IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/wdevel/v104y2018icp10-30.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The importance of Ostrom’s Design Principles: Youth group performance in northern Ethiopia

Author

Listed:
  • Holden, Stein T.
  • Tilahun, Mesfin

Abstract

Youth unemployment and migration are growing challenges that need more political attention in many countries, particularly countries with rapid population growth and economic transformation. Proactively mobilizing the youth as a resource in the creation of sustainable livelihoods can potentially be a win-win-win solution that Ethiopia is currently attempting. The new youth employment strategy includes allocation of rehabilitated communal lands to youth groups. This study investigates the extent to which Ostrom’s Design Principles (DPs) are followed and matter for the early performance of youth groups in terms of their stability, trust and overall performance. Data from a census of 742 youth groups in five districts in Tigray in northern Ethiopia is used. This study utilizes econometric methods to assess correlations between the DPs and a range of early performance indicators. The study contributes to the limited literature on local collective action utilizing large samples. We find a high degree of compliance with the DPs. Some of the DPs appeared more important for early performance of the youth groups. The Ethiopian youth group approach to mobilize landless and unemployed youth is promising and should be tested elsewhere. Further longitudinal research is needed on the Ethiopian model as it is still at an early stage of testing as most groups are less than five years old.

Suggested Citation

  • Holden, Stein T. & Tilahun, Mesfin, 2018. "The importance of Ostrom’s Design Principles: Youth group performance in northern Ethiopia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 10-30.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:wdevel:v:104:y:2018:i:c:p:10-30
    DOI: 10.1016/j.worlddev.2017.11.010
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305750X17303728
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.worlddev.2017.11.010?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 look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ernst Fehr, 2009. "On The Economics and Biology of Trust," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 7(2-3), pages 235-266, 04-05.
    2. Agrawal, Arun & Chhatre, Ashwini, 2006. "Explaining success on the commons: Community forest governance in the Indian Himalaya," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 34(1), pages 149-166, January.
    3. Elinor Ostrom, 2010. "Beyond Markets and States: Polycentric Governance of Complex Economic Systems," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(3), pages 641-672, June.
    4. Elinor Ostrom, 2010. "Analyzing collective action," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 41(s1), pages 155-166, November.
    5. Collier, Paul & Hoeffler, Anke, 1998. "On Economic Causes of Civil War," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 50(4), pages 563-573, October.
    6. Poteete, Amy R. & Ostrom, Elinor, 2008. "Fifteen Years of Empirical Research on Collective Action in Natural Resource Management: Struggling to Build Large-N Databases Based on Qualitative Research," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 176-195, January.
    7. Wade, Robert, 1988. "The management of irrigation systems: How to evoke trust and avoid prisoner's dilemma," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 16(4), pages 489-500, April.
    8. Bardhan, Pranab, 2000. "Irrigation and Cooperation: An Empirical Analysis of 48 Irrigation Communities in South India," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 48(4), pages 847-865, July.
    9. Ostrom, Elinor & Basurto, Xavier, 2011. "Crafting analytical tools to study institutional change," Journal of Institutional Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 7(3), pages 317-343, September.
    10. Jeffrey M Wooldridge, 2010. "Econometric Analysis of Cross Section and Panel Data," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 2, volume 1, number 0262232588, April.
    11. Agrawal, Arun, 2001. "Common Property Institutions and Sustainable Governance of Resources," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 29(10), pages 1649-1672, October.
