Master thesis

6.0Conclusion

In the Agro-climatic region of Udaipur, the local governing institution’s inability to effectively manage plays a significant and additional pressure on the local CPRs. The institution as a whole can be said to demonstrate a large degree of apathy towards the Commons in general and towards the massive amount of encroachments on the Commons and this attitude is reflected in the community. The local governing institution has even blocked and ignored community initiatives towards evicting the encroachments, thereby breaking the law concerning how they should react on filed complains. Therefore it must be concluded that the actions of the local governance, to a large degree, are enhancing and determining the continued failure of the CPRs. Ostrom’s principles of guarantied sanctions, regular face-to-face communication and community participation in the decision process, that is necessary for efficient local governance, are non-existent in the Udaipur survey villages and as a result the area available as Commons for the poor and landless in the community has been severely limited in size. The complete lack of governance as well as the indifference from the revenue Department has led to an encroaching norm with the population and the vegetation suffering as a result. In general the situation reflects Hardin’s assumption of the rational individual that seeks to enhance personnel gains with no concern for the community and the future of all of their livelihoods. In short; the lack of governance and monitoring from both the local Panchayat and from the Revenue Department leads to the further encroachment of the lands and the growing disregard of the Commons as CPR.

In the agro-climatic region of Jaisalmer, the severe restraints on vegetation and agriculture from the environment have on the other hand, enhanced the local governance and given the social and economical significance of the Orans and Gochars, the communities are showing fairly effective local management efforts. The degradation of the lands is much more a result of the desertification than a result of improper local governance. It reflects Ostrom’s principles of maintaining frequent face-to-face communication and dense social networks, the users support effective monitoring and rule enforcement and the knowledge that sanctions will be enforced. In this case the sanctions that are effective are not the monetary fines but rather the social exclusion and a “fear of the gods” in relation to the very religious communities. This has maintained the vegetation level on the Orans and Gochars at an acceptable level and has prevented large scale encroachment as it is seen in the other regions. It is not possible to enclose large additional lands as Oran or Devbani, because the fuel wood needs will still have to be met, and this out of necessity would overshadow the religious respect. The basic needs will always come before anything else. If people are starving or not allowed to extract the resources they need, this will easily outweigh the social norms of conduct, as it is beginning to in the agro-climatic region of Alwar that holds much more vegetation and much higher productivity than Jaisalmer. One of the crisis managements systems in Jaisalmer is to sell a fairly large percentage of the livestock both in order to relive pressure on the vegetation and water sources and to avoid the economic loss from the death of the livestock.

In the region of Alwar, the situation of both local management and the relationship to the Central Government, in the form of the Forest Department, is very different from the two other regions. The communities have a close and traditional relationship to the forest and the Devbani and this enhances the local management and protection of the areas and they are well aware of the general and continued process of the depletion of the forest. This has resulted in fairly good local governance with a very effective crisis management and initiatives by utilizing local plants that, although not the best for fodder for the livestock, it can sustain them during droughts. As stated in the analysis Alwar does not seem to fit completely to any of the theories. The official local governing institutions are slow to act and as in Udaipur, they have a tendency for apathy towards the situation of the Commons as a whole. In contrast to Udaipur, the community has not accepted this and has formed informal organisations to manage and protect the CPRs, especially the Devabani and the forest in general. In Alwar many of the communities have lost their traditional user rights of the forest and this has resulted in an increase in illegal activities to make ends meet for the households, this has also resulted in violent fights with neighbouring communities over access. The result is a slow but steady negative process of accountability towards the traditional norms, but the main reason for the continued degradation is from the significant and well known corruption of the Forest officials grading the Sariska Tiger reserve. The community that lies outside the Tiger Reserve, where the typography allows for intensive and high productive farming the dependency on the CPRs is very low and as a result the social norms and institutions upholding them have come to a complete breakdown.

In answering the problem formulation: How is the local governance determining the success or failure of the CPRs in three agro-climatic regions in Rajasthan, India? It must be concluded that strict government control does not lead to a more sustainable management of the CPRs but rather to the contrary. The main reason for the continued encroachment problems in all the regions of the research is the acceptance of bribes and the overall corruption with the Government departments. But only in the case of Udaipur has this manifested into a near complete apathy in the communities towards the encroachments and the general status of the Commons. In the other two regions the communities are showing fairly efficient efforts to maintain their CPRs and to monitor the usage and enforce exclusion of outsiders, in accordance with Ostrom’s principles. It must be stated that, in Udaipur Hardin’s assumption of the focus on private gains will overshadow the good of the community and could very well in the long run lead to the complete destruction of the local environment. In general is must also be concluded that there is a lack of long-term perspectives towards the local Commons, even though the knowledge of their degradation is there and more importantly felt in the communities. But more often than not this leads to private gains outweighing the community needs and the needs of the CPRs to maintain its vegetation cover and in turn sustain the community.

Some of the most important aspects of successful local management is to have an efficient monitoring system, regularity and participation by the communities in the local management as well as legal rights to exclude outsider and evict encroachers, but all of this matters little if the community does not accept and support the rules and norms towards the Common Property Resources.