit, governmental, and com munity institutional arrangements that operate at multiple scales to generate productive and inno vative as well as destructive and perverse outcomes ( Douglass C. North 1990, 2005 ). In this article, I will describe the intellectual journey that I have taken the last half century from when I began graduate studies in the late 1950s. The early efforts to understand the poly centric water industry in California were formative for me. In addition to working with Vincent Ostrom and Charles M. Tiebout as they formulated the concept of polycentric systems for gov erning metropolitan areas, I studied the efforts of a large group of private and public water producers facing the problem of an overdrafted groundwater basin on the coast and watching saltwater intrusion threaten the possibility of long term use. Then, in the 1970s, I participated with colleagues in the study of polycentric police industries serving US metropolitan areas to find that the dominant theory underlying massive reform proposals was incorrect. Metropolitan areas served by a combination of large and small producers could achieve economies of scale in the production of some police services and avoid diseconomies of scale in the production of others. These early empirical studies led over time to the development of the Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) framework. A common framework consistent with game theory enabled us to undertake a variety of empirical studies including a meta-analysis of a large number of existing case studies on common-pool resource systems around the world. Carefully designed experimental studies in the lab have enabled us to test precise combinations of structural vari ables to find that isolated, anonymous individuals overharvest from common-pool resources. Simply allowing communication, or “cheap talk,” enables participants to reduce overharvest ing and increase joint payoffs contrary to game theoretical predictions. Large studies of irrigation systems in Nepal and forests around the world challenge the presumption that governments always do a better job than users in organizing and protecting important resources.

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Beyond Markets and States: Polycentric Governance of Complex Economic Systems

The punctuated equilibrium theory contends that government attention allocation is universally leptokurtic in that long periods of stability are punctuated by bursts of rapid and radical change; the empirical evidence in support of this claim is however exclusively drawn from democratic systems. The absence of electoral politics and institutional decentralization in authoritarian regimes could presumably affect institutional friction; whether and how this might pose as a qualification to the thesis is of major interest. By analyzing four streams of government actions in Hong Kong from 1946 to 2007 straddling the colonial and postcolonial regimes, we have found that government processes are generally leptokurtic even under authoritarian regime institutions, with the degree of the dispersion of decision-making power across the streams of actions affecting the magnitude of punctuation. We have also found that punctuation was greater when the political system was more centralized but declined as the political system democratized.

How Authoritarianism Intensifies Punctuated Equilibrium: The Dynamics of Policy Attention in Hong Kong

The Performance of Self-Governing Irrigation Systems in Nepal

Coping with Change: A Study of Local Irrigation Institutions in Taiwan

Foreword Said Irandoust and Frank Rijsberman Preface Walter Coward Asian Irrigation Problems and Prospects - Ganesh P Shivakoti, Wai-Fung Lam and Ujjwal Pradhan PART ONE: GENERAL PERSPECTIVES ON TRANSITION Perspectives on Asian Irrigation - Randolph Barker and Francois Molle Social Capital and Irrigation Management - Norman T Uphoff Bringing Rigor and Evidence to the Relationship Institutions Against Change - Nirmal Sengupta PART TWO: RESPONSE TO COMPETITION FOR RESOURCES Groundwater Markets and Irrigation Potential in South Asia - Humnath Bhandari and Ganesh P Shivakoti A Micro Study from Nepal Emerging Water Crisis and Political Economy of Irrigation Reforms in India - Vishwa Ballabh Recognizing Multiple Water Uses in Intersectoral Water Transfers - Ruth Meinzen-Dick and Rajendra Pradhan The Closure of the Chao Phraya River Basin in Thailand - Francois Molle Its Causes, Consequences and Policy Implications The Emergence of Polycentric Water Governance in Northern Thailand - Uraivan Tan-Kim-Young, Pakping Chalad Bruns and Bryan Randolph Bruns PART THREE: INSTITUTIONAL REFORMS AND NEW PARTNERSHIP Asian Irrigation in Transition - Thierry Facon Service Orientation, Institutional Aspects and Design, Operation, Infrastructure Issues Participatory Approaches to Irrigation Development and Management in the Philippines - Luis P Eleazar et al The Next Generation Leadership and Turnover - Peter P Mollinga, Gao Hong and Anjali M Bhatia The Contradictions of Irrigation Management Reform in the People's Republic of China Reforming Taiwan's Irrigation Associations - Wai-Fung Lam Getting the Nesting of Institutions Right People's Participation in Irrigation Management in Thailand - Tassanee Ouvichit Coalition-Building for Participatory Irrigation Management Under Changing Water Resource Trends - M V K Sivamohan and Christopher A Scott Reflections on Reforms in Andhra Pradesh, India Irrigation Sector Reform in Asia - Douglas L Vermillion From 'Participation with Patronage' to 'Empowerment with Accountability' PART FOUR: MARKETS AND ECONOMIC PRODUCTIVITY OF IRRIGATED AGRICULTURE Making Irrigation Management Pro-Poor - Eric Biltonen, Doan Doan Tuan and Jinxia Wang Indications of Potentials from China and Vietnam Moving Beyond Water Provision - Helmi Strategic Issues Related to the Transition of Irrigation Management in Indonesia Farmer-Managed Irrigation Systems in Asia - Robert Yoder and Prachanda Pradhan Subsistence Agriculture in Transition PART FIVE: SYNTHESIS AND STRATEGIC RESPONSES The Future of Irrigated Agriculture in Asia - Douglas L Vermillion, Elinor Ostrom and Robert Yoder What the Twenty First Century Will Require of Policies, Institutions and Governance Index

Asian irrigation in transition: responding to challenges.

The decline of agriculture in Taiwan has adversely affected the incentives of farmers and the government to engage in irrigation management. Despite that, Taiwan's irrigation systems have shown a high degree of robustness. This study seeks to understand how institutions have contributed to the robustness of Taiwanese irrigation. Conceptualizing an irrigation system as a social-ecological system (SES), this study examines the development and design of Taiwanese irrigation institutions, and how these institutions have enabled farmers and irrigation managers to cope with the dynamics in the SES, and hence contributed to the system's robustness. The study has found that the robust systems are built upon institutions that allow effective coordination of the activities of a multitude of farmers, enhance the development and sustenance of a repertoire of ideas, and nest the problem-solving efforts of various scopes and scales in a complementary manner. The institutions enable individuals and organizations at different levels to engage in continuous learning and adaptation that, in turn, facilitates the systems' adaptation to the changing environment. 1. Robustness and change in Taiwanese irrigation Taiwan's irrigation sector has been facing a series of challenges in the past decades. As the country's economy has developed, agriculture has lost its comparative advantage and become economically non-viable. The over- production of paddy rice in Taiwan and worldwide has kept grain prices low; the opening up of Taiwan's agricultural produce market to international competition as a result of Taiwan's entry into the WTO is going to make agriculture even more difficult to sustain (AERC, 1999, 2000, 2001). The decline of agriculture has driven the rural youth to cities, resulting in rapid ageing of the farming population. 1

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Wai Fung Lam

Papers

How Authoritarianism Intensifies Punctuated Equilibrium: The Dynamics of Policy Attention in Hong Kong

The Performance of Self-Governing Irrigation Systems in Nepal

Coping with Change: A Study of Local Irrigation Institutions in Taiwan

Asian irrigation in transition: responding to challenges.

Foundations of a robust social-ecological system: irrigation institutions in Taiwan