Resource industries may be subject to regime shifts in environmental as well as economic conditions. Regime shifts in different dimensions require carefully calculated policies that reflect ...probabilities and welfare effects. In a simple model, I extend the established approach to regime shifts to consider the combined effects of regimes in multiple dimensions. I consider both exogenous and endogenous risks of regime shifts in cases of both observable and unobservable regimes. The unique model has a nonlinear objective function, and model solutions are established via recent developments in optimization that invoke a vector-valued value function.
Renewable resources are affected by both environmental variability, which makes the year-to-year stock growth uncertain, and the risk of irreversible events (e.g., a stock collapse). Little is known ...about how a renewable resource harvester would optimally respond to the combined effects of both sources of risk. In this paper, we propose a simple dynamic resource model to investigate this issue. For some structures of the harvesting cost function, we find that anticipating a higher variability in biological growth induces a cautious management policy, but only when regime shift risk is accounted for. Accounting for the risk of regime shift may prescribe large changes in management responses to anticipated random changes in biological growth whereas ignoring such a risk prescribes small changes in management. Optimal escapement is not constant but varies across all periods when the planning horizon is finite and the regime shift risk is endogenous.
Research has recognized that states enable or constrain private governance initiatives, but we still know too little about the interactions between private and public authority in the governance of ...various social and environmental problems. This article examines how states have responded to the emergence of forest and fisheries certification programs, and how state responses have influenced the subsequent development of these programs. It is argued that historical and structural differences in the management of forest and fisheries have resulted in divergent state responses to certification programs, but that both trajectories of interaction have led to a strengthening of the non‐state program. The article draws upon these cases to inductively identify types of interaction between state policies and non‐state certification programs, the causal mechanisms that shed light on interaction dynamics, and the conditions under which state involvement is likely to result in either strengthening or weakening of non‐state programs.
•We present behavioral games as an instrument to study and facilitate self-governance.•Collective action games for groundwater were played in Andhra Pradesh, India.•Games and community debriefing ...addressed mental models of groundwater.•Games and debriefing increased likelihood of community rules governing groundwater.
Groundwater is one of the most challenging common pool resources to govern, resulting in resource depletion in many areas. We present an innovative use of collective action games to not only measure propensity for cooperation, but to improve local understanding of groundwater interrelationships and stimulate collective governance of groundwater, based on a pilot study in Andhra Pradesh, India. The games simulate crop choice and consequences for the aquifer. These were followed by a community debriefing, which provided an entry point for discussing the interconnectedness of groundwater use, to affect mental models about groundwater. A slightly modified game was played in the same communities, one year later. Our study finds communication within the game increased the likelihood of groups reaching sustainable extraction levels in the second year of play, but not the first. Individual payments to participants based on how they played in the game had no effect on crop choice. Either repeated experience with the games or the revised structure of the game evoked more cooperation in the second year, outweighing other factors influencing behavior, such as education, gender, and trust index scores. After the games were played, a significantly higher proportion of communities adopted water registers and rules to govern groundwater, compared to other communities in the same NGO water commons program. Because groundwater levels are affected by many factors, games alone will not end groundwater depletion. However, games can contribute to social learning about the role of crop choice and collective action, to motivate behavior change toward more sustainable groundwater extraction.
•Coastal communities remain on the fringes of the promised socio-economic benefits of oil development.•An intersection of four themes characterize the oil-fisheries-livelihoods nexus.•Small-scale ...fishing communities experience adverse impacts due to reduced access to ocean-based livelihoods.•The compounding pressures include pollution, dwindling fish stock, and overall marginalization.•Future research should focus on gender and cross-sectoral governance and collaboration.
A quarter of global oil production comes from offshore fields and about 60% of internationally-traded oil travels by tankers. The relationship between oil, fisheries, and coastal communities is documented primarily through case studies in individual jurisdictions and via the impacts of oil spills. Yet, the implications of oil development for fisheries and coastal communities are much broader. This study provides an extensive review of the effects of oil development in relation to four interconnected themes: 1) the environment, including marine habitats and fish; 2) small-scale fisheries and coastal community livelihoods; 3) coastal and ocean spaces, including disputes over territory and infrastructure; and 4) ocean and coastal governance processes. We map spatial overlaps between the oil sector and small-scale fisheries and point to the frequent displacement of fishers from fishing grounds due to increasing coastal traffic and infrastructure, and the catastrophic effects of oil spills on fisheries and coastal economies. Though the oil sector generally has negative impacts on fisheries livelihoods and coastal communities, these effects and their mechanisms vary across locations, ecosystems, species, and specific activities and groups. Overall, this narrative review provides a comprehensive account of the scholarship to date and points to key themes for future research, including intersections between offshore oil and gender, cross-sectoral governance, and the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 14. Underpinning all of these challenges and potential solutions is a clear need for stronger integration of social and natural science knowledge, perspectives, and tools.