    12. Edella Schlager & William Blomquist & Shui Yan Tang, 1994. "Mobile Flows, Storage, and Self-Organized Institutions for Governing Common-Pool Resources," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 70(3), pages 294-317.
    13. Bezu, Sosina & Holden, Stein, 2014. "Are Rural Youth in Ethiopia Abandoning Agriculture?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 259-272.
    14. Ostrom, Elinor & Walker, James & Gardner, Roy, 1992. "Covenants with and without a Sword: Self-Governance Is Possible," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 86(2), pages 404-417, June.
    15. Christopher Blattman & Edward Miguel, 2010. "Civil War," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 48(1), pages 3-57, March.
    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. Takahashi, Ryo & Otsuka, Keijiro & Tilahun, Mesfin & Birhane, Emiru & Holden, Stein, 2024. "Beyond Ostrom: Randomized experiment of the impact of individualized tree rights on forest management in Ethiopia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 178(C).
    2. Holden, Stein T. & Tilahun, Mesfin, 2018. "Land rental as a complementary income source for land-poor youth," CLTS Working Papers 6/18, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Centre for Land Tenure Studies, revised 16 Oct 2019.
    3. Holden , Stein T. & Tilahun , Mesfin, 2018. "Gender Differences in Risk Tolerance, Trust and Trustworthiness: Are They Related?," CLTS Working Papers 3/18, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Centre for Land Tenure Studies, revised 16 Oct 2019.
    4. Holden, Stein T. & Tilahun, Mesfin, 2021. "Mobile phones, leadership and gender in rural business groups," World Development Perspectives, Elsevier, vol. 24(C).
    5. Holden, Stein T. & Tilahun, Mesfin, 2019. "How Do Social Preferences and Norms of Reciprocity affect Generalized and Particularized Trust?," CLTS Working Papers 8/19, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Centre for Land Tenure Studies, revised 10 Oct 2019.
    6. Holden, Stein T. & Tilahun, Mesfin, 2021. "Are land-poor youth accessing rented land? Evidence from northern Ethiopia," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 108(C).
    7. Rosegrant, Mark W. & Fan, Shenggen & Otsuka, Keijiro, 2021. "Global issues in agricultural development," IFPRI book chapters, in: Agricultural development: New perspectives in a changing world, chapter 2, pages 35-78, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    8. Holden, Stein T. & Tilahun, Mesfin, 2023. "Numeracy Skills, Decision Errors, and Risk Preference Estimation," CLTS Working Papers 5/23, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Centre for Land Tenure Studies.
    9. Stein T Holden & Mesfin Tilahun, 2021. "Preferences, trust, and performance in youth business groups," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(9), pages 1-28, September.
    10. Holden, Stein T. & Tilahun, Mesfin, 2024. "Does War Enhance or Undermine Other-regarding Preferences and Trust?," CLTS Working Papers 6/24, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Centre for Land Tenure Studies.
    11. Holden, Stein T,, 2017. "Policies for Improved Food Security: - The Roles of Land Tenure Policies and Land Markets," CLTS Working Papers 9/17, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Centre for Land Tenure Studies, revised 21 Oct 2019.
    12. Oniki, Shunji & Berhe, Melaku & Negash, Teklay & Etsay, Haftu, 2023. "Do economic incentives crowd out motivation for communal land conservation in Ethiopia?," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 150(C).
    13. Tingyu Li & Bo Liu & Shuhao Tan, 2022. "Can Social Capital Help the Youngers Rent Land?—A Case of Pastoral Areas in Inner Mongolia, P.R. China," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(10), pages 1-15, October.
    14. Holden, Stein T. & Tilahun, Mesfin, 2022. "Are risk preferences explaining gender differences in investment behavior?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 101(C).
    15. Holden, Stein T. & Tilahun, Mesfin, 2021. "How are social preferences of youth related to their motivation to invest in environmental conservation (local public goods)?," CLTS Working Papers 3/21, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Centre for Land Tenure Studies.

