Elinor Ostrom, Arthur F. Bentley Professor of political science in the College of Arts and Sciences and a professor in the School of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University Bloomington,was awarded the Nobel Prize in economic sciences on Monday, Oct. 12, 2009. She shares the award with Oliver Williamson, Edgar F. Kaiser Professor Emeritus of Business, Economics and Law at the University of California, Berkeley. Ostrom is the first woman to win the Nobel Prize for Economics, which was established in 1968.

Ostrom is co-founder and senior research director of the Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis at IU Bloomington. Ostrom and her husband, Vincent Ostrom, established the Workshop in 1973. The Office of the Vice Provost for Research has supported the Workshop and its increasingly international endeavors throughout its nearly four decades of existence.

In making the award to Ostrom for her "analysis of economic governance," the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said, "Elinor Ostrom has made extensive studies of the management of common property by groups of common owners, contrasting that with management by state or private institutions. Perhaps surprisingly, she has found that those with a vested interest in the resources they manage are frequently better at regulating those resources than publicly appointed management bodies would be. Her research reveals that in many, but not all, cases, allowing users to develop their own rules to regulate the use of common property results in the most efficient solution for managing those resources. ... In short, self-governance can be successful. Her work incorporates both case studies of numerous real-life examples and laboratory experiments testing the ways people interact. The experiments reveal that people seem more willing to regulate others' behaviour than predicted, and also that the development of efficient rules for regulation depends critically on good communication between the people involved."

More than 15 years earlier, in an issue of Indiana University's Research & Creative Activity magazine, Ostrom said this: “How people think of themselves, structure their relationships with others, and pursue opportunities, may make the difference between a sustainable and meaningful way of life and a way of life reduced to rubble. … Problem-solving requires a sense of mutual regard for each other and a willingness to draw upon what people can learn from one another in building common knowledge and shared communities of understanding. What we have learned from our experience at the Workshop is that the work as it unfolds can be immensely stimulating and productive. Each achievement is the beginning of new adventures.”

For more information on Elinor Ostrom, her research, and her career, as well as IU's history of Nobel Laureates, please view the links below:

List of Indiana University Nobel Laureates: http://research.iu.edu/traditions/index.html

Indiana University news release: http://newsinfo.iu.edu/news/page/normal/12185.html

Broadcast of Ostrom press conference: http://broadcast.iu.edu/ceremon/Nobel/

Nobel Laureates in Economics, 2009: http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/economics/laureates/2009/

A Researcher's Tale, Then and Now, article from 25th anniversary issue of Research & Creative Activity magazine: http://www.indiana.edu/~rcapub/v25n1/tale.shtml

Workshop on Political Theory and Policy Analysis: http://www.indiana.edu/~workshop/