Human Ecology, Vol. 32, No. 4, August 2004 ( C 2004)

Chronicle of a Foreseeable Tragedy: Birds NestsManagement in the Niah Caves (Sarawak)1

Quentin Gausset2

The number of birds nests harvested in the Niah cave today is only a fractionof what it used to be. This article focuses on the socioeconomic causes of thedecline. It argues that the present situation is not directly linked to the tragedyof the commons, since the ownership of cave and nests is private. The tragicaspect is, rather, linked to an attitude of free riding which was threatening theprivate system of ownership in the 1980s, and which forced Penan ownersto lease their caves to the former free riders (thereby diluting managementresponsibility), and to harvest nests as soon as possible (before the birds canlay eggs and reproduce). It is therefore the tragedy of a management systemwhose rules, intended to avoid open access and free riding, lead to unsustain-able behavior. Since the birds cannot be privatized, it is also the tragedy ofa system in which actors are unable to reach a consensus on how to managesustainably a de facto common property resource.

KEY WORDS: birds nests; tragedy of the commons; common property resource manage-ment; Malaysia; Sarawak.

INTRODUCTION

The exploitation of birds nests as food has a long history, dating backto the sixteenth century. Its trade from Borneo to China was already in

1The research was conducted during AprilJune 2000, October 2001, and JulyAugust 2001and based mainly on semistructured interviews. All kinds of actors in birds nest manage-ment were interviewed in Niah, including 7 traders (mainly Chinese), 11 owners of parts ofthe cave (mainly Penan who have Malayized), more than 20 workers and collectors of nests(mainly Iban), and 6 government officials dealing with the management of birds nests. Aquestionnaire was conducted in Rumah Ranggong, an Iban community living close to thecave whose members are heavily involved in collecting nests.

2Institute of Anthropology, University of Copenhagen, Frederiksholms kanal, 4, DK-1220Copenhagen K., Denmark; e-mail: quentin.gausset@anthro.ku.dk.

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existence when Dutch merchants began operating in the Malaysian andIndonesian region (Cranbrook, 1984, p. 150; Koon and Cranbrook, 2002,pp. 6465). The nests are made out of the saliva and feathers of swiftlets.Once processed to remove the feathers, the nests are consumed in soupsthat are believed by many people (mainly Chinese) to have rejuvenatingand cosmetic virtues. In Malaysia there are two main species of birds thatproduce edible nests: Aerodramus fuciphagus (producing the highly valuedwhite nests) and Aerodramus maximus (producing black nests) (Koon andCranbrook, 2002, pp. 216). They inhabit limestone caves, such as the Niahcaves, which are the object of this study. In the Niah cave, the exploitationof black nests began fairly recently, less than 200 years ago (Harrisson andJamuh, 1956; Koon and Cranbrook, 2002, p. 68; Medway, 1958). It soon be-came a major center of black nest production, which peaked at 18,500 kgper year in 1931 (i.e., 70% of the total production of black nests in the stateof Sarawak; Cranbrook, 1984, p. 155). The fame of the Niah cave owes a lotto this huge production of nests, and also to the archeological discovery ofthe oldest human remains in South-East Asia (Harrisson, 1958). To protectthis unique archeological site, the caves were made into a national heritagesite under the authority of the Sarawak Museum, and later into a nationalpark under the authority of the National Parks administration. Recently,the swiftlets have become a protected species.

The exploitation of birds nests in the Niah cave sustains the livelihoodsof hundreds of people, and has been one of backbones of economic devel-opment of Niah town. However, for several reasons, the number of swiftletsand nests has sharply declined during the past 15 years (it is estimated to bebetween 5 and 10% of what it was 70 years ago). It is widely believed thatone of the causes of this decline is the overexploitation of the nests. Thisis very unfortunate, as birds nests are a renewable resource which couldvery well be managed sustainably. Since theAerodramusmaximus has threebreeding periods per year (Koon and Cranbrook, 2002, pp. 3739), it wouldsuffice to practice selective harvesting and refrain from harvesting the nestsuntil the young chicks can fly away, to have a sustainable management ofthe resource combined with a high yield. Yet, today, nests are generallyharvested as soon as they are big enough to be sold, regardless of whetherthey hold eggs or immature chicks. The aim of this paper is to review thecauses of the overexploitation, and to discuss the way in which the presentmanagement system relates to the model of the tragedy of the commonsdeveloped by Hardin (1968).

EVIDENCE OF BIRDS NEST DECLINE

It is difficult to know exactly the number of birds living inside the cave,and how this number has evolved over the course of time. Estimates of

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birds nests numbers have been made for the past 70 years, and show areduction of 90% of the original population.3 But these estimates are ques-tionable because they are based on different methods, ranging from eye-balling to systematic counting. Even counting birds flying in and out of thecave has been problematic, as it sometimes concentrated only on the mainmouths of the caves, which left many birds unaccounted for. Moreover, thecounting has been based on the assumption that each bird comes in and outof the cave twice per day, and that the number of swiftlets constitutes 70%of the total population of birds in the Niah cave. Yet, despite the inpreci-sion of the data, everyone in Niah recognizes that there has been a drasticdecline. People remember that not so long ago (1015 years), they wouldnot visit the cave without a plastic bag on their head and shoulders to pre-vent bird droppings from falling on their hair and clothes. People wouldbe white with droppings when leaving the cave. The noise made by thebirds prevented people from talking to each other if they were some dozenmeters apart. Tourist guides praised the extraordinary sight of millions ofbirds and bats flying in and out of the cave. Today, all of this is gone. Thecaves look empty and are quiet. So despite the fact that the exact number ofbirds is difficult to establish, everybody agrees that there has been a majordecline.

