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Common-pool resources in rock climbing

César Rendueles

Sociology of Sport Journal 32, Issue 4, December 2015, pp. 436-451

Abstract

Sport climbing relies materially on the existence of routes equipped with bolts: vertical

itineraries with anchors that allow climbers a safe ascent. Without bolting, sport

climbing simply would not exist. In many countries, bolting is an altruistic individual

activity that is usually neither organized nor regulated. Sport climbing bolting requires

expensive hardware and sophisticated technical skills. However, equippers earn no

money or prestige for this effort, which benefits many climbers.

This paper develops a sociological approach to rock climbing bolting as a common-pool

resource facing a deep crisis. In its early years, bolting was ruled by generalized

reciprocity. The popularization of sport climbing quickly changed this framework. A

small group of very active equippers has become net providers of public goods without

compensation in economic or status terms.

Keywords: rock climbing, bolting, reciprocity, altruism, common-pool resource.

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Introduction

Cooperation, altruism and reciprocity issues are central in contemporary debates on

collective action (Sennett, 2012). Often experts in this area feel forced to choose

between two theoretical alternatives: they either try to explain altruism as a derivative

form of self-interest (Becker, 1991) or defend the irreducibility of the concern for others

on moral or evolutive grounds (Nagel, 1970; Sober and Wilson, 1998). Sport has been

an important source of examples in this academic field (The Economist, 2012). In some

sports, competition is systematic and legitimate and has clearly-defined boundaries. So

it seems a promising testing ground for those rational choice theories that aspire to

subsume cooperative behavior under instrumental rationality, on the assumption that the

latter is simpler than the former (Elster, 1989: 60). Many sport sociologists, however,

have suggested a subtle institutional balance between cooperation and self-interest even

in competitive contexts (Albert, 1991; Bourdieu, 1991; Seippel, 2006). In fact, sport

illustrates the limitations of the reductionist explanations of cooperation, in terms of

either pure selfishness or altruism. To grasp the complex relationship between

cooperation and competition, we need to go beyond formalism, using historical,

sociological and hermeneutical tools.

This paper actually examines a sport practice materially based upon systematic

collaboration. In Spain and in other countries sport climbing relies on the cooperative

activity of a few individuals –“bolters” or “equippers”–, who drill bolts providing the

primary means of protection into the rock face. Rock climbing is an increasingly

popular, technified and professionalized activity (Aubel and Ohl, 2004; Abramson and

Fletcher, 2007). Some elite climbers have almost become celebrities. Sport companies

market all kinds of equipment for rock climbing: ropes, harnesses, carabiners, helmets,

belay devices etc. Beginners’ climbing courses, urban climbing walls and guide

companies have proliferated all over the world and there is growing awareness of the

tourism potential of sport climbing (Hanemann, 2000). But all this sporting and

commercial activity is built upon an informal cooperative background: a huge amount

of selfless work done by a small group of equippers.

Spontaneous reciprocity is usual in many sports. Mountaineers signal with cairns their

routes and long-distance runners publish their tracks on the Internet. But anyone can run

or walk without those contributions. Sport rock climbing would be impossible without

bolting, a technically complicated and expensive task. However, bolting is frequently an

altruistic and independent activity, lacking financial incentives, institutional support or

public recognition. Of course, systematic cooperative behavior is displayed in various

aspects of contemporary sports, such as the voluntary labor of coaches or club officials.

However, sport climbing involves a qualitative leap. First of all, equippers are deeply

concerned about the security of rock climbers. Some routes, especially those at the

beginner level, are climbed by thousands of people who literally put their lives in the

hands of safety systems set up in a cooperative manner without supervision or official

regulations. Secondly, the effort of bolters is in turn poorly recognized. Unlike what

usually happens with amateur coaches in other sports, the prestige equippers gain for

their work is minimal. Lastly, the cooperative behavior of equippers in Spain is

individual and spontaneous: it is not coordinated through formally established

organizations or federations and does not play an important role in informal affinity

groupings.

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In other words, at least in Spain, the material conditions required for the practice of

sport climbing rely on costly radical cooperative behavior, which is not organized and

has no obvious returns. It is a rare pattern in our society, with the exception of the

family sphere. Instead, it holds significant similarities with the common resources that

are characteristic of many traditional societies. In this paper I will analyze sport

climbing bolting as a common-pool resource, i.e. as a set of social norms that regulates

the provision and use of some kind of common good (Mattei, 2011; Ostrom, 1990),

which, in this case, is sport climbing routes created by non-professional equippers.

