Socio-ecology of stress: why do CPR management projects fail? A case study of sheep and pasture development project in Rajasthan, India

Abstract

In a stratefied rural society, different classes of landless pastoralists or cultivator cum pastoralists are expected to have varying stakes in the protection of environment. 'Assurance' mechanism suggested by Sen and Rauge has been used to understand the institutional arrangement required to coordinate varying expectation of behaviour by different classes in supply of restraint in resource use. However, our contention is that time horizon in which various classes may appraise different resource use options for common vis-a-vis private lands would vary not merely because of differential vulnerability to environmental risks but also because of accumulated deficits or surplus in household budgets, mobility patterns, simultaneous operations in factor and product markets etc. Given those differences thus, the ration of insurance that different classes seek about risks in future supply of common resources augmented through present restraint may also vary. Implication being that institutions providing varying assurances to different classes coupled with differential premia obligations do not emerge or get innovated through changes in the factor prices alone. Central question thus is to find out how such assurance was provided in some of the traditional societies in past and why modern projects in this regard fail to provide it now. Paper provides illustration of a sheep and pasture development cooperative to suggest some policy alternatives.