Making the Commons Work: Conservation and Cooperation in Ireland

Commonage represents land held under common property that incorporates a system of local cooperative arrangements and rules to conserve and manage the Irish uplands. We analyze the institutional and economic factors that influence the behavior of commonage farmers under a common property regime using a recursive bivariate probit model. Results show that (1) cooperation has a positive and important impact on commonage conservation; (2) agricultural policies by way of livestock premia increase the level of degradation; while (3) farm financial support through agri-environment measures positively affects commonage conservation and encourages cooperation between farmers.