The operation of a number of non-contiguous parcels of land as a single farming unit is known as land fragmentation. It is a widespread and persistent phenomenon and, at the same time, widely criticized by development agencies. Available evidence clearly suggests that the unqualified faith in the merit of consolidation is not justified; fragmentation may have some rationale. This paper substantiates the latter position with a case study of an irrigated agricultural system. Thereafter, it locates fragmentation within the broader context and analyses its role within a hierarchy of phenomena in the linked social and ecological local system. For this analysis an evolutionary game model is used. It is shown that fragmentation increases the resilience of the system of cooperation. The study concludes by suggesting an appropriate strategy for resilience management.

Though there are economically based arguments for public intervention in negotiations between private agents, such intervention will often take place as a consequence of political interests. In this paper we discuss how varying political interests of an intervening body affect its intervention mechanism. We derive a unique Bayesian–Nash equilibrium for a two-step, three-player game in which the optimal intervention mechanism (subsidies) and the optimal size of the traded good are decided.

The paper has been motivated by the negotiations between a Russian processing plant, causing transboundary, polluting emissions, and Nordic companies offering technology which will reduce the emissions significantly. Nordic governments have intervened in the negotiations and offered subsidies, which is subtracted from the seller's price if trade takes place. Combining the theoretical results and empirical facts we conclude that the Norwegian government seems to have had stronger political interests in this case than did the Finnish government.

Collective action can play a significant role in sustainable management of common grazing lands through restricting access and regulating use. However, it is not clear why there are often violations of grazing restrictions in equilibrium. This paper first presents a theoretical framework of collective action in community management of grazing lands that explicitly models individual violations behaviour. Then data from the highlands of Amhara region of Ethiopia are used to test the model predictions to examine the impact of policy-relevant factors on collective establishment of grazing restrictions and violations of grazing restrictions. Econometric results show that collective action in community grazing land management is likely to be more beneficial and effective in communities with better market access or higher populations. Collective action, on the other hand, is less likely to be successful in communities with greater social, economic, or cultural heterogeneity or more affluent members. Factors related to greater livestock profitability, such as rainfall, or fixed costs of negotiating agreements, such as total land area of the community, have ambiguous effects, as they are associated with establishment of grazing restrictions as well as violating the restrictions.

This paper applies recent advances in ecology to our understanding of firm development, sustainability, and economic development. The ecological literature indicates that the greater the functional richness of species in a system, the greater its resilience – that is, its ability to persist in the face of substantial changes in the environment. This paper focuses on the effects of functional richness across firm size on the ability of industries to survive in the face of economic change. Our results indicate that industries with a richness of industrial functions are more resilient to employment volatility.