Slí Eile: Yesterday, it was announced that a Nobel prize is to be awarded to Elinor Ostrom of Indiana University in the USA 'for her analysis of economic governance, especially the commons' and to Oliver Williamson of the University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA 'for his analysis of economic governance, especially the boundaries of the firm'. These follow Tobin, Sen, Krugman and many others. Ostrom, the first female economist to win the prize in economics, has researched on the way self-organised communities - and not just Governments and Corporations can successfully manage resources. She argues that 'Social capital is an essential complement to the concepts of natural, physical and human capital and can be used for beneficial or harmful ends - or simply be allowed to dissipate'
7 comments:
Its fitting that Ostrom should be so honoured, not just as the first woman to be awarded but also for her pioneering work exploring 'civil society'/ 'social' capacity for economic organisation and management outside both 'state' and 'market'. As someone who has used her work for years I'm delighted not least since her work demostrates that the 'tragedy of the commons' (Garret Hardin's (in)famous hypothesis) is in reality the 'tragedy of open-access regimes' since commons-regimes (that is, collectively managed resources) can avoid their degradation and over-use. Her work is a fitting testament also to 'non-western' forms of economic management and organisation and demonstrates the capacity for effective forms of economic co-ordination outside the privatisation/private property approach of the free market and the collectivisation/nationalisation of state control. Little wonder her analysis has been a staple part of green economic thinking for decades.
In the context of Ireland's current economic trauma I would be interested in learning of examples (which would attract widespread participation and have a meaningful impact) of "economic co-ordination outside the prvatisation/private property approach of the free market and the collectivisation/nationalisation of state control".
Paul, why should the context for judging Ostrom's contribution to economic thinking be confined to Ireland's current economic trauma?
Brilliantly misunderstood!! I'm not questioning the validity or relevance of Ostrom's analysis; I'm simply curious about the potential for applying her insights in Ireland. We are in a state of some flux in political and economic terms (though not as much as I'd like) where some previously cherished nostrums are being cast aside. Does Ostrom have something useful to fill the vacuum?
Ok Paul. Well, a lot of her work is on 'common pool resources' (natural and human-made) and associated commons regimes in fishing, land-use, irrigation systems, other water resources, often in the developing world.
So, most concretely we'd need to see what 'common pool resources' we have or could have (if ownership entitlements are altered) and see if a commons regime would work better (however defined) than state or private ownership. How about...off shore oil and gas?
But perhaps her most pertinent insight (of course I'm interpreting here) would be for the re-assertion of social control/regulation over economic decisions - not state control - but bringing economic activity and assets currently under state or market ownership into local community control and use (if not necessarily ownership). Ostrom could provide some of the 'Meitheal mentality' our great leader Cowen spoke of earlier this year at the FFers Ard Fheis.
Many thanks for the considered response. I suspect I'm considered as being unnecessarily provocative on this site, but I did serve an apprenticeship seeking to explore this space between private property rights and collective (usually state on behalf of all citizens) ownership and I retain an interest.
I fear that the space to apply these ideas has shrunk and that, in developed economies, the popular perception of their application is of being pre-modern and harking back to an age that's long gone.
The Irish Times ran an interesting editorial on this on Friday. See
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2009/1016/1224256786267.html
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