DRMS: Inequalities, Institutions and Sustainability: An Experimental Study of Local Efforts to Govern the Commons

以社区为基础的办法管理自然资源的长期挑战之一是，这种办法往往导致社会排斥和经济不平等的加剧。自然资源财产权的下放是应对环境退化的一种越来越受欢迎的政策回应，尤其是在发展中国家。这一趋势的一个例子是，当地社区现在集体拥有和管理着世界上剩余森林越来越多的份额(目前超过15%)。一些学者报告说，集体拥有和管理森林的地方社区往往比政府表现得更好，至少在综合环境状况方面是这样。然而，一些学者担心，当当地资源使用者自主管理共享资源时，往往会增加不平等：管理最终主要受益于自然资源使用者群体中相对富裕或享有特权的成员，从而进一步边缘化较贫穷的成员。这一风险严重威胁了以社区为基础的办法的可持续性，特别是因为越来越多的证据表明，经济不平等程度相对较高的群体使用的共用资源往往具有更差的资源条件。这一研究项目调查了基于社区的治理方法产生这种不平等的条件，以及资源使用者为促进更公平的治理结果而可能设计和执行的体制安排。本项目涉及自然资源治理过程中的两种决策。首先，这项研究对地方治理不平等如何影响弱势家庭参与群体治理活动的决定，以及这些决定对资源可持续性的后续影响有了更深的理解。第二，通过审查不同体制安排对谁从资源管理活动中受益的影响，这项研究产生了关于解决森林用户群体不平等负面影响的方法的新知识。具体地说，研究人员考察了尼泊尔和印度的社区森林管理组织，并聚焦于三个问题：不平等如何影响集体行动？不平等如何影响利益分配和可持续性？哪些干预措施可以减少不平等？这四个假设是：事实上，减少不平等的干预措施可以增加对决策的参与；将激励在资源管理方面投入更多的时间；将增加公地的利益，使处于不利地位的家庭受益，并将改善环境结果。该团队通过四项随机对照试验来评估这些假设，每项试验都使用了三种减少不平等的干预措施。这些村庄是通过配对整群随机选择的，N为360个村庄，相当于每个国家每个实验条件下有60个村庄。还有一项在八个村庄进行的人种学案例研究。干预措施是：为低种姓和部落群体设立一个小组委员会，为高种姓和男性公民设立一个小组委员会，并对他们进行包容性价值方面的培训，这两个小组委员会再加上一个妇女小组委员会。由于尼泊尔对妇女有委员会成员配额，而不是按种姓分配，因此待遇略有修改。治疗前和治疗后的家庭调查衡量规划小组活动的参与度和资源使用情况，并辅之以卫星图像。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

One of the longstanding challenges of community-based approaches to managing natural resources is that such approaches often lead to increases in social exclusion and economic inequality. The devolution of property rights over natural resources is an increasingly popular policy response to environmental degradation, especially in developing nations. One example of this trend is that local communities now collectively own and manage an increasing share (currently more than 15 percent) of the world's remaining forests. Several scholars have reported that local communities that own and manage their forests collectively often perform better than governments, at least when it comes to aggregate environmental conditions. Some scholars, however, are voicing concerns that when local resource users self-govern shared resources it often produces increased inequality: the risk that the management ends up benefiting mostly the relatively rich or privileged members of natural resource user groups, hence further marginalizing poorer members. This risk is a serious threat to the sustainability of community-based approaches, especially as there is mounting evidence that common-pool resources used by groups with relatively high degrees of economic inequality tend to have more degraded resource conditions. This research project investigates the conditions under which community-based governance approaches produce such inequalities, and the institutional arrangements that resource users may design and enforce to foster more equitable governance outcomes. This project addresses two types of decision making in natural resource governance processes. First, the research produces a deeper understanding of how local governance inequalities affect the decisions of disadvantaged households to participate in the group's governance activities, and the subsequent effects of those decisions on resource sustainability. Second, by examining the effects of different institutional arrangements on who benefits from resource management activities, the research produces new knowledge about approaches to address the negative effects of inequality in forest user groups. Specifically, the researchers examine community forest management groups in Nepal and India and focus on three questions: how do inequalities influence collective action? How does inequality influence the distribution of benefits and sustainability? What interventions reduce inequality? The four hypotheses are: interventions to decrease inequality de facto can increase participation in decision making; will motivate greater time investments in resource management; will increase benefits of the commons going to disadvantaged households, and will achieve improved environmental outcomes. The team evaluates the hypotheses through four randomized controlled trials each of which uses three inequality reducing interventions. The villages are selected using matched-pair cluster-randomization with an N of 360 villages which makes for 60 villages per experimental condition per country. There is also an ethnographic case study in eight villages. The interventions are: creation of a subcommittee for low-caste and tribal groups, a subcommittee plus training for high-caste and male citizens on the value of inclusiveness, and both of these plus a subcommittee for women. Because Nepal has committee membership quotas for women but not by caste the treatments are slightly modified. Pre- and post-treatment household surveys measure both participation in the planning group activities and resource use, and are be supplemented with satellite imagery.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.