Research

If Congress and other policymakers take the right steps in important areas, then abundance is within reach.

The CGO polled 1,000 Americans to learn what they think about abundance, technology and innovation, and America’s prospects for the future.

When private land is designated as critical habitat for an endangered species, does that change the value of the land?

This policy paper examines conservation projects using crowdsourcing to determine if it is a useful tool for advancing conservation efforts.

This paper explores a modest but not insignificant opportunity to put a price on carbon that doesn’t raise consumer prices.

In this policy paper, authors Austin Vernon and Eli Dourado explore what life would be like with endless energy.

In this paper, authors Robert M. Zink and Luke B. Klicka examine—according to modern standards—the validity of subspecies currently listed.

How can private land be counted in the 30 x 30 efforts proposed by the Biden Administration? Megan Jenkins and Harrison Naftel explain.

In this comment authors examine two promising tools for private conservation that should be included in the US' 30 by 30 efforts.

Recently, the Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service proposed a rule that would rescind its 2020 definition of habitat under the Endangered Species Act.

In 2009, Elinor Ostrom won the Noble memorial prize in economics sciences for, in the words of the prize committee, “demonstrating how local property can be successfully managed by local commons without any regulation by central authorities or privatization.” This account of Ostrom’s contribution focuses on how her work presented a “third way” of governing […]

This paper describes how a non-profit and a for-profit business helped save one of the last grassland ecosystems in the world.

Saving taxpayers and protecting homes, this solution is a win-win for landowners, insurers, and policymakers. To keep this private approach alive, we’ll need protections that fan the flames of innovation.

Discussions of Elinor Ostrom’s key contributions to the study of polycentric governance of complex institutions are often framed as a challenge to biologist Garrett Hardin’s classic essay “The Tragedy of the Commons” (TC). Ostrom herself used the word “challenging” to describe TC, a contribution that both encapsulates and expands on Hardin’s then long-standing concern with […]

1. Polycentric Governance Much of Ostrom’s work refutes the notion that there is “a single solution to a single problem.”8 She argues instead that “many solutions exist to cope with many different problems.”9 Specifically, much of her work has explored the conditions under which local resource users can develop bottom-up, self-governing institutional arrangements to manage resources—but […]

1. The Polycentric Governance System of the Pacific Salmon Regime As Elinor Ostrom and her coauthors illustrated, common-pool resource management faces at least two broad types of collective action problems: “appropriation” problems and “provision” problems. One of the things that makes the salmon SES so complex is that the various governance functions addressing these […]

Size (and Scale) Matter: Addressing Ostrom’s Critics In his classic article “The Tragedy of the Commons,” Garrett Hardin famously declared that “ruin is the destination toward which all men rush, each pursuing his own best interest in a society that believes in the freedom of the commons.” Elinor Ostrom disagreed. She argued that, even […]

1. Self-Governance and Democracy Both Elinor and Vincent Ostrom drew a distinction between governing over others and governing with others. Governing with others is one of the fundamental features of a democratic society. Democracy, in the Ostroms’ view, is not just a system of voting; it is a system of how people relate […]

Utah State University has had a long-term involvement in water resources management in the Dominican Republic. A few years ago one of us (Randy Simmons) visited the Dominican Republic’s National Institute for Water Resources. Behind a counter on the main floor of their offices, an entire wall was taken up by a map […]

An edited volume that uses the institutional framework developed by Nobel Prize winning economist Elinor Ostrom of how institutions impact environmental outcomes.

This working paper from economists John Morehouse and Edward Rubin examines whether coal power plant owners choose locations that reduce their potential exposure to clean air monitoring and regulations.

In this paper, Laura Huggins, Olivia Hansen, and Harrison Naftel explore how to help turn wildlife into an asset rather than a liability.

Author Jeffrey McCoy first provides an overview of the ESA's congressional history by examining amendments made in 1978 and 1982.

Wood and Watkins identify key lessons from the case of the dusky gopher frog about how to more effectively use critical habitat to help species recover.

Our research suggests that establishing a clear process for how decisions about exclusion will be made will help improve transparency.

This policy paper examines both the benefits and drawbacks of designating critical habitat. Learn more here.

This public interest comment is on the proposed a rule to define “habitat” as used in the Endangered Species Act (ESA) of 1973.

This research-in-focus piece reviews the existing literature that measures the economic impacts of various types of federal land on nearby communities.

Regulators should embrace changes to encourage continued innovation in how consumers both produce and consume the electricity that powers their lives.

There are better ways to protect the environment than requiring agencies to engage in multi-year long reviews before every major action.