Diaz Ordaz Small-Scale Irrigation System

Resource System
Watershed and associated topography
Resource Units
Freshwater

The town of Diaz Ordaz is located in the Tlacolula wing in the Oaxaca Valley, Mexico, and the resource appropiated is water for irrigation. The irrigation system is divided into numerous subunits called tramos, which localize labor mobilization for infrastruture provision. The system alternates between riparian and prior appropriation rights for water according to the discretion of an elected official. The source author hypothesizes that water scarcity during the moisture-sensitive period of the main crops forces certain types of social organization to allocate water.

 

The case A Tramo in Diaz Ordaz is part of the original Common-Pool Resource (CPR) database. A summary of the original CPR coding conducted in the 1980s by Edella Schlager and Shui Yan Tang at Indiana University may be found under the CPR tab in the Institutional Analysis section below.