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	Elinor Ostrom Wins Nobel for Common(s) Sense by Fran Korten Yes Magazine USA   Feb 2010   Elinor Ostrom was an unusual choice for the 2009 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences.   For one thing, she is the first woman to receive the prize. Her Ph.D. is in political science, not economics (though she collaborates with many economists, and considers herself a political economist). But what makes this award particularly special is that her work is about cooperation, while standard economics focuses on competition.   Ostrom’s seminal book, Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action, was published in 1990. But her research on common property goes back to the early 1960s, when she wrote her dissertation on groundwater in California. In 1973 she and her husband, Vincent Ostrom, founded the Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis at Indiana University. In the intervening years, the Workshop has produced hundreds of studies of the conditions in which communities self-organize to solve common problems. Ostrom currently serves as professor of political science at Indiana University and senior research director of the Workshop.   Fran Korten, spent 20 years with the Ford Foundation making grants to support community management of water and forests in Southeast Asia and the United States. She and Ostrom drew on one another’s work as this field of knowledge developed. Fran interviewed her friend and colleague Lin Ostrom shortly after Ostrom received the Nobel Prize.   Fran Korten: When you first learned that you had won the Nobel Prize in Economics, were you surprised?   Elinor Ostrom: Yes. It was quite surprising. I was both happy and relieved.   Fran: Why relieved?   Elinor: Well, relieved in that I was doing a bunch of research through the years that many people thought was very radical and people didn’t like. As a person who does interdisciplinary work, I didn’t fit anywhere. I was relieved that, after all these years of struggle, someone really thought it did add up.   And it’s very nice for the team that I’ve been a part of here at the Workshop. We have had a different style of organizing. It is an interdisciplinary center—we have graduate students, visiting scholars, and faculty working together. I never would have won the Nobel but for being a part of that enterprise.   Fran: It’s interesting that your research is about people learning to cooperate. And your Workshop at the university is also organized on principles of cooperation.   Elinor: I have a new book coming out in May entitled Working Together, written with Amy Poteete and Marco Janssen. It is on collective actions in the commons. What we’re talking about is how people work together. We’ve used an immense array of different methods to look at this question—case studies, including my own dissertation and Amy’s work, modeling, experiments, large-scale statistical work. We show how people use multiple methods to work together.   Fran: Many people associate “the commons” with Garrett Hardin’s famous essay, “The Tragedy of the Commons.” He says that if, for example, you have a pasture that everyone in a village has access to, then each person will put as many cows on that land as he can to maximize his own benefit, and pretty soon the pasture will be overgrazed and become worthless. What’s the difference between your perspective and Hardin’s?   Elinor: Well, I don’t see the human as hopeless. There’s a general tendency to presume people just act for short-term profit. But anyone who knows about small-town businesses and how people in a community relate to one another realizes that many of those decisions are not just for profit and that humans do try to organize and solve problems.   * Visit the link below to access the complete interview. Visit the related web page
	All of us must work for women''s empowerment by Graca Machel Africa Progress Panel Mozambique / South Africa   Women are one of Africa’s greatest assets. To many of us, this is self evident. But they are an asset too often taken for granted. This is not only unjust, but deeply damaging for the continent’s prospects. For Africa’s political, social and economic health and progress depends above all upon the empowerment of her women.   In my lifetime, there have been both extraordinary breakthroughs and heartbreaking setbacks for women. Who could have imagined a few decades ago that we would have a female head of state, or be the first continent with a parliament where women are in the majority? The number of female chief executives in business, the public sector and civil society is increasing, and women’s organisations are becoming more assertive and vocal in every walk of life.   But these achievements serve to highlight an unacceptable and unnecessary reality. Across the continent, women continue to be repressed, oppressed, disempowered, marginalised and subject to discrimination, discrimination which takes many forms.   Women in conflict situations are particularly vulnerable to displacement, exploitation and sexual violence. But even in peaceful societies, women find their talents blocked by formal and socio-cultural barriers.   Compared to men, women work longer hours, are paid less, have fewer legal rights including over their bodies, their land and their property, and have less access to economic opportunity, whether in the form of credit, vocational training or employment. Only about half of the continent’s women are literate (compared to two thirds of the men) and only a minority have access to adequate health services and information. Maternal mortality rates in Africa are scandalous.   Compounding matters, information and gender disaggregated data regarding both the plight and the economic and social contribution of women is lacking. The bald facts might jolt leaders out of their complacency. Instead, unchallenged prejudices, traditional customs and practices can serve to camouflage the suffering that hundreds of millions of women endure, in silence.   The good news is that in many countries, legislation and policies are being put in place to fight discrimination and challenge mindsets. Over the last decade, the role of women in Africa has been receiving growing political recognition.   The African Protocol on the Rights of Women and the African Union’s adoption five years ago of the Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality in Africa in 2004 were major breakthroughs. In a number of countries the participation of women in parliaments and governments is significant.   This is long overdue. But there is a still a long way to go. Getting laws passed and policies approved is only a beginning. Resources are needed to put in place the practical means to address gaps and inequalities in access to land, the law, education, health, employment, credit, information and political participation. Mechanisms are needed to monitor progress and enforcement.   Much more can be done to promote gender equity. The personal example set by political and business leaders is critical. They can ensure that growth and development strategies explicitly incorporate gender goals and targets, and that these are used as the basis for assessing their implementation. Development partners can also do more to incentivise actions that empower women, including through budget support.   Women’s health remains consistently under prioritised and under-funded. Maternal and infant mortality rates remain shockingly high. Women do not control their sexual health. HIV/AIDS has been the greatest disaster to affect our continent in the last half century. With some 60% of new infections now among girls and women between 15 and 24, only by focusing on young women can we hope to overcome it in the next 50 years.   As Kofi Annan said, when women are healthy, educated and able to take the opportunities life affords them, we reap a double dividend with children thriving and countries flourishing.   In my view, the key to tackling these many challenges is political will and commitment . Secondly, education of girls is the best investment any society can make. It has a multiplier effect on all aspects of life, from the reduction of infant and child mortality and disease prevalence to empowerment, entrepreneurship and economic performance. It improves the quality of life for both men and women now, and for future generations.   Despite real progress in increasing the number of children in school, sub-Saharan Africa is the only region not on track to meet MDG gender parity objectives in primary and secondary school enrolment. In fact, there remains an obstinate and large gender gap right across age groups.   The proportion of girls completing primary school has increased substantially since 1991. But it still lags some 10 percentage points behind boys. There is a similar gap in those at secondary school while, in contrast, more girls than boys in Latin America receive secondary education. According to UNESCO, there are just 68 women enrolled in tertiary education for every 100 men in sub-Saharan Africa – lower than in South and West Asia.   A top priority must be to increase investment and remove the barriers preventing girls accessing education. These barriers range from the financial to the cultural – as well as attitudinal. Parents and elders need to be persuaded of the benefits of investing in their daughters’ education.   Women have come a long way in the last 50 years. Much of this has been achieved despite, not because, the attitude of powerful men. Where and when men and women truly come together around an agenda for women’s empowerment in every sphere of life, underpinned by equal access to education, the scope for progress is unlimited. Fulfillment of Africa’s vast potential depends upon such an alliance. All of us must work to make it happen.   * Graça Machel is a renowned international advocate for women''s and children''s rights, and has been a social and political activist for decades.
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