Abstract
Of the three strategies available for managing common property resources (CPR)—centralized control, privatization and local management—this essay focuses on the last, which has proven quite effective in various settings throughout the Third World, with the key to success being local ability to control access to the resource. The major factors at issue in the Sundarbans situation are: historically external pressure on the forest; currently dense population in adjacent areas; a land distribution even more unequal than the norm in Bangladesh; and a decentralized local government structure initiated in the mid-1980s. The first three factors have encouraged the local population to view this CRP as a frontier to be exploited,rather than as a resource to be preservedfor sustained yield. Thus to the extent that the new local government structure proves to be democratic and responsive to popular needs, it would most likely accelerate destruction of the Sundarbans, using the area as a cheap and easy way to provide some livelihood to the rural poor and landless. Accordingly, decentralization cannot be a viable strategy for preserving this unique forest resource; only a strong central control can ensure its survival into the next century.
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Additional information
1. The original version of this paper was prepared for the Sundarbans Workshop, sponsored by the Smithsonian Institution and the Joint Committee on South Asia of the Social Science Research Council and the American Council of Learned Societies, Washington, DC, 20–21 November 1987.
Harry Blair is professor of political science at Bucknell University, and has held appointments at Colgate, Cornell, Columbia and Yale Universities, as well as at the United States Agency for International Development. He has conducted academic research and has served as a consultant in South Asia for more than 20 years, focusing on rural development policy, natural resource management and decentralization. In the subcontinent, his primary geographical concentration has been on Bangladesh and, within India, on Maharashtra and Bihar.
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Blair, H.W. Local government and rural development in the bengal Sundarbans: An inquiry in managing common property resources. Agric Hum Values 7, 40–51 (1990). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01530435
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01530435