In economics, a public good, like a lighthouse or a radio signal, is both non-rivalrous

and non-excludable. Each individual’s consumption of such a good does not limit

another individual's consumption of that good and it is impossible to exclude any

individuals from consuming the good. The opposite of a public good is a private good,

which is both excludable and rivalrous. The owner of a car, for example, can exclude

others from using it and his or her use of the car necessarily prevents its use by another

person. Common goods are rivalrous but non-excludable: fish stocks, pastures, water…

Elinor Ostrom (1990) used the expression “common-pool resource” (CPR) to designate

a system of cooperative management of the commons. Ostrom sought to refute Garret

Hardin’s basic conclusion in The Tragedy of the Commons (1968). Hardin believed that

individuals, acting rationally, inevitably end up over-exploiting common goods. The

orthodox solution to the tragedy of the commons is to put the common goods under the

control of the state or to privatize them. Instead, Ostrom showed through historical

analysis that “communities of individuals have relied on institutions resembling neither

the state nor the market to govern some resource systems with reasonable degrees of

success” (1990: 1).

There has been little research into common goods in sports practice and what there is

focuses on the management of scarce resources, such as waves in surfing, rather than on

the processes concerning the provision of goods and services (Rider, 1998; Nazer,

2004). Specifically, I attempt to understand the dilemmas faced by sport climbing

equippers trying to preserve a common-pool resource in the weak social environment of

Spanish modern rock climbing and mountaineering.

Institutional economics has shown that numerous traditional societies have managed to

develop stable systems of common resources. Many communities manage pastures,

fishing or water efficiently, resorting neither to the market nor to external bureaucratic

agencies. In the past few years, a lively debate has developed about the role that

commons can play in complex contemporary societies. Ongoing personal relationships

within societies with well-defined boundaries are a key element in traditional commons,

as they discourage free-riding and allow for the sanctioning of misconduct. Thus, some

common goods systems emerging in Western countries, such as the Swedish

snowmobile trails, have developed in small rural areas with a significant social fabric.

Trust, reputation and reciprocity between non-anonymous participants are crucial in

these commons (Antilla and Stern, 2005: 463). Obviously, this implies a major barrier

for the survival of this kind of institution in increasingly individualized societies that are

experiencing a decline in their social capital (Putnam, 2002), especially when ongoing,

specialized work is required for the commons.

This dilemma is clearly seen in the case of sport climbing equipment. In Spain, bolting

cooperative strategies emerged as a system of generalized reciprocity in small

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mountaineering communities joined by tenuous but lasting social bonds. However,

nowadays it is a tiny group of uncoordinated bolters who provide climbing routes for a

huge number of anonymous climbers with whom they do not have any kind of personal

or associative relationship. Their situation poses a challenge neglected by most analyses

of commons: the subjective motivations of the people who participate in these

institutions.

Climbing bolting customs are contextual. The Spanish framework is very different from

the French –where climbing equipment is much more institutionalized– or the British,

who are very restrictive with bolting (McNamee, 2007). Nevertheless, I believe the

Spanish case is a concentrated example of conflicts and dilemmas related to climbing,

which are repeated in many other places and, in any case, it may throw some light on

some of the contemporary debates on common goods and resources.

Methodology

This paper poses a socio-interpretative analysis (Alonso, 2013; Bourdieu, 1994) close to

Denzin and Lincoln’s description of the practice of qualitative research as a form of

bricolage: putting together a set of representations in order to solve a concrete problem

(Denzin and Lincoln, 2000: 4-6). I used eclectic sources of information – climbing

magazines, blogs or even my own personal experience– as secondary data in the

research design. And I conducted in-depth interviews with some of the best-known

and most active Spanish climbing equippers as a basis for discourse analysis of their

motivations and subjective representations. I expected to meet people with a strong sense of community, a positive perception of

the social aspects of climbing and a solid discourse on personal responsibility and

cooperation. It was exactly the opposite: the bolters I talked to seemed very

individualistic and, although they could talk for hours about alloys and bolts, they fell

silent and uncomfortable when I asked them about their motivations. I used hermeneutic

interviews to help them to develop and verbalize their conflicting experience

(Vandermause and Fleming, 2011). For example, I put examples of cooperation and

altruism in other contexts (art, economics, politics...) and encouraged them to compare

these processes with their own trajectory. I also used my own experience as a climber to

urge them to analyze changes in the world of climbing in recent years. The

conversations were transcribed and analyzed. The research participants were informed

of the purpose of the interviews and they expressly indicated that they did not wish to

remain anonymous and desired to be quoted with their real names and nicknames. In the

following pages, I reproduce some verbatim quotes from the interviews, identifying the

equipper by his first name.

