The overall theme of this principle was that the opportunity existed for most to participate and play a role in altering the operational rules of the CPR, albeit some had much more involvement than others. The range of those involved with the CPR is not in question; it is the amount of involvement and more importantly, the weight given to certain groups within that public that has been shown to be a concern. In this way, participation through Focus Groups or ZC presentations may be present, but the effect of that participation could vary, possibly acting to ruin the collective-choice arrangement that is seen by Ostrom to allow, “individuals who directly interact with one another and with the physical world (to) modify the rules over time so as to better fit them to the specific characteristics of their setting” (Ostrom, 1990, p. 93).
One of the possible explanations for this uneven participation is offered in Ostrom’s work, “None of these situations involves participants who vary greatly in regard to ownership of assets, skills, knowledge, ethnicity, race, or other variables that could strongly divide a group of individuals” (Ostrom, 1990, p. 93). Clearly, this is not the case for the Zone process and heterogeneity of the group members could work to alter the participation input in favor of larger, more robust institutions and interests. Most of those attributes vary amongst Focus Group Stakeholders and even within the ZC.
The Treaty plays an interesting role in the discussion surrounding who is involved with the
management of the Lake and its catchment and how much power those interests have. It
does play a part in altering that relationship. On the one hand, the Treaty helps to include Maori and/or tangata whenua beliefs and interests, but it also elevates their status above other citizens when plans and policies are developed under the Treaty. The tangata whenua have a much stronger say than any other group because they have six specific seats at the ZC table as well as co-governance agreements with DoC and ECan. No other interest has such a
97 direct influence. Some may argue that Dairy plays a prominent role, and that is not being
denied here, but Dairy interests do not have specific seats at the ZC table, even if some
members are dairy farmers. Six specific dairy seats on the ZC could surely cause community uproar. The ZC, outside of the runanga representatives and elected officials, are there first as individuals. For example, there is no Treaty agreement for recreational users or for families who have lived around the area for generations. Those who may use the Lake very often and are part of the CPR community in a different way, must act through Focus Groups or hope that someone on the ZC can pass along their views (including the tangata whenua, if such is the case). In this way, the Treaty causes disruption in the balance of interests within the ZC in a way that could inhibit collective-choice.
As well as including the public, the ZC tried to include its own members in the rule- recommendation discussions. To ignore a member or to overwhelm another’s position would jeopardize the collective-choice arrangement between CPR appropriators because it would effectively leave out their point of view or input. It is impossible to include every possible interest in the process but if the actual rule-making is hijacked by one group, then the collective-choice arrangement fails, and so too would Ostrom’s principle of collective- choice because ‘most’ people affected by the rules would not be working to alter them. Ostrom does use the term ‘most individuals’ and not ‘all’ but surely one group dominating others would not fit for this principle.
At first glance, this may seem enough to void the presence of the principle within this CPR. However, just because Ostrom’s (1990) work surrounding her principles does not include a CPR with such a conglomeration of different interests does not mean this principle is automatically void. And it even seems that this is not the case, as the collaborative governance design has given a range of participants from large dairy interests and local runanga to recreational users and rural women a chance to have their voice heard and taken into account. Ostrom’s (1990) principle requires there be a way for most individuals to participate, and in this case, that way or opportunity does exist. Granted, there are no rural men or urban women stakeholder group, so those interests either have been assumed to exist in other representations or were left out of the stakeholder groups. However, as long as runanga interests do not drown out others due to their advantageous Treaty
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6.1.4 Monitoring
The comments about a lack of monitoring focused on secondary issues to the Lake like birdlife and fisheries but also on larger-scale considerations at the catchment level. The focus on water quality and quantity in the Lake and catchment for this thesis also matches the focus of the institutions that monitor those same topics and who provided excellent data. Calls for more holistic monitoring and monitoring based on possible recreation days may be beneficial to the management of the Lake. They have been included in this analysis for future zone committee work or general consideration. Although the monitoring of the Water Executive, statutory agencies responsible for quality and quantity of water, does add some accountability to the institutional arrangement, it does not fully satisfy the principle. While water seems reasonably well monitored in terms of quality it is not so well for quantity (the government has recently introduced regulations requiring all irrigation water takes to be real time reported to regional councils using telemetry and automatic, tamper proof recorders on consented takes), also more holistic measures of the quality of the Lake and the stress and pressures on it are not well monitored, including the actual numbers and types of users.
The monitoring of the environmental aspects pertaining to the Lake opening seemed to be effective and it was clear who carried them out. It was also clear that as long as ECan remains under the control of appointed commissioners, their accountability to those
appropriators within the catchment is too indirect to be considered as fulfilling the principle. For some issues there may be voluntary monitoring in which case, the principle could be fulfilled, but this is not the case for the major issues in the catchment. When elections are held again at the regional level, accountability can return and with it, the fulfilment of this design principle.