"This book grew out of a conference organized in 2018 to mark the fiftieth anniversary of Garrett Hardin's The Tragedy of the Commons, one of the the most cited articles of the 20th century. The conference was less a celebration of the substance of Hardin's essay than an acknowledgment of how it has shaped a half decade of research and theory. The conference, held at Georgetown University's Law Center in Washington D.C., brought together nearly fifty researchers from over twenty different nations to present their research on a wide variety of interdisciplinary and trans-disciplinary perspectives on the "commons." The scope and depth of research presented at this conference could hardly have been imagined by Garrett Hardin when he published his essay in 1968. Nor could he have imagined that the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in Economic Science, Elinor Ostrom, would debunk the central assumption underlying his famous essay- that shared resources must be either privatized or heavily regulated in order to prevent their depletion. In many ways, however, Ostrom revived what might have been a waning theory and field by setting in motion a whole new line of inquiry and research empirically demonstrating the variety of ways that resource users and communities come together to cooperatively utilize and sustainably manage shared resources"--

The commons theory, first articulated by Elinor Ostrom, is increasingly used as a framework to understand and rethink the management and governance of many kinds of shared resources. These resources can include natural and digital properties, cultural goods, knowledge and intellectual property, and housing and urban infrastructure, among many others. In a world of increasing scarcity and demand - from individuals, states, and markets - it is imperative to understand how best to induce cooperation among users of these resources in ways that advance sustainability, affordability, equity, and justice. This volume reflects this multifaceted and multidisciplinary field from a variety of perspectives, offering new applications and extensions of the commons theory, which is as diverse as the scholars who study it and is still developing in exciting ways.

This book proposes a new approach to economics, starting from the commons and based on the Economy of Francesco (EoF), a worldwide movement of young people who aim to change the current economic models and working towards a fair, sustainable, and inclusive economic system. EoF was convened by Pope Francis and is inspired by the example of St. Francis of Assisi, featuring Franciscan economic roots and institutions, as well as theories of the social sciences. The authors raise and answer several important questions throughout the volume, such as: What if the economic courses taught in the universities across the globe focused their attention on the topics of the commons rather than on private goods? What if social businesses, rather than being considered as a hybrid form of businesses, became the normal approach, and ethical and green finance ruled over the standard financial sector? Is it possible to move away from the primacy of the consumers to the preeminence of ethical consumers who express their preferences for an inclusive, sustainable, and workers-friendly economic system with their daily choices? Using a unique approach, the book includes the contributions of prominent scholars which are integrated and discussed by young international scholars, providing a fresh analysis with a glance of hope for the future. The book is a must-read for students, scholars, and researchers of economics and related disciplines interested in alternatives to the current economic mainstream in general, and the Economy of Francesco in particular.

The book discusses how division affect the fabric of cities, and people’s sense of identity and agency, and are reflected in physical features, architecture, and urban planning. The question of divided cities represents a complex and multistranded urban Ecology—at once both social and spatial; it cannot be limited to a single science or discipline, such as social or spatial fields. This suggests integrated and cross- disciplinary understandings, as well as integrated or parallel approaches and solutions. Urban ecologies of division manifest in multiple forms. One of their most palpable expressions is conflict, with parallels around the world, and often with correlations in the spatial fabric. Violence in such contexts is often a surface expression of deeper socio-economic or ideological differences. Whether as a result of intervention by authority or by dissent between groups, a divided city inevitably becomes a place of conflict in various forms and intensity, eroding the joy of living and sense of collective belonging to the detriment of all. In effect, it erodes the collective advantage of being part of a more unified society. A city exists in collections of social structures which mutually form a society. A divided city implies divided social structures and, in consequence, a divided society. The papers compiled in this book present many case studies of divided cities, discussing the different causes of divisions and their effects on societies. Some of the causes can be linked to conflicts, wars, colonialism, or legislative political systems. In response to the serious challenges resulting from these divisions, the book aims to provide opportunities for new approaches and possibilities for new interventions and solutions, making it significant to urban planners, architects, and policymakers.

This book examines women’s participation in social, economic and political development in West Africa. The book looks at women from the premise of being active agents in the development processes within their communities, thereby subverting the dominate narrative of women as passive recipients of development.

This Handbook provides the first comprehensive review and synthesis of knowledge and new thinking on how food and food systems can be thought, interpreted and practiced around the old/new paradigms of commons and commoning. The overall aim is to investigate the multiple constraints that occur within and sustain the dominant food and nutrition regime and to explore how it can change when different elements of the current food systems are explored and re-imagined from a commons perspective. The book sparks the debate on food as a commons between and within disciplines, with particular attention to spaces of resistance (food sovereignty, de-growth, open knowledge, transition town, occupations, bottom-up social innovations) and organizational scales (local food, national policies, South–South collaborations, international governance and multi-national agreements). Overall, it shows the consequences of a shift to the alternative paradigm of food as a commons in terms of food, the planet and living beings. Chapters 1 and 24 of this book are freely available as downloadable Open Access PDFs at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

Institutions and Incentives in Public Policy: An Analytical Assessment of Non-Market Decision-Making explores, both in theory and in practice, the consequences of using public policy as a tool to achieve specific individual and social goals, as well as its impact on private solutions to address such goals. The chapters examine the institutional incentives that operate in non-market settings, both governmental and non-governmental, using the theoretical frameworks of market process theory and public choice theory, they analyze a diverse set of contemporary public policy issues at both the domestic and international levels. Authored by individuals from a variety of disciplines with diverse interests in public policy, this work includes discussions of topics, such as foreign aid, education policy, environmental policy, health care policy, and the construction of private cities. This volume is relevant to scholars, students, policymakers, and knowledgeable citizens interested in the study of economics, political science, public policy, as well as those interested in particular policies rather than specific disciplines.