The annual European Regional Conference of the International Association for the Study of the Commons (IASC) is an interdisciplinary gathering of academics and practitioners discussing the question of how to deal with the use of resources in capitalism. Thus, the conference went beyond the borders of academia and presented a grand overview of theoretical, empirical and practical approaches to using the commons model as a way to enable communities to organise and manage common resources. This year, the conference addressed the seeming gap between two dominating fields of study: the development of local institutions for the management of the commons on the one hand and effects of the global expansion and deepening of capitalist modes of production and extraction, consumption, and societal reproduction on the other by focusing on the “glocal” connections and interdependencies, reactions of local communities to global processes like climate change, or the local ramifications of and resistance to global economic and social developments.

Naturally, an annual conference of this magnitude presents a wide variety of topics in presentations and discussions. The following is a selection of what panels the authors have chosen as fairly representative.

JESSE RIBOT (Chicago) opened the conference with one of the central “glocal” issues we face today: climate change. He criticised the concept of “climate refugees” used by the IPCC. This takes one cause and finds multiple outcomes; Ribot instead proposed to take the outcome – migration – and look for the different causes in the analysis. Thus, migration presents as the result of many causes. Most importantly, Ribot emphasized vulnerability as a central concept in the analysis of migration. Climate change is thus one aggravating factor for people who lack assets and social security.

Building on the much-discussed notion of the Anthropocene, DAVID SCHLOSBERG (Sydney) pointed out that the “injustice” appearing in this era is an expression of two kinds of disruptions: Slow violence in the form of long-term degradations and punctual disruption like floods, wildfires and heatwaves. According to Schlosberg, we need to adopt a language of vulnerability, because anthropogenic environmental deterioration will continue to inequitably undermine the cultures, resources, land, and health of vulnerable communities.

PETER KNOEPFEL (Lausanne) gave a keynote on the governance of local commons. Starting from a definition of the commons as a political rather than legal notion, he explained local microcosms as territorial local commons with unequal participation rights recognized by unequal user rights. In Western Europe the boundaries established within microcosms of local commons separate those with ownership rights from those without. The governance of local microcosms is regulated through Local Regulatory Arrangements (LRA), which assure the legitimization, control of boundaries, monitoring and sanctioning and fix the rules and the integration of the microcosms into the overall political system. He concluded that context within which such microcosms emerge, live and will be maintained or valued will vary in time and space and cannot be defined in a universal way.

SILKE HELFRICH (Jena) advised to shift the discussion from “commons” as a fixed state to “commoning” as ongoing practice. Stating that “there is no such thing as the commons”, she emphasized actors, the constructed nature of common spaces and the potential of all goods, communities and spaces to be turned into a commons. This would lead to a new discussion about processes, patterns and potentiality. Theorising of commoning, according to Helfrich, is a missing piece in commons theory that needs to be taken on.

The panel “Influence of European & international forest policies” focused on how the European and international forest governance affects local contexts, influences national state frameworks on forestry and how communities respond to it. LYSANN SCHNEIDER (Bern) analysed social and environmental transformation due to international influences on forest resources in Mexico. ANNINA AEBERLI (Bern) presented forest discourses and connected policies in Sarawak, Malaysia, and the influence of European forest concepts until today. PAPA FAYE (Dakar) dealt with the rationalization of domination in Senegal and brought out its relations with the dynamics of global economic and environmental policies. RAHEL JUD’s (Bern) presentation dealt with the implementation and the effects of the REDD+ policy and the impacts of pilot projects on local communities and livelihoods in Indonesia. JERYLEE WILKES-ALLEMANN (Zürich) highlighted governance systems of forest recreation and its challenges of managing and planning in urban forest areas.

In “Switzerland as a laboratory”, panelists discussed different historical approaches. ANNE-LISE HEAD (Geneva) presented a rich overview of the commons in Switzerland in the longue durée. In a socio-historical perspective, she emphasized the inclusion/exclusion processes which the positive assessment of the commons, (an evaluation that dominated the conference), relativized. MARTIN SCHAFFNER (Basel) reported on a research project on the corporation Ursern, where three characteristics of land use are noted: the common ownership of the pastures, an elaborate set of rules, and the management of the land. SARAH BAUMGARTNER (Bern) and MARTIN STUBER (Bern) have analysed the common fields of the civic corporation of Bern. It became clear that long-term survival of such an institution is only possible through multiple transformations.

The panel “Common-pool Resource (CPR) Institutions in the Shadow of the State” explored the connection between commons and the state in different actor constellations and sociocultural contexts. JEAN-DAVID GERBER (Bern) claimed that Large-Scale Land Acquisitions (LSLA) often result in the creation of new commons, where the state plays a significant role in the creation of new institutions and redistribution of resources. JOSÉ PABLO PRADO CÓRDOVA (Ciudad Guatemala) presented a case of successful bottom-up initiative for claiming state-mediated property rights and nature conservation through grassroots mobilization. Then, JESSPER LARSSON (Uppsala) explained how open market places could support creation of the commons in 17th Century Northern Scandinavia, where the state supported the process, yet commons turned against the state. SARAH RYSER (Bern) discussed invisible uses of the land classified as idle by nature resource dependent people and gendered experience of participation in the government land deal. Lastly, MONICA VESILE (Berlin) examined multiple meanings of forest commons and the role of the post-socialist state in the production of laws and policies that resulted in unequal distribution of forest common ownership, membership and access to the resources.

