Case Studies of Social-Ecological Systems

Title
Type

Community and Forest: Environmental Narratives in Ikaria island, Greece

Case
Τhis case concerns the Radi forest in Ikaria Island, Greece. It is revealed the role of local, community institutions, and the external institutional context in the organization process of people and forest. This work synthesizes and analyzes, by historical ethnography, the socio-ecological system, its origins and the conditions that contributed to the emergence and establishment of this system. The invention and the appliance of management plans by the self-organized community in Ikaria island...
16 Aug 2019

Institutional Analysis of Tourism system from a Commons Perspective in Upper Mustang, Nepal

Case
Before the introduction of tourism, people of Upper Mustang subsisted on only three occupations: agriculture, animal husbandry, and petty trans-Himalayan trade. The Upper Mustang region of Nepal has long been a tourist destination, especially for the westerners. Once popularly known as a Lost Kingdom of Nepal, this region is located in the rain-shadowed with harsh climatic conditions, but evokes a mystical and exotic image for tourists because of its unique landscapes and rich cultural heritage...
05 Dec 2018

The Cantareira Water Supply System and Local Efforts for Sustainable Agriculture in Nazaré Paulista, State of São Paulo, Brazil

Case
This case is based on field work done as part of ASU's Global Development Research Program in alignment with local organizations actively capacitating local small to medium-scale agriculturalists, and mitigating biodiversity and water shortages. Research focused on the municapity of Nazaré Paulista, but extended to the adjacent municipalities that fall under the Bragança area of São Paulo State and the respective watershed. Between 2014-2016, the region experienced a major drought that brought...
04 Dec 2018

Water Equity and Tourism: A Case of Nainital District, Uttarakhand

Case
The current case is based on findings specific to ten villages in two blocks, Ramgarh and Dhari located in the Nainital district of Uttarakhand, India. This study is based on fieldwork that was carried over the course of a few years since 2014; originally with the intent to ascertain the impact of climate change on the livelihoods of mountain farmers. It was found that urbanization and the increase in tourism infrastructure in the district over the past decade has resulted in a conflict over...
03 Dec 2018

Tourism and Natural Infrastructure in Community de Agua Blanca, Puerto Lopez, Ecuador

Case
Agua Blanca Community is located in the province of Manabí, in the municipality of Puerto López, Machalilla parish. The community, founded in 1930, is within the Machalilla National Park, and occupies an area of 10,500 hectares. It is made up of approximately 80 families, that is, almost 300 people. It possesses one of the largest archaeological settlements on the coast related to the manteña culture (800-1532 AD). The community has historically conducted activities in agriculture and livestock...
02 Dec 2018

Channel Islands National Park Marine Protected Areas

Case
 Marine sanctuary waters include 1,128 square nautical miles from mean high tide to 6 nautical miles offshore San Miguel, Santa Rosa, Santa Cruz, Anacapa, and Santa Barbara Islands. Warm and cool currents support a great variety of flora and fauna, including giant kelp, fish and invertebrates, marine birds, pinnipeds, and cetaceans. The key resources (natural infrastructure) in the system are the marine food web. The key shared resource relevant to the commons dilemma faced by the...
30 Nov 2018

Hydraulic Fracturing Governance, Pennsylvania

Case
Pennsylvania is the second largest national producer of natural gas. Within the natural gas system individuals have the right to lease mineral rights granting production companies the capability to extract the resource. This accessibility coupled with the widespread nature of spillover effects serves as the basis for this common pool resource study, for externalities are not limited to users of the resource.With the federal government obstaining from hyrdaulic fracturing regulation,...
18 Nov 2018

OpenABM: Agent-based model database

Case
OpenABM is a node in the CoMSES Network, providing a growing collection of tutorials and FAQs on agent-based modeling, a model library intended to provide a locus for authors and modelers to share their models, and forums for modeling-related discussions and job postings.You can find OpenABM here: www.openabm.org.
14 Jul 2017

Large N Comparative Studies of Ostrom's Design Principles

Case
There have been a number of studies that focus on testing whether and in what contexts Ostrom's institutional design principles may lead to successful governance of common-pool resources.  The study of Cox et al. (see sources) coded the presence or absence of each of 8 design principles and success in 62 cases and found that the likelihood of success and the presence of individual design principles is positively correlated.   However, because institutions are systems, it is...
13 Jul 2017

Community-based drinking water governance regimes in Čadrg, Slovenia

Case
Čadrg is a scattered mountain village in the southern part of the Western Julian Alps in western Slovenia. It belongs to the Municipality of Tolmin, which is characterized by its position near the border, its inaccessibility, being demographically threatened, and a peripheral location. Čadrg has forty-five permanent residents, and its high percentage of young residents means it is one of the few mountain villages in the municipality with good prospects for the future.The village community has...
09 Jun 2017

Dynamics of coupled populations in an open, three-trophic-level system

Case
The investigated stream system, which consists of three-coupled populations (benthic algae, grazers, and predators), is modeled as a fixed region of space(e.g., stream reach) and over a limited period of time.  The time scale allows for growth of primary producers (algae), but not for reproduction of grazers and predators.  The system is open, allowing immigrations and emmigrations.  Immigration at all trophic levels is assumed to be governed by external factors and to be...
09 Oct 2016

Spread of ideas based on epidemiological models

Case
The population dynamics underlying the diffusion of ideas hold many qualitative similarities to those involved in thespread of infections. In spite of much suggestive evidence this analogy is hardly ever quantified in useful ways. Thestandard benefit of modeling epidemics is the ability to estimate quantitatively population average parameters, such asinterpersonal contact rates, incubation times, duration of infectious periods, etc. In most cases such quantities generalizenaturally to the...
07 Oct 2016

Computer Modeling of the Immune System Reconstruction after Peripheral Blood Stem Cell Transplantation

Case
Attention is focused on the immune system reconstruction and the process of production of T- and B- lymphocytes and natural killer (NK) cells after autologous haematopoietic stem cells transplantation (HSCT). The mathematical model for leukopoiesis proposed in Periodic oscillations in leukopoiesis models with two delays is used as an initial point for investigations. HSCs in bone marrow are presented as two descrite groups: proliferating cell and non-proliferating (quiescent) cells. Quiescent...
03 Oct 2016

Living in a network of scaling cities and finite resources

Case
Many urban phenomena exhibit remarkable regularity in the form of nonlinear scaling behaviors, but their implications on a system of networked cities has never been investigated. Such knowledge is crucial for our ability to harness the complexity of urban processes to further sustainability science. In this paper, Qubbaj et al. (2014) develop a dynamical modeling framework that embeds population–resource dynamics—a generalized Lotka–Volterra system with modifications to incorporate the urban...
30 Sep 2016

San Pedro Fishery, Belize

Case
     San Pedro, Belize is an island village of approximately 1,200 residents in 1979. Located off the coast of Belize in a strategic place on Ambergris Cay it is close to abundant local fishing and has easy access to nearby commercial markets (Belize city, Corozal, and Chetumal). The fishing cooperative, Caribena Cooperative Limited, was San Pedro’s official fishing organization handling capture, processing and sale of the village’s primary resource: marine produce consisting of...
09 Aug 2016