Institutions are considered as the constraints on decision makers’ behaviors. Studies analyzing institutions and the management of natural resources have mainly focused on the impact of institutions on the process of decision making, in particular how institutions and regulations affect the management and use of common pool resources. To figure out the impacts and the relationships, studies have mainly concentrated on the type of constraints imposed by institutions. However, understanding the type of institutional structure is important to clarify how effective are the institutions and how feasible and costly is an institutional adjustment to a sustainable system. This paper presents a part of PhD dissertation, describing the structure of regulations established by groups of rangeland users in Semnan of Iran. The main aim of the whole study was to figure out the impact of group-made regulations on the grazing decisions regarding number of livestock, grazing time and grazing duration. Besides seeking to clarify the impact of group-made regulations on the grazing decisions, clarifying the structure of group-made regulations has been attempted. Using the five key theoritical elements of the grammar of institutions, the study is an effort at applying the theory for practical situations. Accordingly, the result presented the structural place where the regulations stand. Reviewing the history of the Iranian rangelands, particularly the study area, used to go in depth about how the regulations have been framed.

Keywords