The International Association for the Study of the Commons

2008 Conference Program

Multiple forms of participation

The conference will be delivered through a range of different activities.  These are briefly described below.

Special symposia

We propose a small number of topics to be the subject of special symposia or workshops to allow for focused examination and discussion of emerging issues of interest. 

Anyone who has an interest in developing themes for a symposium should submit their ideas to John Powell at the University of Gloucestershire.   Currently two symposia are under development:

Symposium on Social learning as a way to conceptualise commons management problems. 

Participation is regarded as the key to creating effective policies yet participation can take many forms and focuses attention on notions of power and influence.  Notions of participation itself influence the manner in which different interests may be able to become involved in the policy process, and limits the range of potential solutions.  Recent suggest that social learning occurs through collective engagement with a problem.  Exploring commons management problems through a social learning approach might result in participants reconceptualising their role and relationships with the resource.  The symposia should explore the potential for social learning as a means of achieving more effective governance of commons.

Illustrative questions:

·        What is social learning?

·        How might it be applied to common pool resources?

·        What scope does the approach offer for developing new approaches to commons management and policy making?

Symposium on the role of common property rights in a global economy focused on privatisation of resources

Conceptions of resource efficiency are often based on simple and narrowly focused measures such as GDP, net income, profit margins, or total outputs in physical units of certain materials.  The current economic approach assumes economic growth is achieved most efficiently through private ownership resources for production.  A more holistic conception of ‘efficiency’ would encompass a wider array of measures and require a balancing of a range of outputs including environmental and social impacts as well as the purely monetised aspects of economic goods.  This symposium would build on work started at the Conference on “Common Property rights and development: who owns growth?” to be held in Oxford in December 2007.

Pre-conference workshops

A series of pre-conference workshops will run on the day before the start of the conference.  These will cater both to those new to the concept of ‘common-pool resources’, and to the expert.  Workshops on the following topics are currently planned:

·        Introductory workshop on the commons

·        ‘New’ commons: what are they, where are they, and how should they be managed?

·        Research design and methods (qualitative and quantitative)

·        Institutional analysis

·        Applications of Game Theory to new commons

·        Measuring the economic costs and benefits of commons

·        Participatory research techniques

·        Writing scientific reports and getting published

Anyone who would like to take part in delivering a workshop, or who has an idea for running a workshop should contact John Powell at the University of Gloucestershire.

Young researcher sessions

Graduate students, those recently qualified, or just starting out in research careers may benefit from taking part in sessions identified specifically for young researchers.  The aim is to encourage attendance by young researchers and students.  These will have the following characteristics:

• Allow for presentations of research ideas, preliminary work or recent completion
• Provide for research methods discussions
• Take part in a non-threatening atmosphere

Side event/thematic panels

Opportunities will be provided to sponsoring organisations and other outside bodies to organise and deliver focused policy/practitioner workshops, Thematic panels may also be established to examine a particular issue within a sector, such as forestry or fishing.

Poster presentations

Poster sessions will be organised and run at specific times in order to make the sessions more interactive and attractive both to those presenting and their potential audience.

Keynote speakers at plenary sessions

Several plenary sessions with key note speakers will be held during the week.

Panel sessions of presented papers

Papers will be grouped and presented in standard panel sessions with a chairman.

Short paper sessions

Papers will be presented in a more ‘distilled’ form, with more time devoted to questions and discussion.

Round table discussions

Specific issues will be debated by invited speakers in small discussion groups.

Video and other media presentations

A screening room will be provided for video, film, and other forms of presentation.

Field trips

Local field trips will reinforce and be linked to the conference themes.  One day will be set aside specifically for field trips.