Forces Driving More
din, who in 19 wrote a seminal article titled “The Tragedy of the
Commons,” in which he argued that scarce resources shared by the
community were soon exhausted without government regulations.
While scholars were debating theories of what ought to be, Os-
trom and her colleagues embedded themselves in communities from
Switzerland to Nepal, observing and documenting their behavior.
What they uncovered were communities who managed scarce resources
through informal norms. Resource use was tied to resource upkeep.
What applied to one, applied to all. Behaviors like cheating were not
tolerated. Participation in community tasks was a requirement. Indi-
viduals accepted responsibility for the overall results.
Ostrom’s work highlighted the power of informal self-government.
While the results were compelling, her qualitative approach did not
receive the scientific accolades of more theoretical treatises and quan-
titative analyses. That was, until 2009 , when Elinor Ostrom became
the first woman to share the Nobel Prize in Economics for her “analysis
of the role of economic governance, especially at the commons.”^ True
to form, her prize money went toward scholarships. Regrettably, in
June 2012 Elinor Ostrom passed away.
Her studies in Nepal had parallels to the indigenous community
in Peru.^ The Nepalese farmers whom Ostrom observed also made do
with limited supplies of irrigation water. Each year they cleaned and
rebuilt crude earthen canals held together with mud, stone, branches,
and tree trunks. When the snow melted and the water flowed, they
divided the water between them, following long-standing community
norms.
For those looking in, how these farming communities governed
themselves was not readily apparent or even germane. What they ob-
served were primitive canals badly in need of drastic improvements. So
with the best of intentions, these outside observers secured money to
build a modern irrigation system complete with cement-lined canals
and metal headgates.
For the United States Agency for International Development
(USAID) and Nepal’s government, the initiative promised to be a
winner on all fronts. Their feasibility assessment foretold of crop yields
shooting up, food production increasing, family incomes rising and
communities dramatically better off. With financing secured and plans