Salomé Guilbert

Abstract

Sustainable management of common-pool resources (CPR) has become a crucial challenge at a time of growing ecological disruptions. Environmental governance systems have appeared to be suitable compromises and are expected to foster significant changes in resource-use practices to preserve resources. Yet participatory arrangements do not systematically produce effective environmental outcomes. One explanation may lie in the influence of power asymmetries within decision-making arenas, which contribute to shape trade-offs through which environmental burdens are shared among stakeholders. This research investigates how power asymmetries within CPRs governance systems may form decision-making trade-offs, conditioning their capacity to produce ecologically significant changes in resource-use practices. The empirical case focuses on the French water governance system and combines a quantitative analysis of river basin governance documents, budget allocations and discursive framing, with a comparative qualitative case study of three sub-basins. The results will be compared with ecological indicators of water quality. By analyzing how power asymmetries structure the distribution of environmental efforts among users, this research intends to contribute to the empirical study of power within environmental governance and to the understanding of the transformative capacity of common-pool governance systems facing increasing environmental pressures.