In the panel on “The Climate Change Dilemma: Global and Local Scales in Climate Science” DANIA ACHERMANN (Denmark) illustrated the study of ice as a fundamental part of climate change research. An attempt to overcome the abstraction of climate change was presented by BRITTA ACKSEL (Essen); counteracting classical research language, personal stories about local actions should reach the broader public. KLAUS EISENACK (Berlin) highlighted the heterogeneity of adaptation in water governance where rigid water use rights and externalities challenge adaptation. JOHANNA GOUZOUZAI (Strasbourg) showed the use of different discourses used by two types of claim-makers. SADAF JAVED (New Delhi) illustrated structural differences within tea grower communities that lead to different perception and adaptation possibilities regarding local weather varieties.

The goal of the panel on “The Impacts of Commons Enclosures on Local Power Relations“ was to bring back the notion of power and power differences in the study of commons. LAURA WEIDMANN (Fribourg) showed on the basis of Namibia’s land right system that including traditional authorities in the system of communal land governance is accompanied with uncertainties in respect to rights, duties, and the scope of power. TIMOTHY ADAMS (Bern) illustrated the unbalanced power relations within contract farming in Malawi. Sugar cane farmers have become dependent on world market prices and the rural economy loses its resilience. HEINZPETER ZNOJ (Bern) illustrated the complex rules that have arisen due to the transformation of common property regimes in Indonesia on the basis of the changing buffalo law. The complex rules also generated structural conflict between men and women.

In the panel “Undermining the Commons: Transnational Corporations, Mining, and Impact on Commons Governance” THOMAS NIEDERBERGER (Bern) showed how prior negative experience and knowledge exchange trigger resistance among the local population in mining areas in Peru. BERIL OCAKLI’s (Berlin) study showed similar results in Kirghizstan. Nevertheless, the local community is not powerless against the company. The cases by DIT FATOGOMA DJANE ADOU (Bern) on Côte d’Ivoire and PURABI BOSE (Gujarat) on India showed the controversies of mining promoted as development. SASKIA WALENTOWITZ (Bern) highlighted the need to change our narratives at the time of the Anthropocene to include social components and power relations. The discussion showed that Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) may not be detected by looking at specific cases; it is crucial to observe other actors such as environmental security companies and sector conferences.

The main findings of the panel on Large-Scale Land Acquisitions (LSLA) and their connection to “resilience-grabbing” showed that the concept often ignores water- and related resource-grabbing which were an integral part of commons before the investments. TOBIAS HALLER (Bern) pointed out from comparative African case studies institutional changes disconnecting water and other common pool resources. FRANZISKA MARFURT (Bern) showed how access to water is removed from women in a land deal in Sierra Leone and outlined how women tried to resist further land and water grabbing by “institution shopping”. On a more aggregated level JAMPEL DELL’ANGELO (Maryland) argued that there is not much data on water grabbing and that one needs to find new criteria while THOMAS BREU (Bern) presented a comparative quantitative state-level analysis to argue that states with much demand for water not necessarily also engaged in LSLA consuming much water. The debate showed that we still have a long way to go to address issues of empirical studies and aggregation on a more quantitative and state level.

The panel “Towards a New Institutional Political Ecology” focused on how to bring in power, conflict and embedding notions into the debate on the: Haller used Ostrom’s notion of policentricity to focus equally on decision-making, institutional negotiation and collective action. He showed that Ensminger’s Institutional Change Model marries policentricity, new institutional and political ecology approaches. ANGELA KRONENBURG GARCÍA (Leiden) and HAN VAN DIJK (Leiden) argued, based on Ribot’s theory of access, that conflicts will lead to processes of institution building to be studied. JOHANNES EULER (Duisburg-Essen) proposed that commons can be seen as another institutional logic and thus have the potential to become a “meta-logic”. This requires a dialectical understanding as formulation for the embeddedness and “mediatedness” of the commons.

In a discussion about the institutional implication of sustainable management of water as a commons, CHARLOTTE DE CALLATAY (Louvain) underlined that international law has to develop tools to help local actors to self-organise by defining a legal framework with substantial and procedural rules. INES DOMBROWSKY (Bonn) that political and economic transformation in Mongolian mining led to a vacuum in water sector while it fostered extraction. Impacts fostered considerable institutional change in water sector, but shortcomings remain overwhelming.