I selected a sample of very experienced sport climbing bolters who equip routes at every

level of difficulty. I looked for net suppliers to the commons, whose motivation could

not be easily reduced to a derivative selfish interest in terms of reputation (the bolting of

extreme climbing routes can be a prestigious activity). The equippers I looked for

commit themselves to expensive, under-recognized, long and monotonous work. I

selected a group of equippers with a track record of more than 250 climbing routes of

all levels and over ten years’ experience. All of them men, as bolting is a strongly

masculinized activity, belonging to different age groups (between 34 and 64 years old).

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I selected equippers with different attitudes towards institutions: a) independent bolters

hostile to any interference, b) independent bolters with an interest in coordinating with

their peers and c) bolters actively collaborating with mountaineering federations.

Finally, I limited the sample to the northern half of Spain, where the most active

climbing areas are found. I did not find significant differences in the motivation of

equippers related to their experience, their attitude towards institutions, their age or their

place of residence.

Climbing equippers are a small group, poorly organized and lacking public visibility.

Furthermore, sport climbing bolting is a controversial activity that encompasses some of

the main conflicts of rock climbing and mountaineering. Many sport climbing equippers

have been embroiled in controversies about technical or aesthetic matters, such as the

design of climbing lines or the style of climbing equipment. Climbing-related web

forums have magnified these debates. As a result, most equippers choose to keep a low

profile. Thus, the main difficulty I had to overcome was contacting veteran but active

equippers who were willing to be interviewed. In this respect my own experience as an

amateur climber played an important role as it allowed me to earn the trust of some

bolters who, in turn, put me in touch with others and who provided me with information

and documentation about their activity.

The geographical distribution of the interviewees by area is as follows. Pyrenees: Luis

Alfonso Sanz, “Luichy” (49 years old, 2,000 routes, 30 years experience). Basque

Country, Rioja and Navarre: Juan Manuel Hernández, “Kroma” (44 years old, 400

routes, 25 years experience) and Koldo Bayona (53 years old, 300 routes, 27 years

experience). Cantabrian mountain range: Eduardo Rodríguez de Deus (38 years old, 300

routes, 19 years experience). Sistema Central: Ignacio Luján (42 years old, 1,200 routes,

25 years experience), Juan Manuel León (31 years old, 250 routes, 13 years experience)

and Juan Luis Salcedo (64 years old, 300 routes, 30 years experience). The interviews

were conducted between May 2012 and February 2013 and lasted approximately two

hours each. Some of them were supplemented by telephone and e-mail conversations.

The sport climbing dawn

There are several types of climbing, which differ in both technical and social aspects

(Kidd and Hazelrigs, 2009). The most popular forms in Spain are sport climbing,

traditional climbing and bouldering, but aid climbing, ice climbing and deep-water

soloing are common too.

In traditional climbing the athletes place all the anchors they need to protect themselves

from falls and remove them as they ascend. Although the risk level is variable, it is an

adventure sport. Climbers ascend through routes that others have led previously in first

ascents. But they have to make complex decisions regarding security under conditions

of risk and uncertainty (West and Allin, 2010). Frequently, traditional climbers consider

their sport as a risky and technically complex extension of mountaineering.

Bouldering is a type of rock climbing that is performed without the use of anchors or

ropes. Climbers attempt to reach the top of rocks between three and eight meters high.

Accidents are prevented with “crash pads” –portable foam mats– and the help of

“spotters” that redirect the climbers’ fall so that they land safely on the bouldering mat.

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Bouldering practitioners often describe this type of climbing as a sport with a strong

recreational dimension and distant from traditional mountaineering (Sherman, 1994).

Sport climbing relies on permanent small anchors (bolts) fixed in the rock for protection

at regular intervals. The climber ascends through a route where pre-placed bolts follow

a 'line' up a rock face. As each bolt is reached, the climber attaches a quickdraw to the

bolt and clips the rope through it. Before the use of climbing bolts, rock faces could

only be climbed if they could be protected with traditional climbing gear. The

introduction of permanent climbing bolts changed the perception of what could be

climbed and gave rise to sport climbing. Sport climbing routes minimize the risk of

serious accidents and climbers can concentrate on extreme technical and athletic

challenges. Therefore, fixed anchors are essential components of sport climbing, just

like bikes in cycling.

Spain has a huge number of accessible, well-equipped and high-quality sport climbing

areas close to large population centers. In fact, it has become one of the world centers

for this sport. Traditional climbing remains a high-risk, minority and male-dominated

activity, whereas sport climbing is increasingly popular, practiced by a wide range of

ages and with a growing presence of women.

