Research on institutions for agricultural water management under the CGIAR Challenge Program on Water and Food - Water Scarcity, Livelihoods and Food Security - page 134

regulation can improve cooperation in economic experiments, however the
results were context specific. Jack (2009) found that in the Kenya watersheds,
underlying social norms and preferences had a strong influence on people's
decisions. Enforcement mechanisms caused crowding out (replacement of
internal motivation by external rules) of social preference for equity, which
Cardenas et al. (2010) also found with fines for non-compliance with
regulations. High fines reduced cooperation if they generated resentment and if
people knew that there was a low chance of being caught violating the
regulations.
Beyond the many site-specific findings, the CPWF research on how
institutions influence the way that water was allocated had several general
lessons. Well-designed policies for improving water management had net
positive impacts on both the environment and economic growth. Good
understanding of the impact of policy or regulatory change on different users
could be the basis for targeting interventions to support vulnerable groups who
might be negatively affected. The understanding could also provide incentives
for people to participate in broad-based collective action. Several innovative
approaches were developed to do this in CPWF. Finally, the findings on PES
suggest that while such schemes may be economically and ecologically feasible,
careful attention to the social context will be necessary for them to work in
practice.
Institutional innovation processes
The final group of papers and the topic by Molle et al. (2009) looked at how
water management institutions evolve. They also looked at how institutions
can be strengthened to lead to more equitable and sustainable outcomes. Lebel
et al. (2006) assessed how governance in socio-ecological systems increased
resilience. They used case studies to answer the question: How do certain
attributes of governance function to enhance resilience? Three specific
propositions were explored: (1) participation builds trust, and deliberation leads
to the shared understanding needed to mobilize and self-organize; (2) poly-
centric and multilayered institutions improve the fit between knowledge,
action and social-ecological contexts in ways that allow societies to adapt better
at appropriate levels; and (3) accountable authorities that also pursue just
distributions of benefits and involuntary risks enhance the adaptive capacity of
vulnerable groups and society as a whole. Lebel et al. (2006) found some
support for parts of all three propositions. They concluded that analysts, facili-
tators, change agents, or stakeholders, need not only ask, “The resilience of
what, to what?” but must also ask, “For whom?”
Though Lebel et al. (2006) found support for all three propositions, their first
proposition on the importance of participation and deliberation is the easiest for
external interventions to address. Many CPWF projects developed or adapted
tools and approaches to identify and better analyze stakeholders and to facilitate
more systematic, informed and equitable interaction among stakeholders.