For decades, economics assumed shared resources were doomed: either privatize them or watch them collapse. Elinor Ostrom proved the field wrong. Her research showed that communities around the world successfully govern shared resources – forests, fisheries, water – when they can design their own cooperative institutions.
In 2009 she became the first woman to receive the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences, for exactly this work on governing the commons. Her legacy runs straight through climate policy: the atmosphere is the ultimate commons, and her design principles – cooperation, local knowledge, shared rules – are the foundations of an economy that could sustain it.
Achievements
- First woman to receive the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences (2009)
- Proved that communities can sustainably govern shared resources
- Her design principles underpin modern climate and commons governance
In Planet vs. Patriarchy: Women are building a better economy.