In Spain, sport climbing began in the 1980s as an extension of traditional climbing. In

its origins it was intimately linked to the mountaineering world (Moscoso, 2003, 2004;

Waterman and Waterman, 1993). As a result, sport climbing inherited some of the

consensus and rules typical of mountain climbing and alpinism. For example, the

process of socialization for a climber used to be long, often lasting several years. There

was no codified set of skills specific to sport climbing. These were part of a wide and

vague assortment of abilities related to mountaineering. The transmission of that

knowledge was informal and usually proceeded through long-lasting personal

relationships between mountaineers (Léséleuc, Gleyse and Marcellini, 2002). Rock

climbers were expected to accept a certain degree of risk and to be able to overcome

uncertainty situations. As two Spanish bolters point out:

“In the seventies we would come together at the mountaineering club, but it

wasn’t the club in the sense of an institution that circulated the information we

needed, but this rather came through personal contact between climbers. You

trusted those climbers who climbed as hard or better than you”. (Juan Luis)

“Climbing in the eighties was an underground sort of thing. I have even seen a

guy in a mountain refuge shooting up heroin. But it is true that, this apart, you

were a mountaineer who one day discovered climbing. Now you have climbing

gym climbers and some of them go on to discover the mountain”. (Ignacio)

Since then, sport climbing in Spain and other countries has grown rapidly and it has

been standardized (Rotillon, 2006). Nowadays, there are a great number of public and

private climbing walls and sport climbing courses for beginners (Llopis, 2010). The

training of a sport climber has been systematized in verified procedures that expert

instructors are able to transmit in a few sessions. There is specific sport climbing

equipment, which is reliable and easy to use (Smith, 1998). Standardization has

increased the number of sport climbers and has caused a rift between sport climbing and

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traditional mountaineering. Now sport climbing no longer depends on common

experience and personal relationships. As another equipper points out: “Before, you

started climbing in a more slow-paced way. Dangerous things were done but, at the

same time, everything was more under control, in the sense that we were a small group.

Nowadays you see hordes of people who have done a weekend course and you see

many of them improvise.” (Juan Manuel)

This systematization, however, has not affected equally every climbing field (Hardy,

2002). Sport equipment and service suppliers have experienced a high degree of

specialization and technification. But this transformation has not had the same impact

on the equippers of climbing routes. In addition, climbing bolting is currently more

homogeneous, reliable and safe than some years ago. Nevertheless, equippers continue

to rely on antiquated codes that clash with the present social reality of rock climbing.

The evolution of sport climbing bolting

Sport climbing relies materially on the existence of equipped routes, i.e. vertical

itineraries with anchors that allow climbers a safe ascent. Without these anchors sport

climbing simply would not exist. Bolting is a very complex task with a very small

margin for error. On some of those climbing routes, thousands of people will hang 30

meters high from steel bolts screwed just a few centimeters into the rock.

In Spain and other countries, bolting is an individual activity that is not usually

organized or regulated (McNamee, 2007). Sometimes mountaineering federations or

clubs commission the bolting of a rock face, but most bolting is done on the equippers’

own initiative. They do this work unselfishly and even anonymously.

It is important to point out that, in sport climbing, bolting is not part of the athletic

endeavor itself. This is very different from traditional climbing. Most current equippers

do not drill the anchors as they ascend, unlike traditional climbers on first ascents.

Instead, they descend from the summit with fixed ropes and they drill in the bolts

without much physical effort. It is a technical job rather than an athletic one, which they

try to carry out in the most rapid, comfortable and efficient way. Furthermore, most

equippers bolt all kinds of routes. Some of these are beginners’ routes, way below their

own climbing abilities and, therefore, of little sporting interest to them. And others are

elite routes, generally way above their own level and, therefore, impossible for them to

climb.

Equippers search for accessible rock faces appropriate for climbing, with no legal

restrictions. They locate logical climbing lines, place bolts into the rock, clean climbing

routes of scrub and loose rock, which may be dangerous, and even improve some grips.

The location of the bolts must guarantee stone resistance, clean and safe falls and allow

easy clipping of the quickdraws. Distance between bolts determines the potential length

of falls. Finally, hardware deterioration implies supervision and eventually replacement

of the anchors (Guinda, 2000; Ponce et al., 1997).

Most equippers have acquired these skills through self-learning, experience and

informal transmission. They seek out techniques from other crafts in search of suitable

procedures and materials, and they share this information through personal

communication and, at best, sporadic articles in rock climbing magazines. Nowadays,

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knowledge acquired over time has resulted in some widespread bolting protocols. Sport

equipment companies sell bolting-specific gear and some expert equippers are starting

to offer bolting courses. However, informally acquired know-how through experience is

still crucial.

