Common property: can customary law adapt to the free market?

Transition from subsistence to market economy is not easy. In Papua New Guinea most land is still held under traditional systems of common property resource ownership and a growing cash economy can spark conflict concerning management or ownership issues. Research presented at the annual meeting of the UK Development Studies Association (DSA) examines the institutional limitations, during transition, of traditional ownership systems. Data from Morobe villages suggest that subsistence-based common property regimes may lack the institutional capacity to regulate the economic opportunism of individuals and to achieve a measure of collective sustainable development.