Elinor Ostrom

What she did

Studied how communities govern shared resources and published Governing the Commons. She shared the 2009 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences.

Impact and significance

Her fieldwork showed cases in which locally developed rules sustained shared resources, challenging the claim that only private ownership or central state control can prevent overuse.

This is Matria’s interpretation, not a quotation or personalised advice.

Works recorded in the archive

• Governing the Commons (1990)
• Understanding Institutional Diversity (2005)

Sources and access

• Elinor Ostrom, Nobel Prize biographical record
• Ostrom, Elinor. Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action. Cambridge University Press, 1990.Bibliographic reference. Consult the named edition through a library or publisher.
• The Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2009. Nobel Prize documentation.Bibliographic reference. Consult the named edition through a library or publisher.

This label concerns the sources on this record. It does not validate every argument an author makes or establish what is true for a reader. Bibliographic coverage does not mean every passage or quotation has been verified. Specialist review remains pending.