“I learned to bolt, putting at risk other people’s lives. I was self-taught. When I

started, sports climbing did not exist as a concept. Problems cropped up that

needed to be solved. You’d be sold bolt hangers without nuts, so when I opened

my first route with spits [an old-fashioned type of anchor], I drove my local

ironmonger mad trying to find the right bolts. By browsing through catalogues

we were able to identify the most suitable type and alloy”. (Ignacio)

“I started bolting in a completely self-taught manner at the age of 14. I had no

idea and, besides, there was no equipment. I bolted with a figure-eight descender

and a Prusik knot. Bolting a route was a nightmare, often taking several days.

You would try to take in technical innovations but this wasn’t easy. The only

sources of information were some articles published in a few magazines”.

(Pedro)

Usually climbing routes are not isolated, but grouped in “crags”. The most formal

method of spreading information about a climbing crag is a guide, issued by a specialist

publisher, with “topos” (sketches of the routes), photos and details of each route

(Taylor, 2006; Bogardus, 2012). Sometimes, equippers self-publish guides that they sell

in mountaineering clubs, mountain shelters or bars near rock climbing areas. Other

times, equippers upload topos on the Internet. And, finally, equippers occasionally

decide not to publish the information about the areas they bolt, either to avoid mass use

or because of access restrictions (Léséleuc, Gleyse and Marcellini, 2002).

Bolting can be a controversial activity. Conflict is inherent in many sports, but climbing

controversies are typically posed in moral terms. Probably no other sport causes so

much discussion about ethics and “fair means” as rock climbing (Perkins, 2005).

Mutual accusations of disrespect for mountaineering ethics are very common. The

legitimacy of pitons in traditional climbing, the minimum distance between two

climbing routes or even the use of chalk: furious debates are recurrent.

The best-known conflict is the “bolt war”, a historical controversy that confronted

traditional and sport climbing (Bogardus, 2012; Fuller, 2003). The polemic goes back to

the origins of sport climbing and affects equippers profoundly. In essence, many

practitioners of traditional climbing consider risk and autonomy as inherent to climbing

ethics (Donnelly, 2003; Kiewa, 2002; Heywood, 1994). So they think drilling

permanent anchors into the rock is a form of external help incompatible with these

normative foundations. In Spain and other countries, the main controversies occurred

when climbing bolting penetrated high-mountain terrain monopolized untill then by

traditional climbing. Sometimes traditionalist opponents of bolting destroy climbing

anchors.

Other controversies are, so to speak, idiosyncratic to sport climbing. For example,

equippers have the right to authorship recognition (Nettlefold, 1999). They name their

routes and every modification of the original bolting by another person requires prior

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approval. However, as time goes on, the usual problems linked to authorship systems

arise. What is the length of that “copyright” protection? Is it reasonable to forbid

changes in routes opened thirty years ago? What happens if it is not possible to find the

original equipper? Furthermore, restrictions affect the author him/herself and those

equippers who modify their own routes –for example, to increase their technical difficulty– lose credibility.

The spreading of information about climbing routes is another contentious issue. The

accepted rule is that the equipper of a climbing area has the right to decide whether that

information is spread or not and, if it is, the publishing conditions. It is an increasingly

difficult norm to respect in the Internet Age. Climbers sketch and photograph routes and

they share them on Internet forums and blogs. There are commercial offenders, too.

Occasionally, publishers bring out climbing guides without taking local equippers into

account and are harshly criticized.

Who bolts climbing routes?

Bolting is a necessary requirement for sport climbing. But there are really very few

equippers, compared to the multitude of climbers. There is no record book, but in Spain

regular and active bolters form a small group, maybe a hundred or two hundred people

who make up for lack of numbers with constant activity. This small group creates and

maintains thousands of climbing routes of all levels for tens of thousands of climbers of

all abilities. This means a major shift from the early years of sport climbing, when

bolting was a collective and generalized task. Equipping or opening routes was a part of

rock climbing and almost everyone bolted occasionally. Now it is specific to just a few

individuals.

There are two reasons for this process. Firstly, there is a social one. Most of the first

generation of sport climbers came from traditional climbing. As this type of climbing

required a solid knowledge base on self-protection, the transition to the drilling of fixed

anchors for sport climbing was relatively seamless. In contrast, the barriers posed by

lack of expertise are much bigger for somebody directly trained in sport climbing who

starts bolting.

The second cause is technological. In the past, bolting was by hand drilling, a slow and

laborious task. Climbing areas were due to the effort of many people over the long term.

As the participation of different equippers with diverse criteria increased diversity,

climbing areas used to be very heterogeneous. This situation changed with the

popularization of powerful electric drills and bolting-specific gear that allows a single

person to equip large areas quickly.

