Institutional Analysis and Development Framework

The Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) framework is a general framework for analysing how institutions — the rules, norms and shared strategies that structure human interaction — shape behaviour and outcomes. Developed by Elinor Ostrom and colleagues at Indiana University's Bloomington School over several decades and synthesised in her 2005 book Understanding Institutional Diversity, it places an 'action situation' at its centre: a structured setting in which actors interact, influenced by biophysical conditions, community attributes and rules-in-use. The framework was central to Ostrom's Nobel-winning work on how communities govern common-pool resources without privatisation or top-down state control.