Papers in this panel question assumptions about the nature of goods and social dilemmas in commons. They explore how variations in interdependence may influence environmental governance. Rather than intrinsic, dichotomous, or fixed types of goods; variation in uses, users, and interdependence, and how institutions deal with these, can shape the excludability, subtractability, and indivisibility of environmental goods and the potential for conflict and cooperation. Rather than a few symmetric static social dilemmas, interdependence may be better understood as diverse, dynamic, mostly asymmetric, and involving various forms of power. Unpacking the complexity of power in social-ecological systems requires going beyond typical social dilemma models to develop a better typology of how power influences the dynamics and outcomes of social-ecological systems, and their governability. This panel will invite participant questions and present brief provocations to stimulate conversations about going beyond conventional conceptions of commons to better understand environmental governance in contexts of heterogeneous interests, asymmetric situations, and power dynamics. Additional paper proposals related to the panel topics are invited and the scope of the abstract and panel session may be adjusted accordingly.