In this new scenario, equippers assumed a strong commitment to their sport. First of all

in economic terms: the bolting of a climbing route costs between thirty and eighty

dollars, depending on the kind of anchors and the length of the route. It is a huge outlay

for active equippers who have opened hundreds or even thousands of routes. However,

many of them minimize the impact of monetary cost, compared to the enormous amount

of time they spend bolting. Finally, equippers take on great responsibility –even in legal

terms– for the security of the users of their climbing routes.

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Most Spanish equippers lack funding support. Occasionally, federations or

mountaineering clubs finance the bolting of new routes or, more often, the replacement

of damaged or dangerous hardware on existing routes. Sometimes, sport companies

donate equipment for bolting. And those equippers who write climbing guides of the

areas they bolt can recover part of the money they spend. But, in general terms,

equippers spend large amounts out of their own pockets.

“I have bolted around 1,700 routes in all of Spain as well as in France, Morocco,

Algeria, Madagascar, Norway and Namibia. I spend approximately an average

of 5 days a month bolting. A very small part of the equipment comes from my

club; occasionally I exchange material with some manufacturers in return for

publicity in the climbing guides I write. Nevertheless, most of the material I use

comes out of my own pocket”. (Luis Alfonso)

“I’ve been doing this for twenty-seven years and I don’t know how many routes

I have bolted. I used to keep a list, but I stopped back in 1996, when I had done

more than 200. Money is the least important thing. The time you devote to it is

more important. All those weekends you waste looking for areas that a lot of the

times are of no use, setting up ropes…” (Ignacio)

But even more amazing is the scant prestige they gain from bolting. Most climbers have

no idea who bolted the routes they use… and they do not care, either. It is difficult to

find information on the Internet or elsewhere about the main Spanish equippers. Except

for a small circle of connoisseurs they are almost invisible figures, to climbers, media

and sport companies or institutions.

As strange as it may sound, although without the work of equippers sport climbing

would simply not exist, bolting is an activity with limited prestige where, at best,

recognition may be limited to that coming from other equippers. The opposite, however,

may occur, as equippers sometimes have to face destructive criticism from climbers

who criticize the lack of technical, sporting or ethical suitability of their routes. It is

significant that all equippers I interviewed had a very poor opinion of climbers who

benefited from their work, yet failed to show any kind of gratitude and, least of all, to

contribute to its maintenance. As Koldo, a veteran equipper with more than 30 years of

experience, bitterly explained: “I’ve not had any recognition or appreciation for my

work and at this stage I don’t want them either. The vast majority of climbers are

parasites and all regular bolters suffer from burnt-out equipper’s syndrome”. The

obvious question then arises: what is the main motivation of equippers?

Motivation

In recent decades altruism, cooperation and reciprocity have aroused extensive interest

in disciplines such as economics, sociology, philosophy, political sciences and

psychology (Paul, Miller and Paul, 1993; Sober and Wilson, 1998; Kolm and Ythier,

2006; Kimbrough, 2011). This body of work has given rise to an extensive bibliography

and to several established and accepted definitions of altruism and cooperation.

Altruism is commonly described as a selfless concern for the welfare of others.

Cooperation, in a narrow technical sense, usually refers to situations in which joint

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action poses a dilemma for at least one individual who would be better off not

cooperating. These standard conceptions are troublesome: heroic altruism seems

unproblematic, whereas conventional daily cooperation seems to set out a tragic

dilemma. Probably the most sensible solution is to understand the distance between

pure altruism and radical egoism as a continuum (Sennett, 2012).

At first sight, amateur bolting seems a neat instance of pure Kantian altruism. Equippers

earn neither money nor prestige for work that benefits many climbers. However, the

equippers I interviewed rejected emphatically a description of their activity as an

altruistic one. The most repeated statement was: “I bolt for myself, not for others”.

When I asked equippers about their motivation, they usually appealed to aesthetic

reasons in their answers. They saw bolting as a creative craft allowing them to

demonstrate personal excellence, for example reading rock face morphology and

finding the most logical climbing routes.

“Opening up a route has a creative component. You have to find a wall, check

that it is suitable for climbing, find logical lines or routes…you always get

something out of it, the satisfaction of a job well done, sometimes the

recognition of other equippers...in my case, my motivation is the satisfaction of

creating something”. (Juan Manuel)

“I like climbing routes I consider are well bolted, tasteful in their work, where

you can see that whoever bolted them had good ideas, both in the design of the

route and in the ethical aspect, who knew how to interpret the rock and integrate

the route within its surroundings… It isn’t just about drilling”. (Eduardo)

“I do not think bolting is a particularly altruistic activity. I bolt for myself, it is

something I do because I feel like it and I do not expect anyone to be grateful”.

