[go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/wodepe/v31y2023ics2452292923000413.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Community forest legislation in India: Rights-based polycentrism or responsibilization?

Author

Listed:
  • Ballal, Aabha
  • Guha, Asi
  • Tambe, Sandeep
  • Patnaik, Suprava
  • Joe, Elphin Tom
Abstract
In India, forest rights of forest-dependent communities are democratized and decentralized under the Forest Rights Act of 2006 (FRA). This paper attempts to explain the weak performance of the community forest resource rights recognized under this legislation. We begin by discerning the enabling and impeding factors that have influenced the operationalization of the community forest resource rights. We found that support from civil society has been crucial in building collective action and social capital. Technical, financial and bureaucratic hindrances in addition to a conflicting regulatory framework were the major barriers. We conceptualized the framework of rights-based polycentrism by combining the rights-based approach and polycentrism, and using this lens analyzed the design of the community forest resource rights. We found that the legislation falls short of making the state accountable and repositioning the role of the forest department as a duty bearer. The Act assigns responsibilities of biodiversity conservation, protection of catchments, sustainable resource use and preservation from destructive practices to the local communities, without provisioning additional funds or functionaries. Also, the state has not played an enabling role by building agency, capacity and institutions, and continues to be substantially invested in local forest management decisions. We opine that unless these design gaps in the legislation are plugged, it will result in rights-based responsibilization and adversely impact the scaling up of decentralized forest governance. Other developing nations can also benefit from using the rights-based polycentrism lens to strengthen the design of their sustainable forest management policy.