Establishing the causes of bird decline has proved equally problem-atic. Various hypotheses have been proposed. It has been suggested thatthe collection of guano in the cave was disturbing the cave ecosystem andreducing the population of insects on which birds feed (Leh and Hall, 1996,pp. 2526). But the collection of fossil guano has been forbidden since1985, mainly to protect the archaeological potential of the cave, and therehas been no increase in the population of birds. It has also been suggestedthat the use of pesticides has had a negative impact on the bird popula-tion (Vardon, in Sim, 1997, p. 91). However, DDT-type pesticides have nowbeen forbidden for many years, and this argument too is losing its relevance.Many local people suspect that the use of insecticides has both reduced theamount of insects on which birds feed, and poisoned the birds who ate thoseinsects. This seems to be confirmed by the finding of insecticide residues inswiftlets from Niah cave (Cranbrook, 1984, p. 160). This argument is of-ten linked to the fact that most of Niah area has been transformed into oilpalm plantations in the past decade, which is likely to have had a significantimpact on the ecosystem of insects and birds (Koon and Cranbrook, 2002,p. 135). Moreover, many people claim to have witnessed a major drop in thebird population due to the forest fires and haze which hit the region in 1997

3The number of Aerodrama maxima in the Niah cave was estimated to be 1.5 million in the1950s (Medway, 1957), 1.3 million in 1978, less than 500,000 in 1993 (Leh and Hall, 1996), and180,000 in 1997 (Sim, 1997).

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(El Nino). Some also blame smoke for the drop in bird numbers in the bigmouth of the cave after a house standing there burnt down and the smokekilled thousands of birds. Finally, a recent invasion of green algae is alsoblamed for spoiling the reproduction grounds of swiftlets (Sim, 1997, p. 91;Leh, 2001, personal communication).

Apart from these physical causes of decline, most people agree thathumans have also had a negative impact on the population of birds. Somebelieve that the noise made by people in the cave, the smoke of their cook-ing fires or petroleum lamps, and the fact that they wave torchlight at thebirds at night in order to deter thieves from stealing the nests, disturbthe birds, who fly away and look for quieter caves. This seems to be sup-ported by the observation that new caves have indeed been recently col-onized by swiftlets (Leh, 2001, personal communication), although thereare no good data describing this change and the influence of climate andother physical factors might play a role. Finally, most actors involved rec-ognize that the overexploitation of nests is partly responsible for birdsdecline.

This article will focus on the issue of overexploitation, but it is impor-tant to keep in mind that it is not the sole factor responsible for the decline,and that physical aspects do have an impact on the bird population. Thiscan be seen in the fact that the populations of bats and of mossy swiftletshave also fallen dramatically, despite the fact that the reproduction of thesespecies is not disrupted (mossy nests are not harvested). Big clouds of batsused to be seen coming out of the cave at dawn, but this is no longer thecase, as the bats are no longer so numerous. The production of guano, whichcomes not only from edible nest swiftlets but also from mossy swiftlets andbats, has declined so sharply (Leh and Hall, 1996) that the extent of thedecline cannot be accounted for only by the decline in edible-nest swiftlets,but implies also a decline in the bat and mossy swiftlet populations. Al-though mossy swiftlets and some species of bats are occasionally eaten bypeople staying inside the cave, especially when their access is easy, this canprobably not account for a major drop in their populations. The decline inmossy swiftlets and bats therefore requires explanation in terms of physicalcauses. Moreover, it should be noted that in 1978 (i.e., before the seriousoverexploitation of nests began), people exploiting the nests were alreadycomplaining about a decline of 60% in yields (Koon and Cranbrook, 2002,p. 107).

In short, we must be very careful not to consider overexploitation asthe only cause of edible nests decline. It is still unknown how much bet-ter management of the nests would do to stabilize or raise the populationof birds, or how many birds could be sustained in the present state of theenvironment.

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ACTORS IN BIRDS NEST MANAGEMENT

A great number of people are involved in the exploitation of birdsnests. One can distinguish actors by their role in the management of nests(i.e., by the different aspects that they control). The owners are generallydescended from the Penan who discovered the cave and started exploit-ing it in the nineteenth century.4 The cave is subdivided into several hun-dred holes, which are all individually owned by more than 100 owners.Ownership is private, and is recognized by a title which was given underthe Brooke administration,5 and which can be sold or inherited. Althoughthe Penan were the original owners, a certain number of Chinese or Malaytraders now own some holes, either through matrimonial alliances withPenan or through purchase.

Although those who own a cave might exploit it themselves, most own-ers lease their cave to somebody else. I will refer to those who rent a caveas leasers. Some leasers exploit the cave themselves, especially if the holeis small and difficult to access. Those leasers who exploit the cave them-selves are usually Penan or Iban (sometimes Kenyah). But most leasers aretraders in nests (although not all traders are leasers) who seldom go in thecave themselves and prefer to sublet the cave to other people who will takecare of the exploitation.