(Ignacio)

This aesthetic self-understanding contrasts with some aspects of climbing bolting that

do bring to light an altruistic attitude. All the equippers I interviewed were profoundly

concerned with the security of other climbers and of beginners in particular (Bogardus,

2012: 299; Mellor, 2001: 36). They sharply criticized those experienced climbers who

neglect security when they bolt easy routes, disregarding the limitations of novices.

Crucially, veteran equippers bolt many routes above and, most importantly, below their

ability level, which have no sporting interest for them. Why do they spend time, money

and effort bolting easy routes that are poorly regarded by expert climbers and hardly

satisfactory from a creative point of view?

“There are people who do not think about others. They are governed by a

philosophy of ‘if you don’t have the level, don’t climb it’. This is why you often

find easy routes which are badly equipped”. (Juan Luis)

“My criterion when it comes to bolting is that each route has its public. If the

route is easy then I think you are under the moral obligation to bolt for people

who climb at that level. On the other hand, if you open a route of great difficulty

and within it there is a much easier section, there you can space out your bolts

12

more. The easier the routes, the greater the safety needs. I think that is

something people often don’t understand”. (Ignacio)

Equippers’ reluctance to accept their own unselfishness should be understood as an

instance of cognitive dissonance or adaptive preference formation (Elster, 1983: 123).

Most climbers wash their hands of bolting. Equippers carry out a collaborative activity

in a highly individualized social environment that denies them economic remuneration,

material resources and public recognition. By interpreting bolting as an aesthetic pursuit

rather than an altruistic activity, equippers succeed in evaluating their activity

positively. Equippers value bolting regardless of the scant recognition they obtain and

of the selfishness of the climbers who take advantage of their work.

Common-pool resources

Sport climbing bolting can be defined in terms of what Elinor Ostrom calls a “common-

pool resource” (CPR): a cooperative-based supply and management system of goods or

services. CPRs are typically regulated by a set of “working rules that are used to

determine who is eligible to make decisions in some arena, what actions are allowed or

constrained, what aggregation rules will be used, what procedures must be followed,

what information must or must not be provided, and what payoffs will be assigned to

individuals dependent on their actions” (Ostrom, 1990: 51).

Additionally, Ostrom (1990: 92) identified some design principles of stable common-

pool resource management: clearly defined boundaries of the group affected by the

system; congruence between appropriation and provision rules and local conditions;

collective-choice arrangements that allow participation in the decision-making process;

effective monitoring by the appropriators; graduated sanctions for those who violate

community rules; mechanisms of conflict resolution that are cheap and easy to access;

and minimal recognition of rights to organize.

Climbing bolting observes, to some extent at least, some of these principles. There are

rules regarding the rights of equippers to their routes, like the right to ban any change in

the line of the route and the anchor’s position, or the right to decide over the way

information about climbing routes is disseminated. There are local rules over the kind of

anchor accepted in a specific zone. An extreme example is Elbsandsteingebirge, a

famous Czech climbing area where the use of protection devices is strictly forbidden

and only knotted or threaded slings can be used (Hanemann, 2000: 112). Norms and

agreements have changed over time. Currently, equippers prioritize security over and

above any other technical or athletic considerations, whereas in the 80s some degree of

risk was considered acceptable or even desirable.

However, at least in Spain, sport climbing is moving away from the CPR model in its

institutional aspects, or rather, the absence of institutional structures. Rock climbing has

neither mechanisms of conflict resolution nor graduated sanctions, so controversies may

become long and virulent. Rights to organize, when they exist, are weak and barely

efficient. In Spain, unlike in France and other countries, the informal agreements that

regulate rock climbing have not given rise to powerful collective actors. Some regional

mountaineering federations are committed to climbing bolting and have tried out partial

13

funding and remuneration models. However, usually, Spanish mountaineering clubs and

federations lack the authority of, for instance, the French Comité de Défense des Sites et

Rochers d'Escalade (COSIROC).

Common-pool resource systems are not a way to coordinate individual generosity, but a

set of complex collective arrangements that are consistent with different motivations. In

this regard, the equippers’ reticence to read their own activity in altruistic terms is quite

perceptive. Contemporary climbing bolting is an extension of a social relationship that

was born and developed in the traditional mountaineering arena, a system characterized

by generalized reciprocity, not by altruism.

Altruism is a motivation that involves putting concern for others before self-interest.

Reciprocity is a way to organize the exchange of goods and services –like the bolting

and maintenance of climbing routes– in the absence of markets or a central distributor.