The conference showed the need for multi-level, interdisciplinary discussions of the commons. The multiplicity of theoretical approaches, empirical research and practical implementations of the concept is certainly one of its strengths; this much became clear in the many panels. Learning from practitioners is as important as refining the theoretical models and developing a critique of capitalist work and resource exploitation that is grounded in real-world alternatives. The conference also emphasized the importance of using the concept in ongoing debates on global developments, particularly around climate change, to introduce much-needed discussions of agency, resource allocation and vulnerability.
One major question, however, was not explicitly addressed: how much is the concept of the commons dependent upon local organisation and social structures? How “global” can the commons be, not just as a concept, but as an empirical model? Many panels and keynotes dealt with either interventions in global discussions and global activism or local practices and institutions, but there was no discussion of the connections between the two; the “glocal” aspect was mostly discussed as an effect of capitalism, not as an important part of the institutionalization of the commons.

Nevertheless, the conference showed the timeliness of a discussion of different concepts on the commons, which have multiplied since and engaged critically with the original formulation of Elinor Ostrom. Discussions will continue at the IASC conference in Utrecht in July 2017.

Conference overview:

Keynotes
Jesse Ribot (Chicago): Social Causality of our Common Climate Crisis
Daniel Schläppi (bern): Shared Ownership as Key Issue of Swiss History. Common Pool Resources, Common Property Institutions and their Impact on the Political Culture of Switzerland from the Beginnings to our Days
Peter Knoepfel (Lausanne): Governance of Local Commons (Local Microcosms) – between Self-Regulation, Public Policies and General Institutions
Silke Helfrich (Jena): From Common Pool Resources via Commons to Commoning: A Conceptual Journey
Maude Barlow (The Council of Canadians): Our Water Commons, Protecting Water for People and Nature Forever
David Schlosberg (Sydney): Environmental Justice in the Anthropocene: Disruption, Community, and Governance

Policy Forum

Stephan Rist (Potsdam): The human rights-based UN Tenure Guidelines: Potentials and challenges to protect commons – views from policy, science and civil society
Series A: Features and Effects of Global (e.g. European) Investments on Commons in the World

#A01 - Food System Impacts on Commons from a North-South Perspective
Fabian Käser (Bern); Johanna Jacobi (Bern)

Maurice Tschopp (Bern): Extensive quinoa production in Southern Bolivia: How are producers associations shaping the governance of natural resources?
Adriana Bessa (Geneva) / Nicholas Orago (Nairobi): Food as a global common-pool resource – potential impacts to the achievement of food security globally and the realisation of the right to food for all
Fabian Käser (Bern): Food System Impacts on Community Water Projects in the Mount Kenya Region
Bram van Helvoirt / Guus van Westen (Utrecht ): Global investment and local livelihoods: the impact of foreign investment on local food security in Sub-Saharan Africa

#A03 - Undermining the commons: transnational corporations, mining, and impact on commons
Thomas Niederberger (Bern)

Beril Ocakli (Berlin), Stakeholder analysis in coupled social-ecological systems: a tool for exploring the role of institutions in conflict and cooperation? Empirical evidence from the mining sector and the commons in Kyrgyzstan
Dit Fatogoma Djane Adou (Bern): Mining industry and Local Peacebuilding in War-Torn States: the Ity mining and the local governance dynamic in Côte d’Ivoire, West Africa
Thomas Niederberger (Bern): “The Open Cut”: Mining, Transnational Corporations and the Commons
Saskia Walentowitz (Bern): The End of the Holocene in the Sahara: Undermining the Commons in Times of the “Anthropocene”
Purabi Bose (Gujarat): Minerals and Forests: People’s Resistance and Corporate’s Persistence in India

# A04 - Energy and the Commons
Christian Rohr (Bern)

Michale Braito (Vienna) / Marianne Penker (Vienna): A common pool resource framework for comparing community renewable energy projects Individual and Collective Adoption of Photovoltaics in Italy and Austria: A comparison of Motivations, Values and Concepts of Human-Nature Relationships
Andreas Roehring (Erkner): Renewable Energies between public and private goods – challenges and opportunities of Energy Transition in Germany
Berte Salimata (Cocody): Ecologie politique et transition énergétique en côte d’ivoire: déterminants sociaux du choix des énergies combustibles dans les boulangeries a Abidja
Aceng Hidayat (Bogor) /Andini Kusumawardhani (Bogor): How to Build Collective Actions and Deal with the Tragedy of the Commons in Cirata Dam, West Java, Indonesia?

