COMMON BENEFITS: IS COMMUNITY TENURE FACILITATING INVESTMENT IN THE COMMONS FOR INCLUSIVE AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT?
SOPHIA GNYCH, STEVEN LAWRY, ILIANA MONTERROSO, ANUKRAM ADHIKARY
With communities in many parts of the world achieving stronger, legally-recognized, collective rights over natural resources, important questions now arise regarding how communities can overcome perceived barriers to investment and deliver sustainable development. Normative economic theory posits conceptual and practical barriers to investment in commons-based enterprises. This paper considers evidence and draws on lessons from four countries—Guatemala, Mexico, Nepal and Namibia—to better understand the pathways emerging to deliver investment in the commons. We find that investment in community-owned resources is taking place, but that investment readiness develops over time, in stages, and is conditional on the level of assurance stakeholders have that the obligations of each party will be met. We also find that community rights have fostered investment that recognizes the social character of commons ownership, to deliver environmental and social returns, as well as profits.
Event: Land Governance in an Interconnected World_Annual World Bank Conference on Land and Poverty_2018
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