Johnson, Craig. 2000. Environmental Stress, Economic Risk and Institutional Change: Inshore Fishing and Community-Based Management in Southern Thailand. Presented at “Constituting the Commons: Crafting Sustainable Commons in the New Millenium”, the Eighth Conference of the International Association for the Study of Common Property, Bloomington, Indiana, USA, May 31-June 4.

This paper considers this debate by exploring the conditions under which rural communities in SouthernThailand implemented and enforced rules of restricted access in coastal fishing. Particular emphasis is placed on the ways in which socio-economic differentiation affects the willingness and ability to bear the costs of enforcing and maintaining rules of common property.A principal aim of this paper was to consider the ways in which environmental scarcities affect collective action and institutional change. The findings from Phuket provide evidence to support the notion that resource-dependent communities can institute and enforce rules of common property. In addition, they suggest a relatively strong correlation between environmental degradation and institutional change.