# A05 - The climate change dilemma: global and local scales in climate science
Dania Achermann (Aarhus) / Matthias Heymann (Aarhus)

Sadaf Javed (Neu-Delhi): The Politics of Global and Local: Perspectives from the Tea Growing Community in North-east India
Klaus Eisenack (Berlin) / Christoph Oberlack (Bern): „Just do it“ – how to bridge the global-local divide in the case of climate change? Archetypical barriers to adapt river basin management to climate change
Dania Achermann (Aarhus): Drill local – think global: The "eternal ice" and the concept of a global climate
Johanna Gouzouazi (Strasbourg): Climate catastrophe in discourses: a versatile rhetoric of emergency at different scales of time and space

# A06 - Transforming the commons: business models of large-scale land investments
Ward Anseeuw (Pretoria) / Christoph Oberlack (Bern) / Perrine Burnod (CIRAD)

Jampel Dell'Angelo (Maryland) / Paolo D'Odorico (Virginia) / Maria Cristina Rulli (Milan) / Philippe Marchand (Maryland): The Tragedy of the Grabbed Commons
Cornelia Hett (Bern) / Vong Nanhthavong (Bern) / Ketkeo Phouangphet (Bern) / Michael Epprecht (Bern): Commercial investments in land: insights from an assessment of the quality of investments in land in Laos
George Christoffel Schoneveld (Kenya): Social and environmental performance of inclusive agricultural business models: A multi-country comparative analysis
Ward Anseeuw (Pretoria) / Mathieu Boche (Paris): Large-scale agricultural investments – The different investment models, their evolution and their differentiated implications

# A07 - Land grabbing - a phenomenon in Europe?
Ramona Bunkus (Halle-Wittenberg) / Insa Theesfeld (Halle-Wittenberg)

Ramona Bunkus, Insa Theesfeld (Halle-Wittenberg): Socio-cultural externalities of European large-scale land deals and concentration processes
Natalia Mamonova (Rotterdam): The post-soviet agrarian capitalism ‘from above’ and ‘from below’: agrarian transformation, land grabbing and rural resistance in Russia and Ukraine
Tomislav Tomasevic (Zagreb): Croatian Social Movements for Commons: From Resistance to Privatisation towards Transformation of the Public
Kerstin Nolte (Hamburg) / Markus Giger (Bern): Collecting and using evidence on impacts of large-scale land investments on common property resources

# A08 - The impacts of common enclosures on local power relations (SNIS)
Jean-David Gerber (Bern)

Laura Weidmann (Fribourg): Namibia’s commonages: A mirror of legitimacies in a plural legal context
Désirée Gmür (Bern): An unbalanced deal: Large-Scale Land Acquisitions (LSLA) for forest plantations and gender in Kilolo district, Iringa region, Tanzania
Heinzpeter Znoj (Bern): Changing the buffalo law – the demise of common property pasture and the rise of a political elite in Sungai Tenang, Sumatra
Timothy Adams (Bern): The Dark side of Contract Farming: Smaller-holder Incorporation in sugar cane Cultivation in the face of Large Scale Land Acquisition in Malawi

# A09 - Are large scale land acquisitions leading to "commons" and "resilience-grabbing"?
Thomas Breu (Bern) / Tobias Haller (Bern)

Tobias Haller (Bern): From commons to resilience grabbing: Common Pool Resources, Institutional Change and Land Acquisitions
Franziska Marfurt (Bern): Gendered Impacts and Coping Strategies in the Case of a Swiss Bioenergy Project in Sierra Leone
Jampel Dell'Angelo (Maryland) /Paolo D'Odorico (Virginia) / Maria Cristina Rulli (Milan): The Global Water Grab Syndrome
Thomas Breu / Peter Messerli / Stephan Rist / Andreas Heinimann / Christoph Bader / Sandra Eckert (Bern): Effects of foreign direct investments on water resources and its relevance for common pool resources

# A10 - The consequences for the commons of large scale investments in land & infrastructure
Annelies Zoomers (Utrecht) / Kei Otsuki (University)

Esther Leemann (Lucerne): Collective Action against Policies of Exclusionary Development in Cambodia
Annelies Zoomers (Utrecht) / Kei Otsuki (Utrecht): Land governance for ‘development as a freedom’? Linking global processes to local collective action
Hsing-Sheng Tai (Dong Hwa): Commons, local people, and collective action amid large-scale investments: an indigenous case study from Taiwan
Christoph Oberlack / Laura Tejada / Peter Messerli / Stephan Rist / Markus Giger (Bern): Sustainable livelihoods through large-scale land acquisitions? Patterns, processes and potentials
Elyne Doornbos (Amsterdam): Defending Social and Environmental Justice: Land Grabbing, Instrumental Freedoms & Politics ‘from below’ in the Context of Nicaragua’s Interoceanic Gran Canal
Corey Wright (Utrecht): Green enclosures, dispossessions and “channelling globality”: A reflection on conflict and resistance in Tanzania’s wildlife management areas (WMAs)
Ana Kurdgelashvili (Bern): Development in the Name of Light: Case Study of Construction Process of the Large Hydroelectric Power Plant Khudon Khesi in Georgia
Delphine / Patrick Witte / Thomas Hartmann / Tejo Spit (Utrecht): Assessing the economic effects of infrastructure development: a critical review in the context of Asian megaproject urban development
Negash Teklu Gebremichael / Zerihun Dejene Fitteheawek (Population, Health and Environment Ethiopia Consortium): The Role of Floriculture Sector in Empowering Women in Ethiopia
Karin Marita Naase (Marburg): Deforestation of the tropical rain forest at the lower Amazon in Brazil: transforming common pool resources into private property

