Experimental Field Evidence of Common Pool Resources : The Water Judge in Bolivia

Common pool resources (CPRs) are usually exploited one generation after another meaning that there is an intergenerational link between consumers. This key dimension is often not considered in theoretical or field experiments, due to the difficultly in approaching it. We overcome this barrier by introducing the hypothesis of “intergenerational altruism”. The implication is that altruism reduce the exploitation of the natural resources, since the agents recognize that the exploitation not only creates negative externalities for their own generation, but also for future generations. To prove these hypotheses, we conducted a field experiment in farming communities located in Bolivia. We consider common water for farming activities as a CPRs, since communities use this resource for decades, the intergenerational link is evident. Our intergenerational field experiment includes four treatments based on the replacement rate of the resources, under one-shot non-cooperative game without feedback. We also introduce the possibility to accumulate water, which modify the availability of CPRs, and the possibility to manage the resources through the traditional social arrangement of the Water Judge. Results showed that the intergenerational link does not mitigate the overexploitation of CPRs. Nevertheless, we found that the “Water Judge” could be a cost-effective treatment in small farming communities