This microreview summarizes the use of deep eutectic solvents (DESs) and related melts in organic synthesis. Solvents of this type combine the great advantages of other proposed environmentally ...benign alternative solvents, such as low toxicity, high availability, low inflammability, high recyclability, low volatility, and low price, avoiding many disadvantages of the more modern media. The fact that many of the components of these mixtures come directly from nature assures their biodegradability and renewability. The classification and distribution of the reactions into different sections in this microreview, as well as the emphasis paid to their scope, easily allow a general reader to understand the actual state of the art and the great opportunities opened, not only for academic purposes but also for industry.
21st Century DESs: Worries about the sustainability of our civilization on Earth are forcing changes on all aspects of industrial production. In organic synthesis, solvents (including their production and degradation) are the main waste component in reactions. Deep eutectic solvents (and related mixtures) offer an irresistible opportunity to improve the sustainability of processes in this century.
In this paper, we survey the literature applying viability theory to the sustainable management of renewable resources. After a refresher on the main concepts of viability theory, we provide a ...general map of the contributions and next discuss them by area of application, including ecosystems and population biology, climate change, forestry and others. We conclude by pointing out issues that deserve more attention and should be part of a research agenda.
Civilizations are large energy consumers, so the more civilized a people, the greater their energy consumption. However, studies have shown that the way energy is produced is polluting and focused on ...finite resources. This study aimed to take stock of the scientific literature on renewable energies, identifying their advantages and disadvantages. The conceptual bibliographic method was used in its four stages: formulation of guiding questions, collection and organization of data, and presentation of responses generated by handling data obtained from Google Scholar and Periódico Capes. The results showed that a) renewable energy comes from a natural cyclothymic source, b) the advantages of renewable energy are almost all of an environmental nature, and c) the disadvantages are of an economic-financial nature. The conclusion shows that the time has come for a decision to be made between paying the high price of environmental sustainability or continuing with the lower costs of compromising the continuity of life on the planet.
Polycentricity is a fundamental concept in commons scholarship that connotes a complex form of governance with multiple centers of semiautonomous decision making. If the decision‐making centers take ...each other into account in competitive and cooperative relationships and have recourse to conflict resolution mechanisms, they may be regarded as a polycentric governance system. In the context of natural resource governance, commons scholars have ascribed a number of advantages to polycentric governance systems, most notably enhanced adaptive capacity, provision of good institutional fit for natural resource systems, and mitigation of risk on account of redundant governance actors and institutions. Despite the popularity of the concept, systematic development of polycentricity, including its posited advantages, is lacking in the commons literature. To build greater clarity and specificity around the concept, we develop a theoretical model of a polycentric governance system with a focus on the features necessary or conducive for achieving the functioning predicted by commons scholars. The model is comprised of attributes, which constitute the definitional elements, and enabling conditions, which specify additional institutional features for achieving functionality in the commons. The model we propose takes the concept a step further toward specificity without sacrificing the generality necessary for contextual application and further development.
摘要
多中心是公共资源学说的一个基本概念。它指的是一个有着多个半自主决策中心的复杂治理模式。如果这些决策中心将彼此考虑成竞争与合作的关系, 并且有资源去争取不同的解决方案, 他们可被认作是一个多中心的治理体系。在自然资源管理这一具体环境中, 公共资源学者们总结了一系列有关多中心治理体系的优点。其中, 最主要的是, 提高适应能力、提供与自然资源体系相符的制度, 以及通过多样化的行为者和治理制度来降低风险。尽管这一概念十分流行, 在公共资源的文献中, 包括其所声称的优势在内的有关多中心治理的系统发展却是个缺失。为了使该概念更加明晰且具体, 我们提出了一个有关多中心治理体系的理论模型。这一模型重点关注那些必要的或有助于实现公共资源学者们所预测的多中心治理功能的特征。这一模型包含了特征, 即那些明确的元素, 和实现条件, 即多中心在公共资源中实现其功能性的其它制度特征。我们提出的这一模型, 在不牺牲该概念使用和发展的普遍性的基础上, 将其进一步的具体化。
Many renewable natural resources have been extracted beyond sustainable levels. While some resource stocks have recovered, others are still over-extracted, causing substantial economic losses. This ...paper develops a model motivated by empirical facts about resource use and regulation to understand these patterns. The model is a dynamic model of a dual economy with technological progress, structural change, and costly resource regulation. Based on this model, we show that technological progress explains the initial increase in resource use. Technological progress also induces structural change and a decline in resource users. While the declining number of resource users does not directly lead to resource recovery, it does reduce regulatory costs, paving the way for resource regulation and recovery. Our results show that although technological progress can contribute to resource degradation, it also helps resource recovery through reduced regulatory costs. Our results suggest further that a temporal use beyond sustainable levels can be socially optimal until regulatory costs fall below the benefits of regulation.
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