As human populations and their demands on natural resources continue
to grow, citizens and officials from around the world search ever
more intensely for effective solutions to environmental problems.
Various factors conspire to make natural resources difficult to
govern well. First, since many larger scale natural resources can be
common pool resources, they pose different—and arguably more
difficult—challenges to governance than private or public goods.
Second, the use of natural resources can produce significant
externalities. Third, the complex spatial and temporal boundaries of
natural resources along with their potential externalities rarely
conform to existing political institutions. Environmental problems
often take decades or even centuries to emerge; their solutions may
take equally long.