Leasers usually pay a fixed rent per year to the owner of the hole inthe cave, and they usually sublet the hole to others for a monthly rent andthe monopoly of trade on the birds nests harvested in the holes. Again,those who rent a cave from leasers can either work themselves in the cave,especially if it is small and difficult to access, or they can hire laborers totake care of and harvest nests, especially when the hole is big. In what fol-lows, those who hire laborers will be called team leaders (mandur in Iban),as they are in charge of finding labor, controlling the collection of nests,selling them to traders (usually the leaser), and distributing salaries to theworkers.

Among the workers, one should distinguish the cave caretakers (tukangjaga in Iban), who usually stay in rotation in the cave to look after thenests and prevent theft, and the collectors, who can be divided into climbers(tukang julok in Iban: those who make the nests fall from the walls of thecave) and gatherers (ngumpul in Iban: those who collect the nests fallen tothe ground).4The persons who are called owners in the present article are in fact considered by theSarawakian state as licensees or right-holders, who do not own the cave as such, butrather the right to harvest the nests (see, for example, Koon and Cranbrook, 2002, p. 104).However, the local Penan perceive themselves as the rightful owners since time immemorial,and I will refer to them as such in what follows.

5Some of the original documents are preserved at the Sarawak Museum.

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Another important actor is the trader, who buys raw nests. The chainof traders is very long. It can start among the collectors, who can buy nestsfrom other collectors and try to sell them for a profit to traders in town.Some traders in Niah also give money to local people in the communitiesharvesting nests, to buy nests for them. But local people usually sell theirnests directly to the traders themselves, since they have to sell the nests tothe trader from whom they rent a cave. Local traders then sell the neststo traders in Kuching who sell them to traders in Singapore or sometimesdirectly to traders in Hong Kong. At the end, the processed nests fetch avery high price and end up in the soup of rich consumers, who are usuallyChinese.

Finally, there are different government agents, who try to secure therespect of nest ownership (or harvest rights), prevent theft, control immi-gration (many workers staying in the caves are illegal immigrants from In-donesia), crime (illegal gambling and selling of drugs takes place inside thecaves), regulate the harvest of birds nest collection so that it is sustainableand does not threaten the population of birds, and collect export taxes onthe birds nest trade.

It is analytically important to distinguish these different actors as theycontrol very specific aspects of birds nest management. The owners con-trol ownership (the right to harvest nests). The leasers control the capitalwhich is needed by owners and lacking among team leaders or workers. Theteam leaders control labor, something which is very difficult for owners andleasers alike. Caretakers control the assets the nests and prevent theirtheft. The collectors control the harvest. The traders control trade (the buy-ing and selling of nests). The government agents control legislation and itsenforcement. And finally, consumers control demand. Finally, it should beremembered that some actors play several different roles at the same time(most leasers are traders, some are team leaders, and a few are workers;some owners and team leaders can be workers at the same time, etc.)

In most cases, Penan owners lease their cave to a Chinese trader ona yearly basis. Chinese traders sublease the hole to an Iban team leaderwho pays either a monthly rent or one third of the nests harvested thisusually covers the yearly rent that the trader pays to the owner. On top ofthis agreement, the trader has the monopoly on trade of the nests harvestedin the cave (usually bought at a price which is lower than if the nests weresold freely). The team leader hires Iban or Indonesian workers to take careof the cave and harvest nests, and shares about two thirds of the harvestwith them.

The benefits derived from the management of nests are distributed asfollows: owners can get between 10 and 30% of the profit, traders between

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50 and 30%, and workers have around 40%, but much less if one countsper person (see Gausset, 2002a and 2002b). The owners have almost nocosts (they usually do not work), the leasers/traders bear the financial riskof the trade, and the workers risk their lives and health to establish a 24-hguard of the nests and climb poles to harvest nests often situated 3050 mabove ground level. They are also the ones who risk being pursued by theauthorities when they harvest nests outside the legal periods.

SHORT HISTORY OF THE BIRDS NEST MANAGEMENT

All actors usually recognize that the management of birds nests, as itis practiced today, is not sustainable, and that the resource might becomeexhausted if nothing is done within a few years. The management problemis very recent. No longer than 2025 years ago, the birds were still plentifuland the exploitation of nests was well managed and under government con-trol. It is therefore important to look at the recent history of birds nest man-agement to identify the turning points at which things began to go wrong ifone wants to identify the causes of the present mismanagement.

Before 1980: Low Price, Equilibrium, Clear Ownershipand Sound Management

The exploitation of nests in the Niah cave began at the beginning ofthe nineteenth century. It soon came under the supervision of the Brookeregime and of the Sarawak museum, which issued licenses to the differ-ent owners and enacted various ordinances to control the collection. Onlytwo harvests were allowed, in December and June, which lasted for twomonths (Medway, 1958, p. 467). Most owners and collectors were Penan,while traders were first Malay, and then later on local Chinese. The ownerseither worked in their cave themselves or hired Penan workers who werepaid a fixed price per harvest, as well as a share of the harvest (Cranbrook,1984). During harvest time, workers stayed overnight in the cave. Tradersestablished a whole village in an adjacent cave (the so-called trader cave),to barter goods for raw nests, or buy nests with money. As many workerscontracted debts with traders, they often repaid the debt in kind. In theearly 1930s, the state established auctions to secure a better price for theworkers and owners (through traders competition) and to prevent tax eva-sion (Banks, 1937). The state also tried to outlaw the repayment of debt inkind with nests. At the end of the 1950s birds nest collection was a dyingbusiness (Medway, 1957, 1958). In 1958, only five Penan were still working

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as professional birds nest collectors. The price was so low that it was uneco-nomic to exploit nests, especially due to the concomitant risk. Exploitationbegan to pick up again in the 1970s when the price increased significantly(see Koon and Cranbrook, 2002, p. 86).