# A11 - European zoological gardens, conservation discourse, and the commons in the South
Samuel Weissman (Bern)

Achim Hagen / Jasper Meya (Oldenburg): International Agreements for Biodiversity Conservation
Girma Kelboro / Till Stellmacher (Bonn): Reflection of Global Changes in Local Governance of the Commons: The Case of African Parks Foundation in Nech Sar National Park, Ethiopia
Eva Keller (Zürich): Zoos and the resurrection of social evolutionism
Samuel Paul Weissman (Bern): Negotiating compensation and security in private protected areas: Conservancies, Zoological Gardens and the pastoral encounter
Eric Jensen (Warwick): The Role and Effects of European Zoological Gardens in Wildlife Conservation Discourses

# A12 - Collective action, environmental challenges, and the commons. Case studies from smallscale irrigation and pastoral systems
Jean-Yves Jamin (CIRAD)

Chikondi Precious Chabvuta (Malawi): Tragedy of the small-scale irrigation farmers in the midst of changing climate
Jamin Jean-Yves (CIRAD) / Adamczewski Hertzog Amandine (CIRAD): From the utopia of win-win development to bottleneck situation. Case studies of Office du Niger area (Mali)
Christian Kimmich (Environmental and Resource Economics, Swiss Federal Research Institute WSL) / Luis Medina (Madrid) / Hannu Autto (Turku): Insurance policies for collective action problems: theory and empirical application to electricity infrastructure
Lu Yu (Berlin): Pastoralism under Climate Change: Perceptions of Climate Change, Local Adaptations and Institutions in Northwest China

Series B: Collective Action, the Commons, and Sustainability: What is the Role of Bottom-up Participatory Resource Governance (“Constitutionality”) in Switzerland and other European Political Systems in Common-Resource Governance?

# B13 - All commoners are equal? The impact of different distributions of power and social inequalities within CPIs
Maïka De Keyzer (Utrecht)

Javier Hernando Ortego (Madrid): Commons, Social Inequality and Institutional Asymmetry in Early Modern New Castil (Spain). A Comparative Perspective on the Resilience of Common Pool Resources
Maïka De Keyzer (Utrecht): From Sand into Gold and back? The impact of manorial sheep breeding on sand drifts in the sixteenth and seventeenth century Brecklands
Jovana Dikovic (Zürich): Challenging of private property and old custom: an example of gleaning

# B14 - Managing commons: pre-modern perspectives
Michael Zeheter (Trier)

Michael Zeheter (Trier): For the Common Good: Regulating the Lake Constance Fisheries, 1350–1800
Robert William Benjamin Gray (Winchester): River Waters Come No More: The Struggle over Wetland Commons in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Hungary
Semih Celik (European University Institute): Understanding Commons in the Ottoman Middle East – Continuity and Change – 17th–20th centuries
Miguel Laborda-Peman (Utrecht): Changing the Commons: Understanding Institutional Change in Pre-Industrial Communities, Northern Spain, 14th–19th centuries

# B15 - Switzerland as a laboratory for governance innovations in the management of CPRs - historical approaches
Martin Stuber (Bern)

Sarah Baumgartner (Bern): “Untere Gemeinde” and “Obere Gemeinde” – Common property institutions in the city of Berne in the transition from the Ancien Régime into the liberal constitutional state
Anne-Lise Head-König (Geneva): The Commons over time in highland and lowland Switzerland: diversity in their size, management accessibility and even survival (16th–21th c.)
Martin Schaffner (Basel): Management of common pool resources in a high altitude alpine environment: Ursern Valley, 1900–2000
Martin Stuber (Bern): Transformation of common fields in building land since the mid-19th century – the financial origins of the richest civic corporation of Switzerland
Marianne Tiefenbach (Bern): Alpine corporations in Grindelwald – their important social function in the use and preservation of the Alps for a sustainable development

# B16 - Constitutionality and bottom-up institution building processes: lessons from Europe
Ramez Eid (Israel) / Gabriela Landolt (Bern)

Ramez Eid (Israel): Constitutionality in Mallorca: the case against environmental corruption
Angelika Lätsch (Bern): Constitutionality and Identity: Bottom-up Institution Building and Identity among Coastal Sami People in northern Norway
Matthias Bussels (Leuven) / Pieter Van den Broeck (Leuven): Envisioning slow paths as a landed commons in Flanders
Gabriela Landolt (Bern): Swiss alpine pastures as common property: Success story of bottom-up institution building in Sumvitg, Canton of Grisons
Elisabeth Schauppenlehner-Kloyber / Penker Marianne (Vienna): Between participation and collective action – two perspectives on urban governance of the Austrian city of Korneuburg

