Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Table 7.1
Framework for the interpretation of property rights.
Rights
Description
Access and
Right to physically access the geographical space occupied by the resource
withdrawal
and to extract portions of the resource.
Management
Right to decide how the resource is going to be accessed and exploited.
Exclusion
Right to put limits on the actors who access, withdraw and manage the resource.
Alienation
Right to transfer property rights to new holders-through donation, sale, bequest.
Source: adapted from Schlager and Ostrom, 1992
introduce a property rights theory developed by the institutional and neo-institutional
economics school of thought (e.g. Demsetz 1967; Ostrom 1990) as the theoretical
framework for the analysis of policy changes associated with the nationalisation of
minerals in Bolivia and Ecuador. In particular, we look at the multiplicity of rights
that can be exercised vis-a-vis property. We follow the categorisation of Schlager and
Ostrom (1992) and divide property rights into rights to access and withdraw, manage,
exclude, and alienate (see Table 7.1).
Access and withdrawal rights refer to the privilege of physically entering the geo-
graphical space of the resource, and to the extraction and appropriation of portions of
the resource. The management rights refer to the ability to decide how access and with-
drawal are exercised. Exclusion rights refer to the faculty of deciding who can exercise
rights on the resource. Alienation rights refer to the right of transferring the property
rights to new holders. These transfers can happen via donation, sale or bequest.
When taken together, Schlager and Ostrom (1992), consider the aforementioned
rights as 'operational'. In doing so, they refer to the ability to exercise a particular right
and differentiate from 'collective-choice' rights, which entail the ability to discuss and
shape the definition of future rights. As such, collective-choice level rights are broader
and go beyond the technical exercise of enforcing a set of rules. By virtue of their
longer-term and open-ended nature, collective-choice level rights have far-reaching
implications for shaping not only the means of using a particular property, but also
the ends that are expected to emerge. In other words, the exercise of collective-choice
rights not only deal with how development should take place, but also the direction
and nature of development. In the following section, the nationalisation processes
taking place in Bolivia and Ecuador are explored through the framework presented
here. While the process of nationalisation has been very complex and is riddled with
intentionally-created ambiguities in legislation, the section aims to present a linear
narrative to render them suitable for evaluation through this analytical lens.
7.4 BOLIVIA
Bolivia has rich mineral resources and a long history of extraction and export. It
has gone through various cycles of privatisation and nationalisation. The most recent
privatisation process culminated in the law of 1997. Though no generalized nationali-
sation process took place, subsequent actions have swung the pendulum slightly back
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