An important point is that Penan had developed a very close and re-spectful relationship to the cave. Myths describe, for example, how the caveis believed to be the remnants of a former village which was flooded due toa breach of taboos (Husain, 1958; Sandin, 1958). The cave was believed tobe inhabited by various spirits, including some of the most important Penanheroes. It was the object of numerous taboos (for example, it was forbiddento shout and make noise inside the cave), as well as important annual ritualsaimed at securing peace, fertility, and good luck.

In short, before 1980, the local system of birds nest management,which involved mainly Penan and some local traders, was still sustainableand well controlled. It was taking place at a low scale; the number of birdsand nests was very high, but the price was low.

The 1980s: Rising Price, Theft, and Illegal Trade

Things began to change in the early 1980s when the price of birdsnests increased sharply (Borneo Bulletin, 1982; Koon and Cranbrook, 2002,pp. 8687; Leh, 1998, p. 25). The price of raw black nests passed from1050 MYR/kg in the late 1970s to 350500 MYR/kg in the late 1980s(Koon and Cranbrook, 2002, p. 86). More and more people got interestedin birds nests: neighboring Iban began to harvest nests illegally, outside ofthe harvesting season and without asking permission from the Penan own-ers, encouraged by new Chinese traders. Officially, there were still only twoharvests per year, and this rule was followed by most Penan owners andworkers. But nests were being stolen on a larger and larger scale, and itwas difficult to control as, at that time, no people stayed in the cave toguard the nests and prevent theft (the Iban village is situated at 30-minwalking distance from the cave, while the Penan villages are much fur-ther away, on the other side of the Niah river). On one hand, the right-ful owners were being prevented from harvesting their nests outside of thelegal season; on the other, the nests were being stolen on a large scaleby unlawful encroachers. Even when caught red handed when harvest-ing nests illegally, thieves escaped punishment and continued to operate.This period was thus characterized by a sharp rise in the price of nests,followed by the development of illegal harvesting of and trade in birdsnests.

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19892001: Bans on Collection, and Breaking Down of the OldManagement System

Alerted by the situation, the Sarawak Museum declared two total banson the harvest of nests from 1989 to 1991, and again from 1993 to 1996, toreplenish the stock of nests (Sim, 1997). However, since the cave is verybig with many entrances, it was impossible to enforce the bans success-fully. As the price continued to rise, reaching a peak of 1600 MYR/kg in1996 (Koon and Cranbrook, 2002, p. 87), theft continued and expanded. Asno Penan were harvesting anymore they were gradually losing control oftheir resource. First, it was being stolen by neighboring communities. Sec-ond, they were prevented from harvesting their resource under a total ban(which lowered cave surveillance by Penan and enhanced theft). To retainactual ownership and profit, many owners decided that it was better to leasetheir holes either to Chinese traders, or directly to the very thieves whowere exploiting their resources. Thus, many owners disengaged from themanagement of their cave and rented it to get at least something out of aresource which would in any case have been harvested, with or without theirconsent. Instead of reinforcing Penans ownership, the total ban weakenedit further, giving thieves a free hand to operate. Other owners convinced theauthorities (sometimes with bribes) that they should be allowed to harvesttheir own nests before they were stolen. The local authorities, acknowledg-ing their powerlessness vis-a`-vis theft, would have had difficulties prevent-ing the rightful owners from harvesting their own resource when they wereunable to protect it from being harvested by others. All the workers (bothPenan and Iban) then began to organize a 24-h guard of their holes to pre-vent theft. The nests began to be harvested more and more frequently tolower the risk of them being stolen. With the workers staying overnight inthe cave (cooking, eating, sleeping, defecating, listening to music, etc.), theold taboos lost ground, as well as the old rituals that required a total clo-sure of the cave for a few days once a year (this became very difficult aspeople would not leave their nests unguarded for fear of theft, and as itis difficult to close the cave with tourists visiting in ever greater numbers).The cave became a haven for illegal activities such as gambling and drugtrafficking.

This period also saw a progressive disengagement of the SarawakMuseum, first in the enforcement of collection rules (involving Police FieldForces at some point), then in the actual management of the cave. Althoughthe Sarawak Museum remains in charge of the archaeological site, the man-agement of the cave and of its wildlife (bats, birds, insects, etc.) has beenofficially transferred to the Forestry Department. This transition created

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confusion and tensions, not just between civil servants belonging to dif-ferent administrations, but also between people involved in birds nest ex-ploitation and government officials. For some years, people were unsurewho was in charge and who they had to negotiate with. Moreover, peopleworking for the Forestry Department did not have the long experience andknowledge of the local people and context that the Sarawak Museum hadaccumulated over the years. Finally, people working for the Forestry andWildlife Department had a more pronounced ecocentric perspective focus-ing on conservation, while all other actors had a clear anthropocentric viewof birds as a valuable resource to be exploited. Unfortunately, the transi-tion happened at the time when the old system had broken down, and whenintervention from the state, despite the best of intentions, was unable tocontrol abuses and actually made things worse.