# B17 - Common-pool resource institutions in the shadow of the State
Jean-David Gerber (Bern)

Jean-David Gerber (Bern): New Commons for the Redistribution of the Profits of Large-scale Land Acquisitions
José Pablo Prado Córdova (Ciudad Guatemala) / Wilder Hernández (Guatemala): Grassroots mobilization for claiming collective state-mediated property rights and nature conservation in an army-owned estate in Guatemala
Jesper Larsson (LARSSON): The Power State Conundrum: The Encounter between Global Demand, Local Users and the State in Early Modern Northern Scandinavia.
Sarah Ryser (Bern): Moroccan regeneration: Government land deal as a catalytic converter for social development
Monica Vasile (Berlin): Multiple Meanings of Forest Commons: producing laws and policies in the Romania

# B18 - Analysis of collective action in payment for ecosystem services contexts
Stefanie Engel (Osnabrück) / Roland Olschewski (Switzerland) / Sergio Villamayor-Tomas (Switzerland)

Patrick Bottazzi (Bangor): Payment for watershed services and the management of the commons: between ‘privatization’ and ‘publicization’ of space and resources
Philippe Le Coent (Montpellier): Can collective conditionality improve agri-environmental contracts? Insights from experimental economics
Marie Ferré (Zurich): Which policy instruments for a more sustainable management of cultivated peat soils in Switzerland? A computerized framed experiment
Sergio Villamayor-Tomas (Switzerland): Testing neighbourhood effects for biodiversity conservation: A Willingness to Accept experiment in the context of European Agro-environmental schemes
Maria Claudia Lopez (Michigan): Effects on intrinsic motivations of Payment for Environmental Services

# B19 - Networking, comparing, and integrating urban commons initiatives in research and action
Ileana Apostol (Paris)

Philipp Klaus (Zurich): Exploring the potentials of self-managed communication tools for development of cooperative living, housing and related urban commons projects
Melanie Dulong de Rosnay (Paris) / Félix Tréguer (Paris): Panayotis Antoniadis (Zurich): What does “as a commons” really mean? A critical reflection on the case of community networks
Ileana Apostol (Paris) / Mark Gaved (UK) / Andreas Unteidig (Berlin): Together, enacting the urban commons
Jens Martignoni (Zurich) / Panayotis Antoniadis (Zurich): Community Currencies as a Commoning tool: The case of Cooperative Housing and Community Networks

# B20 - Emergence of smart cities - a confluence of common and private resources towards a new definition of urban commons
Ramanacharyulu Venkata Amaravadi (Bangalore)

Ramanacharyulu Venkata Amaravadi (Bangalore) / Tulika Kalra (Bangalore): Smart traffic management systems – the starting point for creating urban commons
Ankit Tripathy / Tanisha Mehrotra / Ritu Sanghavi / Yogesh Malpani (Bangalore ): Use of technology for easing traffic mobility in smart cities
Christian Iaione (LUISS LabGov): The Sharing, Collaborative, Cooperative City

# B21 - Urban commons in a "glocal" world
Robert Heinze (Bern)

Hans E. Widmer (Neustart Schweiz): The Power of Neighbourhood and the Commons
Sandro Simon (Basel): Land Tenancy and Agricultural Practice in the Bamenda Wetlands: Between Self-Governance and Open-Access

# B22 - Collective action regimes, co-management, and the commons

Panel B22 – Session I:
Tine De Moor (International Association for the Study of the Commons)

Giangiacomo Bravo (Linnaeus University) / Amineh Ghorbani (Delft) / Ulrich Frey (Halle) / Insa Theesfeld (Halle-Wittenberg): An empirically-tested model of the emergence of institutions
Ulrich Frey (Halle) / Sergio Villamayor (Switzerland) / Insa Theesfeld (Halle-Wittenberg): A new classification of co-management regimes – performance of community managed, co-managed and government-managed irrigation systems
Carena van Riper (Illinois) / Andreas Thiel (Berlin) / Marianne Pencker (Vienna) / Michael Braito (Vienna) / Adam Landon (Georgia) / Jennifer Thomson (Montana) / Catherine Tucker (Florida): Integrating heterogeneous multi-level values and the co-management of social-ecological systems framework
Lukas Peter (Zürich): Democracy and the Commons: Overcoming the Tragedy with the Ostroms

Panel B22 – Session II
Giangiacomo Bravo (Linnaeus University)

Manuel Oelke (Freiburg): Traditional Forest Commons in Germany: Exploring benefits for Nature Conservation
Bidur Khadka (Yokohama): Analysis of multi-layer institution and governance factors in Japanese Satoyama and Community forestry program of Nepal
Andreas Thiel (Berlin) / Christine Moser (Lüneburg) / Anja Betker (Berlin) / Nadine Schröder (Berlin): The determinants and performance of Public Service Industries in Environmental Governance
Piyush Kumar Singh (Patna): Revisiting Agri Value Chain Financing for Small Holdings in India: A global problem and Local Solution
Dagmar Diesner (London) / Marina Chang (Conventry): The contributions of the commons to food sovereignty in Europe: a case study of Campi Aperti and Genuino Clandestino, Italy