Suggested Citation

  • Ballal, Aabha & Guha, Asi & Tambe, Sandeep & Patnaik, Suprava & Joe, Elphin Tom, 2023. "Community forest legislation in India: Rights-based polycentrism or responsibilization?," World Development Perspectives, Elsevier, vol. 31(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wodepe:v:31:y:2023:i:c:s2452292923000413
    DOI: 10.1016/j.wdp.2023.100525
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2452292923000413
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.wdp.2023.100525?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. François Riguelle & Isabelle Thomas & Ann Verhetsel, 2007. "Measuring urban polycentrism: a European case study and its implications," Journal of Economic Geography, Oxford University Press, vol. 7(2), pages 193-215, March.
    2. Gupta, Divya & Lele, Sharachchandra & Sahu, Geetanjoy, 2020. "Promoting a responsive state: The role of NGOs in decentralized forest governance in India," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    3. Ostrom, Vincent & Tiebout, Charles M. & Warren, Robert, 1961. "The Organization of Government in Metropolitan Areas: A Theoretical Inquiry," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 55(4), pages 831-842, December.
    4. Krister Andersson & Elinor Ostrom, 2008. "Analyzing decentralized resource regimes from a polycentric perspective," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 41(1), pages 71-93, March.
    5. Sarker, Ashutosh & Ikeda, Toru & Abe, Takaki & Inoue, Ken, 2015. "Design principles for managing coastal fisheries commons in present-day Japan," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 32-38.
    6. Eliezeri Sungusia & Jens Friis Lund & Christian Pilegaard Hansen & Numan Amanzi & Yonika M. Ngaga & Gimbage Mbeyale & Thorsten Treue & Henrik Meilby, 2020. "Rethinking Participatory Forest Management in Tanzania," IFRO Working Paper 2020/02, University of Copenhagen, Department of Food and Resource Economics.
    7. Mustalahti, Irmeli & Gutiérrez-Zamora, Violeta & Hyle, Maija & Devkota, Bishnu Prasad & Tokola, Nina, 2020. "Responsibilization in natural resources governance: A romantic doxa?," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    8. Sarker, Ashutosh & Itoh, Tadao, 2001. "Design principles in long-enduring institutions of Japanese irrigation common-pool resources," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 48(2), pages 89-102, June.
    9. Erbaugh, James T., 2019. "Responsibilization and social forestry in Indonesia," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    10. Magessa, Kajenje & Wynne-Jones, Sophie & Hockley, Neal, 2020. "Does Tanzanian participatory forest management policy achieve its governance objectives?," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 111(C).
    11. Bidhan Kanti Das, 2019. "Denial of Rights Continues: How Legislation for ‘Democratic Decentralisation’ of Forest Governance was Subverted in the Implementation Process of the Forest Rights Act in India," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 31(4), pages 957-983, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lu, Yuhai & Gong, Mincheng & Lu, Linzhuo & Wang, Yaqin & Wang, Yang, 2024. "Urban polycentrism and total-factor energy efficiency: An analysis based on the night light data," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 198(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Khanal, Yajnamurti & Devkota, Bishnu Prasad, 2020. "Farmers' responsibilization in payment for environmental services: Lessons from community forestry in Nepal," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C).
    2. Mwaseba, Dismas L. & Erkkilä, Antti & Friis-Hansen, Esbern & Maro, Aristarik H. & Maziku, John D., 2020. "Responsibilization in governance of non-industrial private forestry: Experiences from the Southern Highlands of Tanzania," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C).
    3. Biehl, J. & Köppel, J. & Grimm, M., 2021. "Creating space for wind energy in a polycentric governance setting," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 152(C).
    4. Hartwell, Christopher A. & Otrachshenko, Vladimir & Popova, Olga, 2021. "Waxing power, waning pollution: The effect of COVID-19 on Russian environmental policymaking," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 184(C).
    5. Marshall, Graham R., 2009. "Polycentricity, reciprocity, and farmer adoption of conservation practices under community-based governance," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(5), pages 1507-1520, March.
    6. Oedewald, Pia & Gotcheva, Nadezhda, 2015. "Safety culture and subcontractor network governance in a complex safety critical project," Reliability Engineering and System Safety, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 106-114.
    7. Ramdani, Rijal & Lounela, Anu K., 2020. "Palm oil expansion in tropical peatland: Distrust between advocacy and service environmental NGOs," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C).
    8. Paola Bertolini & Enrico Giovannetti & Francesco Pagliacci, 2011. "Regional patterns in the achievement of the Lisbon Strategy: a comparison between polycentric regions and monocentric ones," Center for the Analysis of Public Policies (CAPP) 0097, Universita di Modena e Reggio Emilia, Dipartimento di Economia "Marco Biagi".
    9. Killian, Bernadeta & Hyle, Maija, 2020. "Women's marginalization in participatory forest management: Impacts of responsibilization in Tanzania," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 118(C).
    10. Patricio Valdivieso & Krister P. Andersson, 2018. "What Motivates Local Governments to Invest in Critical Infrastructure? Lessons from Chile," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(10), pages 1-27, October.
    11. Sarker, Ashutosh & Ikeda, Toru & Abe, Takaki & Inoue, Ken, 2015. "Design principles for managing coastal fisheries commons in present-day Japan," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 32-38.
    12. Schaefer, Alexander, 2023. "Polycentricity and adaptation: A multilevel selectionist approach," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 210(C), pages 265-287.
    13. Tiffany H. Morrison & W. Neil Adger & Katrina Brown & Maria Carmen Lemos & Dave Huitema & Terry P. Hughes, 2017. "Mitigation and adaptation in polycentric systems: sources of power in the pursuit of collective goals," Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 8(5), September.
    14. de Wit, Fronika & Mourato, João, 2022. "Governing the diverse forest: Polycentric climate governance in the Amazon," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 157(C).
    15. Matthew L. Hamilton & Mark Lubell, 2019. "Climate change adaptation, social capital, and the performance of polycentric governance institutions," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 152(3), pages 307-326, March.
    16. Jordan K. Lofthouse & Roberta Q. Herzberg, 2023. "The Continuing Case for a Polycentric Approach for Coping with Climate Change," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(4), pages 1-24, February.
    17. Gutiérrez-Zamora, Violeta & Hernández Estrada, Mara, 2020. "Responsibilization and state territorialization: Governing socio-territorial conflicts in community forestry in Mexico," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(C).
    18. Kuzdas, Christopher & Wiek, Arnim & Warner, Benjamin & Vignola, Raffaele & Morataya, Ricardo, 2015. "Integrated and Participatory Analysis of Water Governance Regimes: The Case of the Costa Rican Dry Tropics," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 254-268.
    19. Zarychta, Alan, 2020. "Making social services work better for the poor: Evidence from a natural experiment with health sector decentralization in Honduras," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 133(C).
    20. Djenontin, Ida N.S. & Zulu, Leo C., 2021. "The quest for context-relevant governance of agro-forest landscape restoration in Central Malawi: Insights from local processes," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:wodepe:v:31:y:2023:i:c:s2452292923000413. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/world-development-perspectives .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.