When the ban was lifted in 1996 the Forestry Department helped tocreate (or rather to make official) a birds nest committee, which includedall cave owners. This came about partly in response to a real demand fromcave owners to regain control of their resources, and partly because localparticipation in the management of resources had become a global trendat the end of the 1990s. But the committee has never really been in chargeof the management of the collection, which remains vested in the handsof the Forestry Department, the traders, and the workers. Moreover, thiscommittee does not receive any funds and is totally powerless when deal-ing with the huge interests at stake and with the great complexity of theproblem.

To sum up, one can distinguish seven trends that characterize thechange of management in the Niah cave in the past three decades. First,the price of nests skyrocketed from less than 20 MYR in the 1970s to apeak of 1600 MYR in 1996. Second, more and more actors (Chinese traders,Iban and Indonesian workers) became involved in the business. Third, thePenan gradually lost the control of their resource through theft and caveclosure, although they succeeded in retaining some recognition throughrenting their caves to non-Penan traders and workers. Fourth, leasing andsubleasing has left all actors interested only in making money in the short-run, instead of long-term management of the resource. Fifth, when the tra-ditional system of two harvests per year broke down completely, peoplebegan to stay overnight in the caves and to harvest the nests as soon aspossible so as to preempt-thieves. Sixth, with people staying overnight inthe caves, traditional systems of beliefs, taboos, and rituals were ignoredand making money became the paramount concern of the people involvedin birds nests exploitation. Finally, the level of violence was raised on alllevels. Thieves did violence to the Penan rights, the new leasers and work-ers (the ancient thieves) raised the level of violence to deter others from

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stealing their nests, and the state had recourse to violence to try to imposetwo total bans on harvests (19891991 and 19931996).

MAIN PROBLEMS AND CAUSES OF MISMANAGEMENT

Following this description of historical changes in the management ofbirds nests, I return to some of those aspects that constitute major causesof the present management problems. It is important to recognize that mostof the time, these problems are interrelated in a complex web of causalrelations.

High Price and Free Market

Clearly, problems started when the price for birds nests skyrocketed.A high price is something positive when a management system is sound, asit provides a higher income to workers and owners (we should rememberthat nest harvesting was a dying art in the 1950s and 1960s). But the prob-lem is that a high price is often the trigger to the breakdown of traditionalmanagement systems and can lead to overexploitation.

A free market also has advantages, such as the optimization of costsand benefits among the different actors. However, in Niah the market isnot very free. There exist many trade monopolies (workers have to sell theirnests below the market price to the trader from whom they rent the cave);workers and owners of caves are bonded to the traders from whom theyborrow money, and there exist a lot of illegal trade and tax evasion, all ofwhich are biasing the free market. A second problem is that people, whenthey are free to do whatever they want and when there is big money atstake, have a tendency to maximize profit, avoid regulations (i.e., harvestany time, evade tax), and disregard any ownership system (i.e., steal thenests of others). This then puts pressure on whatever regulatory system isin place (both the state and the traditional Penan management systems).For example, the Sarawakian state has tried to regulate the trade of nests;at one point it forbade the reimbursement of debts in kind (with raw nests)and imposed auctions of birds nests so that local collectors would get afairer price for their resource, and the state would get a better control ofthe trade and collection of taxes. But, the auctions disappeared in 1986, andeach collector reverted to choosing his own trader to sell his nests to. Since itwas at a time when the price was increasing sharply, competition was fierceand the price paid to the owners and workers remained high. But it becameeasier to buy and sell stolen or illegally harvested nests, a practice whichwas seriously threatening the traditional management system. Moreover, it

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became easier to evade export taxes, as the sales were not controlled by thestate. This new opacity of the trade made it difficult for anybody to controland regulate it.

To sum up, a market economy which is tamed and regulated can pro-vide long-term benefits for all, but a market economy which is a war ofeveryone against everyone else is one of the primary causes of short-termprofit maximization and of the breakdown of any existing managementrules.

Theft

One of the main causes of the short-term maximization strategy is un-controlled theft, which makes it very difficult to manage a resource fora long-term benefit. Those people who have sound management prac-tices and refrain from harvesting too much and too often run a seri-ous risk of seeing all their long-term efforts ruined within an hour by athief.

Theft started when the price of nests began skyrocketing and was madeeasier by the fact that new ethnic groups became involved. People interact-ing with other ethnic groups do not always recognize their forms of socialcontrol. Illegal gambling and drug trafficking inside the cave also createdacute needs for quick money and therefore encouraged theft inside thecave.