# B23 - Collective action for the survival of forest commons in Europe
Tatiana Kluvankova, (CE SPECTRA) / Andrej Udovč (Ljubljana)

Laura Secco / Paola Gatto / Nathan Deutsch / Matteo Favero (Padova): The role of forest commons as drivers of social innovation (in Italy): new wine in old barrels?
Tomaz Czerny / Andrej Udovč (Ljubljana): Local-distant owners’ relationships in governing the common pool resource: Agrarian commons in Slovenia
Miguel Sottomayor / Américo Mendes (The Portuguese Catholic University): Commons sustainability and survival in Portugal: the great challenge posed by commoners’ demographic decline and aging
Leticia Merino Rice (México): Community rights over forestlands in Latin America
Stanka Brnkalakova / Tatiana Kluvankova (CE SPECTRA) / Michael V. Marek (CzechGlobe): Enhancing the well-being of EU regions by innovative governance models: Carbon forestry CPR regime

#B24 – Influence of European & international forest policies, investments & discourses on local contexts & counter-responses
Lysann Schneider / Annina Aeberli (Bern)

Lysann Schneider (Bern): From the Maya Forest Gardens to Privatized Timber Business. International Influences on Forest Resources and Social and Environmental Transformation in Mexico
Annina Aeberli (Bern): Forest discourses and policies in Sarawak, Malaysia: European roots and local hybridizations
Papa Faye (Senegal): Neo-liberalization in Senegal's Forestry: Domination through and Local Resistance against Globally shaped National Practices
Jerylee Wilkes-Allemann (Zürich): Governance of forest recreation: the challenge of managing and planning forest recreation in urban forest areas
Rahel Jud (Bern): Implementing REDD+ Policy in Indonesia: Significant Changes Achieved or just a Paper Tiger?

# B25 – The spiritual dimensions of commons – missing link in scientific and policy debates?
Beat Dietschy (Bread for All) / Josef Estermann (Zürich) / Stephan Rist (Bern) / Bruno Stöckli (Bread for All)

Chamu Kuppuswamy (Hertfordshire): Minority group participation in resource governance in the UK
Ian Alexander MacKinnon (Coventry): ‘cumaibh suas ur còir’ - ['stand up for your rights']: towards a Gaelic ontology for governing the commons
Semih Celik (European University Institute): Can the olive tree speak? The “immortal tree” and the spirit of the commons in Turkey’s Yırca

# B26 - Geographical indications as a tool for providing public goods
Dominique Barjolle (Zürich)

Monique Bagal (Lyon): The feasibility of a human-rights friendly regime for geographical indications
Erik Thévenod-Mottet (Bern): Defining, recognising, protecting geographical indications: what is the role of the state?
Krystyna Swiderska (London): Geographical Indications and Biocultural Heritage: Opportunities and Challenges for Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities
Frédéric Wallet (Paris): Building GIs a commons for sustainable development of rural areas
Degree of collective action when registering Protected Geographical Indications
Xiomara Fernanda Quinones-Ruiz (Vienna) / Marianne Penker (Vienna) / Giovanni Belletti (Firenze) / Andrea Marescotti (Firenze) / Silvia Scaramuzzi (Firenze)

Series C: The Commons in the Context of International Law, Human Rights, Trade and Investment Policies, and their Relation with the Triple Crisis of Financial, Environmental, and Humanitarian Processes

# C27 - Law, commons, and sustainable development goals - exploring law's role in promoting sustainability of the commons
Philippe Cullet (London)

Birsha Ohdedar (London): Adapting to Climate Change & Delivering the Human Right to Water – A Case for a Commons Approach to Water Law?
Yuan Qiong Hu (London): Knowledge Commons, Health Innovation and Patent Law
Christine Frison (Louvain): Planting the Seed Commons: Towards Implementing the Zero Hunger Sustainable Development Goal?

# C28 – Sustainable management of Water as a Commons: Institutional implications
Tobias Haller (Bern)

Ines Dombrowsky / Jean Carlo Rodriguez (German Development Institute): Extractivism and the politics of water – the case of Mongolia
Charlotte de Callatay (Louvain): What property regime(s) for a sustainable management of fresh water resources? An analysis of the property regimes in international fresh water law and their implications on national public policies
Anushree Singh (New Delhi): Implications of post-2015 sustainable development goals for governing the commons: a case of rainwater harvesting system in India

# C29 - Environmental justice and the prospect of commons for sustainable development
Christoph Oberlack (of Bern) / David Schlosberg (Sydney)

Elisabetta Cangelosi (Paris): A definition of the commons, between human rights, tradition and resilience
Marc L.R. Hufty (Geneva): Confronting cultural frontiers and environmental justice in the Yungas Biosphere Reserve, Argentina
Thomas Kesselring (Bern): Ethical Reflections on Commons
Dario Novellino (University of Kent): Countering the Transformation of Collective Land into Private Oil Palm Estates: Environmental Justice and Local Resistance on Palawan Island (the Philippines)

