English - Support to Participatory Constitution Building in Nepal ...

The Remake of a Statestatus of Nepal’s community forests, for example, remains state property interms of ownership but they are managed under community based forestmanagement regime. In a real sense, the current property arrangementof community forests is based on co-management systems which arecharacterised by state regulation but with community management.In theory, co-management system is a good model where state andcommunities work in partnership to manage forest resources. However,in practice, how these co-management systems are conceptualised,understood, interpreted and modified by the state authorities to furtherconsolidate their power in the one hand and how socially constructedmeaning of the term co-management in Nepali feudal society is perceivedon the other hand are problematic issues.Similar is the case in farming land. For example, about 87 per centof agricultural households in Nepal cultivate their own farms while aconsiderable number of households (43.4 thousands) are landless farmers(CBS 2003), who are either full tenants and/or cultivator in squatterland without possession of land ownership. Farm land under tenancyarrangement is being managed under co-management system betweenthe landowner and the tenants. Relationships between landowner andtenants reflect the patron-client system of power relationship (Regmi1978), generally favouring the landlords. This type of socially constructedmeaning of tenant in agricultural land is reflected in forest-peoplerelations which are often contentious and largely shaped by the historical,cultural and social settings they live in. For example, those who own theforest land (in the case of forest, it is the state) behave like landlords andthose who invest their labour in the production system on forest land areseen like ‘tenants’. Changing property rights arrangement of communitymanaged forests is therefore necessary to change this power relationshipin post-conflict democratic Nepal.3. Conceptualising common property regimesAmong three property regimes described earlier, common propertyregimes are characterised by the self-governing organisations with a highdegree of integration of social and cultural values. They operate througha collective action, have distribution systems that promote reciprocityand mutual support with substantive communal ownership and heavilyrely on informal rules, local knowledge and information systems. Variousauthors (Esman and Uphoff 1984; Hobley 1985; Jodha 1985; Bromley1986; Oakerson 1986; Abel and Blaikie 1988; Wade 1988; Arnold and113