“The presence of order in the world,” E. Ostrom (1998) writes, “is largely dependent upon the theories used to understand the world. We should not be limited, however, to only the conceptions of order derived from the work of Smith and Hobbes.”We need a theory that “offers an alternative that can be used to analyze and prescribe a variety of institutional arrangements to match the extensive variety of collective goods in the world.” In response to that need, the Ostroms have explored a new domain of the complex institutional reality of social life—the rich institutional arrangements that are neither states nor markets. They are small and large, multipurpose or just focused on one good or service: suburban municipalities, neighborhood organizations, condominiums, churches, voluntary associations, or informal entities like those solving the common-pool resources dilemmas they studied and documented around the world. Yet, once the functional principle behind them was identified, the very diverse forms could be understood as part of a broader pattern, and the logic of the institutional process involved could be revealed with relative ease. They could be seen as a “third sector” (“public economy” was one of the suggested names for it) related to, but different from, both “the state” and “the market.” Irrespective of what we call these domains, the fact is that a theoretical perspective that takes it into account is substantially different from the one based on the classical dichotomy. Aligica/Boettke: Ostroms’ Institutionalism 35
Posted on: Sat, 19 Apr 2014 15:29:22 +0000
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