Theft is very quick and very easy (a thief just climbs and harvests whathe finds), and very difficult to prevent (the cave is huge, has many entrancesand cannot be securely closed; it is difficult to see a thief operating 30 mabove ground, and even if you see him, it is difficult to stop and appre-hend him). Park rangers are underfunded, unable, and unwilling to risktheir lives to control nest collection (at least one government official hasbeen killed inside the cave). They therefore leave this task to the caretak-ers working in the cave. But it is difficult for caretakers who catch a thiefto deliver him to the police or the Forestry administration, since rightfulcaretakers and workers are themselves breaking regulations through har-vesting outside the legal periods. This being said, even if a thief was de-livered to the police, he would likely get away with a fine (a fraction ofwhat he would make by selling nests) or, at worst, a few weeks in jail. Thisis not serious enough to deter him from committing the same crime againonce he is freed. In short, theft gives an extremely high return at a very lowrisk.

Different strategies have been developed to deter thieves. First, thestate enacted two total bans on harvest which in fact proved to be counter-productive; instead of supporting the existing management structures, the

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bans helped destroy them. As the rightful owners were prevented from go-ing into the cave, the only forms of local management and control that ex-isted disappeared, paving the way for the operation of thieves. Moreover,as the police field force was unable to prevent theft, the rightful ownerspreferred to engage in harvesting their own nests illegally before they werestolen, or to directly rent their caves to the people who were stealing them(or to Chinese traders who sublet the cave to the former thieves). The sec-ond strategy was thus to turn former thieves into legal workers throughrenting the cave to them or to traders. However, this did not prevent newkinds of thieves from starting to operate (illegal immigrants, etc.), the newvictims being the old perpetrators. A third strategy was to establish a 24-hguard of the nests. This raised the operating cost of exploiting birds nests,and is not 100% successful (the nests can be quickly harvested when a care-taker falls asleep for one or two hours). A fourth strategy was to raise thelevel of violence and to develop mob justice inside the cave: thieves whoare caught are beaten on the spot. As all these strategies failed to some de-gree, a last strategy has been employed, which consists in harvesting nests assoon as they can be sold, without waiting for the chicks to mature. Withoutefficient control of theft (ideally in cooperation with government authori-ties, coupled with sufficient dissuasive incentives), overharvesting is likelyto continue.

Many Actors: Insecurity and Unclear Responsibility

The breaking down of the old system of management was caused bythe involvement of new actors who did not respect traditional managementrules. As we argued earlier, social control is much more difficult when peo-ple with different ethnic identities interact. An important part of moral-ity and solidarity often ends at the border of the village or of the ethnicgroup.

The involvement of different actors brings many problems. First, whendifferent groups specialize in different aspects of production (which isbroadly the case here, the Penan being owners and collectors, the Chinesetraders, and the rest collectors), professional interest tends to be mixedwith the community interest. The situation is perceived in terms of azero-sum game (what is taken by some is lost for others). The moredifferent actors are involved, the more different perceptions, interests,strategies, and the more difficult it is for them to agree on the manage-ment of the same resource. There is today no supraethnic organizationwhich can take decisions based on a broad consensus among the differentcommunities.

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Second, the more different kinds of people are involved, the more com-plex the management of a resource becomes, but the less people will feelresponsible for it. Even if there was a supraethnic organization to negotiatemanagement, it would be very difficult to reach an agreement, as every-body feels helpless and insecure. Insecurity is an important concept if onewants to understand problems of management. Almost all actors involvedin birds nests feel insecure today. The Penan owners were the first to feelinsecure, when their management system was threatened both by thievesand by the state, which enacted a total ban on harvest and prevented themfrom harvesting their nests. Their reaction was to rent their cave to Ibanworkers or Chinese traders (who sublet to the workers). In this way, theywere able to secure their ownership through having others recognize it, tosecure their income through a yearly rent, and to get rid of all exploitationproblems.

The traders feel insecure because they bear the financial risk, bothin renting the cave and commercializing the nests. Moreover, they haveto renegotiate contracts each year. Their strategy to lower the risk is tolend money to owners and workers, to bind them to longer term agree-ments. They also try to establish monopolies through subletting their cavesto workers on the condition that they sell the entire harvest through them(at a price which is less competitive). The traders/leasers do not get involvedin the management of the cave, and transfer exploitation problems onto theworkers who rent the cave from them.

Workers feel insecure because they also have to renegotiate their con-tract every year with the trader. They risk their lives and health to ex-ploit the nests, but they are the ones who get the lowest share per per-son. Moreover, they are breaking the law by harvesting nests outside of thelegal period. They try to raise their income through selling their nests tounauthorized traders. They also engage in the exploitation of unregisteredsmaller caves, which have no traditional owner, and which gives them all theprofit.

Finally, the state also feels insecure. It is torn between the will to savethe swiftlets (which are defined as a threatened species) and to secure thelivelihood of the local population. The management of the cave is not easyas it involves different administrations (forestry and wildlife, archaeology,agriculture, local development, customary law of indigenous people, po-lice, etc.) which defend different things, based on different premises andstrategies that are at times contradictory. The credibility of the state is thusthreatened. It has to do something to improve the management of the Niahcave, but it has so far failed to do so convincingly. The strategy that it de-veloped to assert its authority was to enact a total ban and to use violenceto deter people from exploiting nests; this has been a failure.

