Mobility of Common-Pool Resources and Privatization of Land Tenure in the Argentine Semi-Arid Chaco
Abstract
During the last few decades there has been a strong tendency towards privatisation
of land tenure to increase protection and sustainable use of natural resources. We
assess this approach in the context of land privatisation in a dry region of the Argentine
Chaco where low income peasants depend on multiple common-pool resources (CPRs) to
survive and where most recently privatisation of land tenure has also included large
absentee landowners. We hypothesise that the results of such policies depend in part
on the mobility of the resources in question, and compare the harvesting practices
of CPRs of varied mobility before and after the conversion of land to private property
to assess the effects of privatisation. We found that privatisation by low income
peasants increased control of access to stationary and low mobility CPRs but highly
mobile species continued being used as open access and over-exploited. In contrast,
the later privatisation of land by large absentee landowners is likely to pose serious
threats to the conservation of the ecosystem in general, and to the ability of low
income peasants to maintain their livelihoods in this region.
Type
Journal articleSubject
ArgentinaChaco
common-pool resources
Impenetrable
land tenure
privatisation
property rights
wildlife.
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Xavier Basurto
Associate Professor of Sustainability Science
I am interested in the fundamental question of how groups (human and non-human) can
find ways to self-organize, cooperate, and engage in successful collective action
for the benefit of the common good. To do this I strive to understand how the institutions
(formal and informal rules and norms) that govern social behavior, interplay with
biophysical variables to shape social-ecological systems. What kind of institutions
are better able to govern complex-adaptive systems? and how can societies (la

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