In a generalized reciprocity system, whether the motivation of participants is altruistic

or selfish is not really determinant. In fact, it is usually a combination of both

(Rendueles, 2013). When, in the past, most climbers were concerned with bolting, it

was of little importance whether they bolted in search of prestige and authority or

because they liked to spend their time on the welfare of others. It was a collective task

arranged through a system of stable but fragile rules and commitments, for there were

no sanction or formal monitoring mechanisms.

As the generalized reciprocity system disappeared because of the popularization of sport

climbing and the subsequent changes in the socialization of climbers, equippers have

become net providers without reciprocal counterparts. Individualized norms –like those

related to authorship– have been preserved, unlike the reciprocity relationship as a

whole. Koldo accurately summarizes this problem: “People don’t equip because

climbing routes are already set up by others. The non-equipper has the upper hand: the

equipper does not remove the bolts when he no longer climbs them and he cannot

charge others for his work”.

This means, in economic terms, that climbing routes are not yet pure common goods.

They have become public or semi-public goods. Nowadays equippers confront a

practical dilemma. They are trapped in the transition from a common-pool resource

model to an individualistic system. They are the only providers of a non-excludable

good whose users are not committed to its maintenance. In other words, the equippers

have been thrown into a kind of forced altruism.

The abundance of ethical discourses in the climbing environment is linked to this

process. In the absence of common rules regulating the provision and use of goods,

controversies tend to degenerate into a confrontation of abstract moral principles. This

is an unpromising strategy. As controversies confront different types of climbing with

antagonistic goals (risk and security, autonomy and extreme difficulty…), it is hard to

reach agreements on shared ethical grounds. Common-pool resources are just social rule

systems that are non-dependent –not exclusively, at least– on ethical duty, but rather

depend on pragmatic arrangements that no-one has any interest in infringing.

Three common alternatives to replace a common-pool resource system are the market, a

bureaucratic organization and organized individual altruism. Up to now,

commodification has only affected urban climbing walls and some via ferratas.

14

Bureaucratic climbing regulations, either by public agencies or by non-profit

organizations, are already a reality in some countries. Finally, bolting could be funded

through distributed altruism, for example, through a micro-donation system supported

by climbers.

Many equippers see major disadvantages in all three alternatives. They bolt in an

individualistic milieu where reciprocity has disappeared and has not been replaced by

organized altruism or public regulation. However, it is a social environment that

preserves their autonomy and freedom, which is something they appreciate in spite of

all its disadvantages.

Conclusions

Climbing bolting concentrates some of the dilemmas that common-pool resources

confront in a complex society. In traditional climbing and mountaineering there was a

delicate combination of values regarding individual autonomy and, on the other hand,

minor but important generalized reciprocity relationships. Mountaineers understood

sport as a bastion of personal freedom but, at the same time, developed shared norms

and reciprocity arrangements that were invoked occasionally: for example, when an

accident occurs and high-mountain rescue teams are organized.

Climbing bolting grew up in that social environment. At first it was an individual but

generalized task. The popularization of sport climbing, the proliferation of routes and

the technification of equipment quickly changed the situation. A small group of very

active equippers have become providers of public goods without compensation in

economic or status terms and lacking a normative framework that makes their activity

collectively meaningful. However, individualistic mountaineering ethics make them

reluctant to accept bureaucratic or market solutions to this dilemma.

In this respect, the theoretical derivations of the crisis of rock climbing bolting go

beyond the sociology of sport and shed light on the original controversy about the

commons between Elinor Ostrom and Garrett Hardin. Hardin raised a variation of the

prisoner's dilemma to prove the systematic failure of spontaneous cooperation.

Ostrom’s CPR model, instead, forced the theory of rational choice to submit itself to the

tribunal of institutional analysis. Throughout history many societies have managed the

commons successfully. Therefore, it is Hardin who has to explain why the tragedy of

the commons is actually so infrequent. In fact, in all its versions, the prisoner's dilemma

is a counterfactual impossibility theorem. It does not describe the empirical difficulties

of real people to cooperate, but the inability of rational choice theory to explain how

individuals collaborate effectively.

The case of climbing bolting poses some empirical limitations of CPR theory. Ostrom's

model seems unable to explain what happens when the individualism and rational

egoism that Hardin assumes become themselves the social norm through historical and

institutional changes. This is precisely what has happened in the case of rock climbing.

The successful management of common goods has social conditions that are

incompatible with an individualized and commodified environment. Again, it is a

problem that goes beyond the field of sports and is related to some fundamental

15

historical changes, such as neoliberal political hegemony and the crisis of social capital

in most contemporary Western societies.

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