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In short, all the actors feel insecure and helpless. All feel that they can-not do anything without the collaboration of others, and have no idea abouthow to organize this collaboration. Everybody blames others as responsi-ble for the degradation of the resource. The long chain of actors dilutesresponsibility. Owners rent to traders and delegate management problemsto them. They give the contract to the highest bidder, not to the sound-est manager. The contract does not mention anything about the numberof harvests, despite the fact that the rent is fixed and is independent of thenumber of harvests (owners have therefore a greater interest in sound man-agement than traders or workers, who all get a benefit which is proportionalto the number of harvests). Traders rent to team leaders or workers anddelegate management problems to them. The workers are not motivated tohave a sound management since they do not own the right to harvest nests,have an insecure contract, and since sound management two harvestsper year is relatively risky (the nests might be stolen). Moreover, it is be-lieved that the birds might go elsewhere and reproduce in places which arenot well managed. If the cost of sound management is individual while thebenefit is communal, there is no incentive for individual responsible behav-ior. Therefore, everybody engages, reluctantly, in overexploitation of thenests.

To sum up, the uncontrolled market, the theft of nests and break downof the traditional management system, and the high insecurity and lack ofresponsibility of all actors in the new systems, are the major causes of thepresent unsustainable management. At present, all actors recognize that thenumber of birds nests is declining every year, and that if nothing is donesoon, the business will die. Everybody has an interest in adopting a long-term perspective and in changing their own individual behavior. Yet peo-ple feel powerless, as sustainable management requires a collective changeof behavior, and as too many loosely connected and uncontrolled actors areinvolved in the exploitation. While the definition of new and better rules forharvesting nests (for example, establishing a selective harvest which wouldleave 25% of nests undisturbed every month for breeding and reproduction,see Koon and Cranbrook, 2002, pp. 137144) is always welcome,6 it shouldbe clear from what precedes that those rules are unlikely to be applied un-til the socioeconomic problems of theft, insecurity, and lack of consensusand collective behavior are addressed. What is needed today, is a consensusamong the different actors on a common and sound system of managementwhich would address these problems.7

6One important aspect of this new management rule would be to legalize the currently illegalpractice of harvest out of the official period. This simple thing would already be a great helpin recreating confidence between the state and most major actors in birds nests management.

7A first draft of such a strategy can be found in Koon (2000).

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WHAT TRAGEDY AREWE TALKING ABOUT?

In an article which has become extremely influential, Hardin (1968)argues that common property resources are doomed to be overexploitedand exhausted by selfish individuals who always try to maximize their pri-vate profit while they communalize the environmental and economic costsof raising production. He then advocates either state intervention in regu-lating selfishness (coercion which is mutually agreed upon by the majorityof the people affected) or, better still, privatization of the resources so asto privatize both the cost and the benefit of environmental management(Hardin, 1968) private property holders are believed to possess the nec-essary information and incentives to take responsibility for environmentalresources (Eckersley, 1995). The model of the tragedy of the commons isclosely related to other models of behavior, such as game theory and theprisoners dilemma. The crux of the problem is that whenever one personcannot be excluded from the benefits that others provide, each person ismotivated not to contribute to the joint effort, but to free ride on the effortsof others. If all participants choose to free ride, the collective outcome isnegative (Ostrom, 1990, p. 6).

The theory of the tragedy of the commons has been severely criticized.One criticism opposes to Hardins concept of homo economicus (the ideathat individuals always try to maximize their own benefit) the view that manis social, acting according to the behavior of neighbors and kin, and able tosacrifice private interest for the common good of the group. Another crit-icism is the idea that capitalism (which includes private ownership, alongwith a frenzied consumption style) is the problem rather than the solution toenvironmental degradation (see for example Colchester, 1994; Joekes et al.,1994, p. 140). Although the authors holding this view tend to agree withHardin that individuals, when left to themselves, cannot work for the com-mon good, they cannot follow him when he advocates privatization sincethis puts the individual person at the center of the management, and since ithas just been argued that individuals cannot been trusted in their behavior.They then advocate stronger communal rules. Another criticism, which isprobably the most common, has been to show that common property re-sources (CPR) are not the same as resources which are open to anybody.CPR are systems of property; they thus regulate access to, and the manage-ment of the resources (Brockington and Homewood, 1996, p. 102; Casimir,1998; Colchester, 1994, p. 81; Cousins, 2000; Feeny et al., 1990; Horowitz,1998; Leach and Mearns, 1996, p. 13; Leal, 1998; Little and Brokensha, 1987;McCabe, 1990; Sather, 1990; Swift, 1996, p. 90; Vivian, 1992, p. 5960, 1994,pp. 17980). Therefore, Hardins suggestion that CPR systems should bereplaced by either privatization or state control is most unwelcome when

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the traditional CPR systems function well and secure equal redistributionof the resources to all. Moreover, as we have seen with the Niah case, aprivate system of ownership can make room for numerous types of leas-ing arrangements, which can create much insecurity (see also Vivian, 1992,p. 61). Ownership insecurity comes from alienation (often from the state)rather than from communal systems of ownership (Lane, 1992, p. 99; Leachand Mearns, 1996, p. 13). Finally, to reduce the field of alternatives to onlythree possibilities (state control, privatization, or chaos/CPR) is too simplis-tic. It is important to recognize that most systems of management combinestate control with some forms of private ownership and some forms of cus-tomary or communally agreed upon rules (Berkes and Farvar, 1989, pp. 910). Many different kinds of environmental management are possible, andwe should take all variables into account if we want to get the institutionsright (Ostrom, 1990, p. 15).

