Durable commons regimes share clear boundaries, local rule-making, monitoring, graduated sanctions, and cheap dispute resolution.
Ostrom's 1990 principles, drawn from Swiss alpine pastures, Japanese village forests and Spanish irrigation systems that had functioned for centuries. She won the 2009 Nobel for showing the commons need not be tragic.
In practice
- An allotment association with clear plots, its own rules, a rota of monitors and a cheap way to settle disputes runs for eighty years.
- A shared office kitchen with none of the five fails within a term, and the missing one is usually cheap dispute resolution.