| Abstract | There were a lot of community-based irrigation management systems persisting for a long time in imperial China, which might have far-reaching effects on rural society. Scholars from diverse disciplines are interested in the impact of irrigation on communities, water culture, withdrawal right, conflict in using water and irrigation management. Some of them also investigate the origin and development of certain irrigation systems from historical records. CPR theory has been applied to current issues; however, it is seldom applied to historical ones. This paper applies a social-ecological system (SES) framework developed by Ostrom to the analysis of nine irrigation systems in Shanxi Province, Shaanxi Province and Anhui Province. Information regarding the nine systems is mainly based on five scholars’ literature.
These nine systems persisted for at least several hundred years. The analysis of relevant second-tier variables indicates that there were similarities and differences in governance system, actor and interaction. There were no appreciable variation across different systems within the study in network structure (multi-level management and senior managers as a bridge between users and local government), property-rights system (users’ withdrawal right mostly depending on their investment on maintenance of physical infrastructure), operational rules, monitoring and sanctioning rules, channels of information sharing, type of conflicts, and investment activities. Collective-choice rules and constitutional-choice rules were actually absent. Users in each system were heavily dependent on irrigation water.
The scale of irrigation system, the participation of local government, the heterogeneity of users and social power differed across the systems. In the light of distinction in accusations made by users among the nine cases some of systems seemed more successful than the others (more successful ones are denoted as outcome success and less successful as outcome failure).Take the four variables as causal conditions and persistence, success and failure as outcomes, and construct fuzzy sets . Run fsQCA3.0 software and the output illustrate individual conditions are not necessary for the persistence or success of irrigation systems, however, high-level heterogeneity of users is necessary for the failure. Different combinations of conditions are sufficient for persistence, success and failure.
Four combinations will generate outcome persistence: (1) small-scale system, high-level heterogeneity of users and low-level participation of local government; (2) small-scale system, low-level heterogeneity and strong social power; (3) high-level heterogeneity, strong social power and low-level participation of local government; (4) high-level heterogeneity, large-scale system, weak social power and high-level participation of local government. High-level participation of local government did not equate to active intervention. It represented users’ dependence on government, especially the authority. The scale of irrigation system did not have a linear impact on the level of participation of local government and neither did heterogeneity of users. In eight systems either strong social power or high-level participation of local government existed or both.
Two combinations will generate outcome success: (1) small-scale system, strong social power and low-level heterogeneity of users; (2) small-scale system, strong social power and low-level participation of local government. High-level heterogeneity of users, large-scale system and low-level participation of local government will generate outcome failure.
Comparative case study analysis in this paper uses secondary data. Although the number of cases is small, the author faces similar challenges in constructing fuzzy sets as scholars conducting the large-N case study mete-analysis do. To improve the stability of membership score the author assign values to the five variables several times. However, the reproducibility and accuracy are note tested. With more information investigated, or further research relevant to the study conducted by other scholars, some of the membership score might need updating.
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