The impact of social context on conservation auctions: social capital, leadership and crowding out

• Author / Creator

  Kits, Gerda Johanna

• Conservation auctions are a policy tool that can be used to cost-effectively achieve environmental goals, by providing incentives for landowners to adopt environmentally friendly beneficial management practices (BMPs) on their land. Using a competitive bidding process, the party interested in encouraging BMP adoption selects and enters into contract with landowners, who receive monetary compensation in return for their adoption of the new practices.

  Previous research on conservation auctions has focused mainly on various design choices which can impact auction performance. This study takes a different approach, examining the influence of the social context in which auctions take place.

  Real auctions may be implemented in communities with varying levels of social capital and leadership. Since these factors have been shown to influence individual behaviour in a variety of settings, we hypothesize that they may also influence bidder behaviour within a conservation auction and, in turn, the cost-effectiveness and environmental outcomes of the auction. Using simulated auctions in an experimental setting, we sort participants into experimental treatments based on social capital and leadership characteristics. We find that both social capital and leadership do indeed have multi-dimensional, context-specific effects on bidder behaviour and auction outcomes.

  In addition, real auctions may take place in communities where some landowners have already adopted BMPs, driven by pro-social or pro-environmental “internal” motivations. Previous research has found that such motivations may be crowded out by the introduction of “external” motivations such as fines or regulation. We show, using an experimental approach, that conservation auctions also appear to cause crowding out of voluntary pro-environmental behaviour.

  This research contributes to the academic literature by linking theories of social capital and leadership to the literature on conservation auctions, and extending the literature on crowding out to this specific policy mechanism. In addition, it provides an innovative way of investigating the influence of social factors within an experimental setting. There are also important policy implications, as our findings draw attention to the importance of considering social context when designing and implementing conservation auctions.

• Subjects / Keywords

  • Social capital
  • Environmental policy
  • Competitive tender
  • Conservation auctions
  • Beneficial management practices
  • Leadership
  • Crowding out
  • Reverse auction

• Graduation date

  Fall 2011

• Type of Item

  Thesis

• Degree

  Doctor of Philosophy

• DOI

  https://doi.org/10.7939/R37896

• License

  This thesis is made available by the University of Alberta Libraries with permission of the copyright owner solely for non-commercial purposes. This thesis, or any portion thereof, may not otherwise be copied or reproduced without the written consent of the copyright owner, except to the extent permitted by Canadian copyright law.