Gabriela Lichtenstein

Current Trends in Latin American Commons Research

Little is known, in a collective sense, about commons or commons research across the diverse regions and countries that make up Latin America. This paper addresses that knowledge gap by means of a review of communal land tenure data for the region, followed by a detailed analysis of international scholarly publications and conference presentations on Latin American commons, covering the period 1990–2012. We show that commons scholarship in the region, while growing, is focused on a relatively small number of countries. We speculate on the reasons for this, as well as identify the challenges that face commons researchers in Latin America as it looks to maximise the academic and policy impact of their work.

Guanaco management by pastoralists in the Southern Andes

BackgroundAs with most wild ungulates, guanacos (Lama guanicoe) overlap their range with domestic livestock resulting in a conflict for the use of rangelands between local livelihoods and conservation. This article explores a multiple-objective project that was set up in the La Payunia Provincial Reserve (Mendoza, Argentina) in order to address conservation of a migratory population of guanacos; desertification processes; and poverty alleviation. This study analyses the potential for guanaco use and management by a low-income Cooperative, the socio-economic impacts derived from the use, and the challenges facing the experience.ResultsThe Cooperative Payún Matrú was formed in 2005 mainly by local goat herders with a subsistence economy, thus providing a unique example where the beneficiaries of guanaco use are a low-income community. The project was successful in articulating the agendas of several stakeholders. A model for guanaco use under high animal welfare standards was developed as well as an alternative source of income for local people.ConclusionsThe case study illustrates how a conflict over the use of grassland between domestic livestock and a wild species could be turned into an opportunity for economic diversification for pastoralists. Lessons are drawn that could contribute to policy decisions as well as sustainable use programmes for other wildlife species.

Guanaco Management in Argentina: Taking a Commons Perspective

This paper deals with wildlife as a non-conventional common-pool resource (CPR) in a country, Argentina, which is poorly represented in the commons literature. Many of Argentinás public policies regarding natural resource management reflect the historical denial of indigenous and low-income rural communities by the State and the promotion of private property over common property. This paper discusses the challenges facing live shearing programs for guanaco (Lama guanicoe) in Argentinian Patagonia and the potential for incorporating lessons from the commons in order to promote sustainable use.

Special Issue on Latin American Commons: An Introduction

A ‘commons’ can be considered any resource (environmental or otherwise) that is subject to forms of collective use, with the relationship between the resource and the human institutions that mediate its appropriation considered an essential component of the management regime. Like public goods, common resources suffer from problems of “excludability” (i.e., it is physically and/ or institutionally difficult to stop people from accessing the resource). Like private goods, they are also “subtractable” (or “rivalrous”), whereby resource use by one person diminishes what is available for others to use. As Ostrom (1990) explained, conventional wisdom assumes that the sustainable management of common resources can only be achieved through centralized government or private control. Yet empirical evidence (garnered from both real world case studies and laboratory work) has challenged this assumption – to show that alternative forms of property can work effectively if well matched to the “attributes of the resource and users, and when the resulting rules are enforced, considered legitimate, and generate long-term patterns of reciprocity” (van Laerhoven and Ostrom 2007: 19). As the same authors go on to note, “many people, ranging from policy makers, donors, practitioners, and citizen activists, to scientists from different disciplines, have begun to appreciate that there is a world of nuances between the State and the market”.

Current challenges for addressing poverty alleviation via vicuña management in Andean countries

Abstract Vicuña (Vicugna vicugna) are South American camelids, the commercial use of which has untapped poverty alleviation potential. Vicuña fibre is produced by extremely low income communities that inhabit the harsh environment of the high Andes in Argentina, Chile, Peru and Bolivia. At the other end of the world, affluent consumers are willing to pay high prices for apparel made of vicuña fibre. Vicuña management projects follow the logic of community-based wildlife management. The rationale for vicuña conservation through sustainable use is that commercial utilization of fibre obtained from live-shorn individuals will generate sufficient economic benefits to outweigh the costs of conservation, and contribute to community development and poverty alleviation. However, while conservation efforts have been extremely successful with vicuñas having recovered from the brink of extinction, the socio-economic achievements have thus far proved modest. Most such benefits are being captured by traders and international textile companies, rather than by local communities. In addition, the high market value of vicuña fibre has attracted a number of groups interested in its production. This threatens the conservation of this wild species, the exclusive rights of Andean communities and could undermine the spirit of the Vicuña Convention. This paper explores multiple-objective projects that address vicuña conservation and poverty alleviation and analyses the challenges that limit a more equitable distribution of benefits among stakeholders.