It is clear from this discussion that the mechanism described by Hardin(the free rider or the open-access) can exist and is a tragedy. But itis equally clear that this tragedy has no direct relationship with the com-mon property resources, and that privatization is no universal solution. Inthe present case, although the Niah cave has been privatized for a longtime, this did not prevent the tragedy of the free rider from happeningin the 1980s, when the traditional system of ownership was challenged bythieves and illegal harvesters. The tragedy of the free rider can in facthappen in any system of ownership (whether state controlled, private, orCPR), when this system is unable to enforce its rules and is breaking down(see also Colchester, 1994; Feeny et al., 1990). What is lacking, when thetragedy happens, is a lack of mutually agreed upon management rules. Asystem of private ownership can be threatened by people encroaching onthe private property, just as much as a system of CPR can be threatenedby individuals who do not follow the common rules. In each case, the crit-ical aspect is not whether the system is private, or communally owned, orstate controlled, but whether the system works and is widely accepted by allactors as legitimate. If not, then the free rider can operate with impunity,as in the Niah cave during the 1980s. The tragedy was that the Penan wereunable to enforce their rights of private ownership on the cave and on thenests; these rights were challenged by the state, by non-Penan workers, andby the traders. As a result, the situation was close to an open-access system.

The Penan strategy has then been to lease the cave to the workers andtraders. Although this saved the system of private ownership from totallybreaking down, it has diluted responsibility and lowered interest in sustain-able harvests. Moreover, this has not prevented other people from threaten-ing the new leasing system through continuing theft of nests (free ridingon the workers efforts). The strategy to counter this trend and prevent free

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riding (open-access) has been to harvest the nests as soon as they are bigenough. So in this case, the tragedy is not even a tragedy of free riding, orthe tragedy of a system unable to enforce its management rules, but it israther the tragedy of a private system of ownership whose strategy to en-force its rule is to delegate responsibility to others who then harvest theresource in an unsustainable manner.

It is important here to distinguish different aspects of property. Prop-erty can concern a resource per se (nests, meat, fish, crop), or a certainenvironment or territory (cave, pasture/forest, lake/sea, field), or the vectorwhich reproduces the resource (swiftlets, cattle/game, fish, seeds). Althoughsome of these aspects are obviously closely linked (the vector is almost thesame as the resource but situated at an earlier stage; the control of the ter-ritory usually aims at controlling the resource and its vector), they shouldnevertheless be distinguished, since they have different impacts on manage-ment. In Niah, for example, the vector (the swiftlet) is very different fromthe resource (the nest). The private property system concerns the resourceand the territory but not the vector. The nests belong to the owner of thecave where they are found (although, in practice, they belong to the firstperson who harvests them, whether he is the rightful owner or a thief), butthe birds belong to nobody. They are free to fly away and establish them-selves elsewhere.8 Since the vector cannot be privatized, there is a needto communalize its ownership and to create a system of common propertyvectors (CPV instead of CPR).

To summarize, there is a tragedy in the past and present managementof birds nests in Niah. Although the resource is renewable, it is exploited inan unsustainable way. It is important here to distinguish between the 1980sand the present period. In the 1980s, the tragedy had nothing to do with thecommons (since the resource was already privatized), but it was a tragedy offree riding or open-access (with thieves operating almost freely in the cave).It was thus the tragedy of a management system that was unable to enforceits own rules. At present, the only free riding left concerns the vector (thebirds) and not the nests or the cave. Since the benefits of good manage-ment and the costs of bad management are shared by all, individuals havelittle incentive to change their behavior except if others engage themselvesin the same way. However, since the birds cannot be privatized, there is a

8This is also true in the case of house-farming of swiftlets (see Leh, 2000; Koon and Cranbrook,2002). Here too, it is the territory (the house) and the resource (the nests) which are private,the birds being free to fly away and reproduce elsewhere. While house farming might bea profitable and sustainable business (it does not have the same problem of theft, tenureinsecurity, and a long chain of irrresponsible actors as in the Niah cave), it is unlikely to solvethe management problem of the Niah cave, or even to reduce the harvest pressure. As longas there is big money to be made in the Niah cave, the pressure will remain high.

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need to create or reinforce a system of common property which would enactsound rules of management to counteract the free riding attitude concern-ing the vector. When it comes to the present management of territory andresource (cave or nests), whose ownership is private, the tragedy is neithera tragedy of the commons, nor that of free riding (since theft is relativelyunder control). It is rather the tragedy of a system whose strategies to avoidfree riding (i.e., leasing, harvesting the nests as soon as possible) lead to un-sustainable management. Ultimately, the tragedy of birds, nests, and cavemanagement in Niah is the tragedy of a system in which the actors are un-able, although willing, to reach a consensus, to change their strategies andmake them more sustainable.

ACKNOWLEGMENTS

I am very grateful to SLUSE for its financial support, and to the StatePlanning Unit of Sarawak for giving me the authorization to do research inNiah, providing me with a research permit, and putting me in contact withgovernment officials dealing with birds nests management. I am also verythankful to Dr Lim Chan Koon and Dr Leh for their extremely qualifiedhelp and friendly support.

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