#C31 - Commons, conservation, conflict, and co-management in Europe
Iain MacKinnon (Coventry)

Maria Del Mar Delgado-Serrano: Defining a Research Agenda for the Commons in Spain
Yasmine Annina Willi / Marco Pütz (Swiss Federal Research Institute): Governance of the Commons: Using the Regional Nature Parks in Switzerland as an Example
Christian Schleyer (Klagenfurt) / Harald Schaich (Freiburg) / Claudia Bieling (Hohenheim) / Holger Gerdes (Berlin) / Bettina Ohnesorge (International Academy for Nature Conservation) / Tobias Plieninger (Copenhagen) / Kathrin Trommler (Berlin) / Franziska Wolff (Öko-Institut e.V): European cultural landscapes as complex social-ecological systems: Pathways, pitfalls, and perspectives

# C32 – Blue Communities, Collective Action for Self-Declared Principles of Resource Governance – Potentials & Limitations
Andreas Kläy (Bern)

# C33 – Is the Right to Water and Sanitation Supported or Undermined by the New Mega Trade Agreements TTIP, TTP, TISA, and CETA?
Elisabeth Bürgi Bonanomi / Andreas Kläy (Bern)

Maude Barlow (The Council of Canadians): A Right to Water perspective on CETA, TTIP and TISA
Rodrigo Polanco (Bern): Investment regulation in mega regionals: promoting or undermining the right to water?
Michael Nanz (FIAN, Switzerland): Will TISA undermine the right to water and the right to food?
Christiane Fürst (Bern): A case study: Water governance in Kenya and how it relates to international economic regimes? Some first insights

#C35 – "Local knowledge" in climate politics: negotiating climate responsibility
Julia Eckert (Bern)

Geoffrey I. Nwaka (Uturu): Indigenous Knowledge as Local Response to Globalization and Climate Change in Nigeria/Africa
Christian Büschges (Bern): The ethics of commonality in climate responsibility debates. Local roots, national contexts and global connections of the concept of buen vivir (“good life”) in Ecuador
Geremia Cometti (Collège de France): Climate change and the crisis of reciprocal relations among the Q’eros of the Peruvian Andes
Neelam Kadyan (World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology) / Sunil Asopa (Jodhpur): Mitigation and Adaptation of Climate Change by Tribes of Thar Desert in India

#C36 – Dissolving the commons: pastoral land rights, state intervention, and international actors in Central Eurasia
Peter Finke (Zürich) / Emilia Roza Sulek (Berlin)

Peter Finke (Zürich): Pastoral land rights in Western Mongolia: state laws and local practices
Aiganysh Isaeva (University of Central Asia): Decentralizing Governance of Agropastoral Systems in Kyrgyzstan: An Assessment of Recent Pasture Reforms
Emilia Roza Sulek (Berlin): Dissolving the Commons: Lessons from the Tibetan Plateau

#C37 – The commons in (post-) conflict zones
Han van Dijk (Leiden)

Gilbert Fokou, Seydou Kon, Bassirou Bonfoh (Centre Suisse de Recherches Scientifiques en Côte d'Ivoire) / Roch Yao Gnabeli, (Abidjan): Traditional hunters, power relationship and common pastoral resource management in post conflict context of North Côte d’Ivoire
Sarah Byrne / Benedikt Korf (Zürich) / Andrea Nightingale (Swedish University for Agricultural Studies): Making territory: War, post-war and the entangled scales of contested forest governance in mid-Western Nepal

#C38 – Digital commons in a "glocal" world
Wouter Tebbens (Free Knowledge Institute)

Wouter Tebbens (Free Knowledge Institute): Digital DIY and Commons-based production
Roger Baig (Guifi.net) / (Department of Computer Architecture): guifi.net, a sustainable implementation of the commons in the telecoms sector
Leandro Navarro (Barcelona) / David Franquesa (Electronic Reuse): eReuse.org a digital device commons for circular economy
Marco Berlinguer (Barcelona): In search of a value regime for digital commons

#C39 – Theoretical debates on institutions for the management of the commons
Tobias Haller (Bern)

Tobias Haller (Bern): Towards a New Institutional Political Ecology: How to marry external effects, institutional change and the role of power and ideology in commons studies
Johannes Euler (Duisburg-Essen): On the societal embeddedness of commons
Angela Kronenburg García / Han van Dijk (Leiden): Appropriation and enclosure in the commons: towards a theory of claim making
Phil Rene Oyono (Center for International Forestry Research): Recognition and the Cultivation of Sub-National Authority in Natural Resource Management in Africa

#C40 – Re-Embedding Finance: Credit Commons, Crowd Funding and Investor’s Corporate Social Responsibility
Heinzpeter Znoj (Bern)

Jean-Philippe Trabichet / Athanasios Priftis (Geneva) / Matthew Slater (Ynternet.org): The Credit Commons: An open protocol for promises
Jadwiga Glanc (Poland): Common cause of the crowd
Christina Gabbert (Halle): Investors as Neighbours – A story of becoming