    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. Holden, Stein T. & Tilahun, Mesfin, 2019. "How Do Social Preferences and Norms of Reciprocity affect Generalized and Particularized Trust?," CLTS Working Papers 8/19, Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Centre for Land Tenure Studies, revised 10 Oct 2019.
    2. Okumu, Boscow & Muchapondwa, Edwin, 2020. "Determinants of successful collective management of forest resources: Evidence from Kenyan Community Forest Associations," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 113(C).
    3. Lemeilleur, Sylvaine & Allaire, Gilles, 2019. "Participatory Guarantee Systems for organic farming: reclaiming the commons," Working Papers MOISA 292325, Institut National de la recherché Agronomique (INRA), UMR MOISA : Marchés, Organisations, Institutions et Stratégies d'Acteurs : CIHEAM-IAMM, CIRAD, INRA, Montpellier SupAgro, Montpellier, France.
    4. Holden, Stein T. & Tilahun, Mesfin, 2021. "Are land-poor youth accessing rented land? Evidence from northern Ethiopia," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 108(C).
    5. repec:cup:judgdm:v:10:y:2015:i:6:p:511-537 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Takayama, Taisuke & Matsuda, Hirotaka & Nakatani, Tomoaki, 2018. "The determinants of collective action in irrigation management systems: Evidence from rural communities in Japan," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 206(C), pages 113-123.
    7. Stein T Holden & Mesfin Tilahun, 2021. "Preferences, trust, and performance in youth business groups," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 16(9), pages 1-28, September.
    8. Daniel A. DeCaro & Marco A. Janssen & Allen Lee, 2015. "Synergistic effects of voting and enforcement on internalized motivation to cooperate in a resource dilemma," Judgment and Decision Making, Society for Judgment and Decision Making, vol. 10(6), pages 511-537, November.
    9. Elinor Ostrom, 2004. "The Working Parts of Rules and How They May Evolve Over Time," Papers on Economics and Evolution 2004-04, Philipps University Marburg, Department of Geography.
    10. Arts, Bas & de Koning, Jessica, 2017. "Community Forest Management: An Assessment and Explanation of its Performance Through QCA," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 96(C), pages 315-325.
    11. Boscow Okumu & Edwin Muchapondwa, 2017. "Determinants of Successful Collective Management of Forest Resources: Evidence from Kenyan Community Forest Associations," Working Papers 698, Economic Research Southern Africa.
    12. Singh, Vijai Shanker & Pandey, Deep Narayan & Prakash, Neha Pandey, 2011. "What determines the success of joint forest management? Science-based lessons on sustainable governance of forests in India," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 56(1), pages 126-133.
    13. Achim Ahrens, 2015. "Civil conflicts in Africa: Climate, economic shocks, nighttime lights and spill-over effects," SEEC Discussion Papers 1501, Spatial Economics and Econometrics Centre, Heriot Watt University.
    14. Esther Blanco & Tobias Haller & James M. Walker, 2017. "Externalities in appropriation: responses to probabilistic losses," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 20(4), pages 793-808, December.
    15. Doss, Cheryl R. & Meinzen-Dick, Ruth, 2015. "Collective Action within the Household: Insights from Natural Resource Management," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 171-183.
    16. Masahiro Shoji, 2018. "Incentive for risk sharing and trust formation: experimental and survey evidence from Bangladesh," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 70(4), pages 1062-1083.
    17. Meinzen-Dick, Ruth & Janssen, Marco A. & Kandikuppa, Sandeep & Chaturvedi, Rahul & Rao, Kaushalendra & Theis, Sophie, 2018. "Playing games to save water: Collective action games for groundwater management in Andhra Pradesh, India," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 40-53.
    18. Simon Cornée & Madeg Le Guernic & Damien Rousselière, 2020. "Governing Common-Property Assets: Theory and Evidence from Agriculture," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 166(4), pages 691-710, November.
    19. Qiuqiong Huang & Jinxia Wang & Scott Rozelle & Stephen Polasky & Yang Liu, 2013. "The Effects of Well Management and the Nature of the Aquifer on Groundwater Resources," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 95(1), pages 94-116.
    20. Poteete, Amy R. & Ostrom, Elinor, 2008. "Fifteen Years of Empirical Research on Collective Action in Natural Resource Management: Struggling to Build Large-N Databases Based on Qualitative Research," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 36(1), pages 176-195, January.
    21. Behera, Bhagirath, 2009. "Explaining the performance of state-community joint forest management in India," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(1), pages 177-185, November.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Youth; Youth groups; Primary cooperatives; Common pool resource management; Group performance; Ethiopia;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • Q15 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Agriculture - - - Land Ownership and Tenure; Land Reform; Land Use; Irrigation; Agriculture and Environment
    • Q23 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Forestry

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:wdevel:v:104:y:2018:i:c:p:10-30. 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: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/worlddev .

    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.