Table 1
Definition of key terms.
| Common-pool resource – a type of resource with high rivalry in consumption (i.e. subtractability of resources) and challenges for excludability; i.e. the ability to exclude other users from consuming the resource. |
| Open access – absence of governance rules for non-excludable resources (e.g. CPRs), where no form of property rights for access or withdrawal exist for a specific individual or group. |
| Privatization – the transfer of control in natural resource management from the public domain to a restricted entity, group or individual, and where the mechanisms for control of the use of the resource are based on market relations. |
| Common-property – Exclusive collective access, use and/or management rights to a defined resource or set of resources at the group level (typically inclusive of a whole community). Common property rights may be formally (e.g. legally from the state) or informally (e.g. through historical norms) established, defined and enforced. In practice, customary common property rights may be highly contingent and subject to constant negotiation and context-specific interpretation. Common property, in theory, can be viewed as a move on the spectrum towards privatization as a first step of enclosure. However, scholarship on common property has historically not considered it as a form of privatization because it is typically not transferable. |
| Social-ecological system – Concept that interdependencies exist between social and ecological functions and outcomes (Liu et al. 2007; Ostrom 2009; Fischer et al. 2015a). |
| Path dependence/lock-in – the limitations or dependency of future system states or changes on past system states and functioning. Once a track/path is started, the costs of reversal are very high and come with increasing returns, in that the probability of further steps along the same path increase with each move down that path (Pierson 2000). |
| Spillover/flows – externalities as direct or indirect effects outside the bounds of the intended resource management system or component being privatized. |
| Procedural justice – the participatory governance by and empowerment of individuals, communities, and societies to decide how their needs are met (Agyeman and Evans 2004; Loos et al. 2014). |
| Distributional justice – ensuring a socially just or fair allocation of resources within and between different generations (Lélé 1991; Langhelle 2000; Loos et al. 2014). |