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ight to use”. Varone et al. (2002) made also a distinctionbetween the resource stock and resource fruit (or yield).When one refers to a natural resource management bothstock and yield are intended.According to Briassoulis (2004), resource regimesare also historically and socio-culturally determined.Consequently, they include only selection of a resource’aspects and attributes with respect to particular activities.In addition to formal ownership and use rights, resourcerights may be informally agreed by a local community of resourceusers and enshrined in community norms and rulesof resource use. The spatial and temporal variability anddiffering degrees of spatial fixity of resources and crucialconstraints for the sustainable development of human activities,produce diverse resource regimes at various levelsof socio-spatial organization within different time frames.To address the institutional aspects of natural recoursemanagement, Briassoulis (2004) proposed tocombine the ideas from the interrelated paradigms of thetheory of complexity with a new institutional approach tosocial and planning analysis that places emphasis on actors(individuals and groups), the diverse relational websor networks to which they belong, the stakes they have inlocal environments and the practices they follow to pursuetheir interests. It asserts that individual identities are sociallyconstructed within settings structured by the powerfulforces—socioeconomic and political organizations, socialdynamics, nature—where power relations shape theopportunity space and value systems of human agents.The actors, as reflective beings, are not passively shapedby and devise actively their social situation, interactingamong themselves and with environment and developingrelational bonds of various strengths and reach.Proceeding from this preconditions, Briassoulis(2004) presented the methodological framework for analyzingthe interactions between ‘problem setting’ and ‘institutionalsetting’ at each principal stages of a policy andplanning process (problem definition, policy/plan formulation,evaluation and implementation). Fig. 1 shows howthese interactions produce complexity in identifying sustainablesolutions to environmental problems, the effectsof this complexity and its implications for planning/policyeffectiveness. The proposed framework was developedfor the analysis of desertification control in MediterraneanEurope. However, some conceptual comments of the author,which we decided to present shortly below, are ofinterest for discussing the problem on the whole.In this framework the Problem setting comprises currentand potential activities, resources and requirementsin them by each activity. The Institutional setting comprisesformal and informal actors and resource regimes.The stages of Policy and planning process in Fig. 1 areshown hierarchically and sequentially arranged, in realitythey intermingle and interact through continuous feedback.In more details, these stages can be described as follows.Problem definition. Any environmental problem istypically first defined by those actors who have stakesin particular activities. Consequently, only the resourcesystems of immediate importance to these activities areemphasized; lesser or no attention is paid to the othersthat may be directly and importantly related to the first.Several uses of resources may also be excluded fromoriginal definition of the problem, and thus are sidelinedin a subsequent policy and planning analysis. Activitieshave different qualitative and quantitative resource requirementsthat are environmentally and socio-culturallydetermined. Depending on who defines the problem, particularphysico-chemical attributes as well as functionsand dimensions (environmental, economic, or social) ofthe considered resources are underscored. When severalactivities compete for the same resource, the pressuresand conflicts over resources increase. Generally, “…problemdefinitions are activity-led, characterized by particularactivity-resource combinations that reflect both the interestsof those defining them and the broader historic contextand socio-cultural milieu” (Briassoulis, 2004, p. 120).The governance system determines who participatesin problem definition. In centralized systems, the problemsare usually defined ‘top-down’ and are thus typically moreexclusive in who contributes; in decentralized systems, aproblem definition may be a more participatory process.The perception of the problem by those with the ‘a rightto define the problem’ influences their active participationand emphasis placed on certain attributes of the resourcesconsidered. In addition to formal stakeholders, a hostof the informal ones also indirectly influence a problemdefinition.Stakeholders, which have different socio-economicprofiles, goals, interests, future outlooks and preferencesfor particular activities, occupy different positions in diverserelational webs and possess different power to promote,or even impose, their favored definition. They espousedifferent causal theories about the problem and influencethe choice of activities, resources and their characteristics,activity-resource relationships and spatio-temporalframes of reference that are considered. Their theoriesare also influenced by the current state of knowledge andavailability of data that can be also incomplete, missing,or even contradictory. Because environmental resourcesoften cross administrative boundaries and spatial levelswith different regimes governing and use, as well as withdifferent resource interests, an institutional interplay arises.Interests and resource regimes from various levelsinfluence problem definitions at a certain spatial level.Multiple, frequently conflicting definitions of a problemexist usually when the most powerful interests dominate allothers and drive the choice of a problem-solving approach.The problem definition that guides the policy and plan formulationstage is an ‘emergent’ definition in the sense thatit is not the sum of the definitions of those experiencing theproblem but is the result of their synthesis at some higherlevel. The resource-wise problems may be ill-defined becausean uneven emphasis on resources, their attributesand their horizontal and vertical interrelationships, dependingon which the activities compete for resources. Thepresent and future causal structure of the problems usuallyremains vague and unclear, at least at the spatial level(s) atwhich they are defined. The complexity of the institutionalsetting results in the spatial and functional compartmentalizationof the environmental integrity of resource systemsat the problem definition stage. Undoubtedly, this cannotsupport holistic resource management: partial, biased,incomplete, competing and exclusionary definitions affectaccordingly the solutions proposed and the priorities assignedto policy and planning actions.Policy/Plan Formulation. At the formulation stage,the additional concerns arise because of the mix of actorsinvolved: the ‘old’ (those who defined the problem)and the ‘new’ (those officially charged with policy and planformulation). The differing traits, competencies, power re-— 110 —