Organising collective reputation: an Ostromian perspective

What do collective reputation and communal pastures have in common? Collective reputation is an important type of collective good produced by many business networks. We argue that it has the structure of a commonpool resource, which points to the relevance of Elinor Ostrom’s theory about the community governance of natural common-pool resources. After adapting the Ostromian framework to the phenomenon of collective reputation, we explore the experience of two groups of winemaking enterprises in Hungary who set up systems of quality assurance in order to protect and improve their joint reputation. We examine if the conditions identified by Ostrom as favourable for the self-governance of commons are also conducive to the governance of collective reputation. Our findings validate our conjecture that research on goal-oriented business networks may use insights from the mature theory of ‘governing the commons’. Potential pathways for further research are outlined.