Table Of ContentCosmopolitan Commons
Infrastructures Series
edited by Geoffrey C. Bowker and Paul N. Edwards
Paul N. Edwards
A Vast Machine: Computer Models, Climate Data, and the Politics of Global Warming
Lawrence M. Busch
Standards: Recipes for Reality
Lisa Gitelman, ed.
“Raw Data” Is an Oxymoron
Finn Brunton
Spam: A Shadow History of the Internet
Nil Disco and Eda Kranakis, eds.
Cosmopolitan Commons: Sharing Resources and Risks across Borders
Cosmopolitan Commons
Sharing Resources and Risks across Borders
edited by Nil Disco and Eda Kranakis
The MIT Press
Cambridge, Massachusetts
London, England
© 2013 Massachusetts Institute of Technology
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any
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Set in Stone Sans and Stone Serif by the MIT Press. Printed and bound in the United
States of America.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Cosmopolitan commons : sharing resources and risks across borders / edited by Nil
Disco and Eda Kranakis.
pages ; cm.—(Infrastructures series)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-262-01902-6 (hardcover : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-262-51841-3 (pbk. :
alk.paper)
1. Infrastructure (Economics)— Europe. 2. Europe—Economic integration. 3. Natu-
ral resources—International cooperation. I. Disco, Cornelis, editor of compilation.
II. Kranakis, Eda, editor of compilation.
HC240.9.C3C66 2013
333—dc23
2012038063
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Just as we were completing the manuscript of this book, we learned of the
death of Elinor Ostrom. We began the project as newcomers to the field of
commons research. At every turn, we encountered her fundamental contri-
butions, which in turn have shaped our thinking. We see this work as build-
ing upon the intellectual tradition that she did so much to establish. We
dedicate this book to her memory, and to Commoners present and future,
in the hope that they will maintain a vibrancy of thought and action in
this domain worthy of Elinor Ostrom’s lifetime of effort, commitment, and
accomplishment.
Contents
Acknowledgments ix
1 Introduction 1
Nil Disco and Eda Kranakis
2 Toward a Theory of Cosmopolitan Commons 13
Nil Disco and Eda Kranakis
I Valorizing Nature
3 The “Good Miracle”: Building a European Airspace Commons, 1919–
1939 57
Eda Kranakis
4 Negotiating the Radio Spectrum: The Incessant Labor of Maintaining
Space for European Broadcasting 97
Nina Wormbs
5 Conflict and Cooperation: Negotiating a Cosmopolitan Hydropower
Commons on the Karelian Isthmus 123
Kristiina Korjonen-Kuusipuro
II Protecting Humans and Nature
6 Predicting the Weather: An Information Commons for Europe and the
World 153
Paul N. Edwards
7 Breeding Europe: Crop Diversity, Gene Banks, and Commoners 185
Tiago Saraiva
8 Under a Common Acid Sky: Negotiating Transboundary Air Pollution
in Europe 213
Arne Kaijser
viii Contents
III Temporal Layering and Interlinking of Cosmopolitan Commons in
Nature’s Spaces
9 Changing Technology, Changing Commons: Freight, Fish, and Oil in
the North Sea 245
Håkon With Andersen
10 “One Touch of Nature Makes the Whole World Kin”: Ships, Fish,
Phenol, and the Rhine, 1815–2000 271
Nil Disco
11 Conclusions 317
Nil Disco and Eda Kranakis
Index 329
Acknowledgments
This book has a long history and would not have survived as a project with-
out the support of many individuals and institutions. The editors want first
of all to thank the contributing authors for their diligence, their patience,
and their insights as we went about constructing a “common” approach
to the phenomenon of “cosmopolitan commons.” Karl-Erik Michelsen
and Bruce Hevly made valuable contributions to this discussion in its early
stages. Chris Kelty kindly agreed to help us hone our tentative insights at a
formative meeting in Lisbon in May of 2009.
The authors and editors have had the privilege of being able to hold a
series of workshops at a number of European venues. Particular thanks are
due to the Department of Philosophy and History of Technology at the
Royal Technological Institute in Stockholm and the Institute of Social Sci-
ences at the University of Lisbon. We also owe much to the embedding of
this book project in the Tensions of Europe network and particularly in the
EUROCORES Project “Inventing Europe,” coordinated by the Foundation
for the History of Technology at Eindhoven University and funded by the
European Science Foundation. As a “shadow project” of the “Inventing
Europe” program, and thanks to the unflagging support of Johan Schot
of the Foundation for the History of Technology and Rüdiger Klein of the
ESF, we had access to facilities and financial support that allowed us to hold
meetings and coordinate our writing. Eda Kranakis also gratefully acknowl-
edges research support from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research
Council of Canada.
We would like to thank the staff at the MIT Press for seeing the book
through the production process: editor Marguerite B. Avery, acquisitions
assistant Katie Persons, and manuscript editor Paul Bethge. Our way at
the MIT Press was paved by the acceptance of our manuscript into the
Infrastructures series, edited by Geoffrey Bowker and Paul Edwards. We
