Compared with more productive areas, mountain areas are at risk of being marginalized, particularly in the agri-food sector. To circumvent price competition, local actors in the mountains can develop specialized local products, which depends on their capacity to act collectively. Collective action, however, is complex and needs to be better understood if it is to steer initiatives towards success. This article sets out a relational approach to studying collective action in a dairy cooperative located in a mountain area: The Primiero cooperative in the Italian Alps. The common pool resources and territorial proximity frameworks were combined in a social network analysis of advice interactions among producer members, and an analysis of trust and conflict among members and between members and other actors involved in the value chain. The results show that the success of collective action can be explained by various complementary factors. Firstly, members had dense relationships, with high levels of trust and reciprocity, while the president had the role of prestige-based leader. Nonetheless, the analysis also highlighted conflicts related to the production levels of “traditional” and “intensive” producers, although members demonstrated a high capacity to resolve conflicts by creating their own rules to control further intensification. Socio-economic status did not appear to play a role in advice relationships, showing that the members interact horizontally. However, the results show that the geographical isolation of some members tended to inhibit their commitment to the collective dynamics. At a higher level, trust toward other actors involved in the value chain plays a central role in carrying out joint projects to develop and promote cheese.

La plateforme LittoSIM modélise à partir des données réelles le risque de submersion auquel une île de la côte atlantique française est soumise et propose à quatre équipes de joueurs d’aménager le territoire, en gérant l’urbanisation et les aménagements de défense du littoral, puis de confronter leur gestion du territoire à des épisodes de submersion marine. Le jeu de rôles, épaulé d’un modèle multi-agents, facilite l’appréhension du risque par les élus et les agents communaux et est conçu pour permettre le suivi des actions et leur réorientation dans la plateforme. Cet article soulève la question du réalisme dans une simulation participative : comment a-t-il été mis en œuvre, dans quel but, avec quels effets ? Le dispositif spatial du jeu met tout d’abord en scène une reproduction de la gestion du territoire et joue sur les échelles spatiales et temporelles et sur les échanges interpersonnels. Par ailleurs, la scénarisation, grâce à des leviers incitatifs invitant les joueurs à modifier leurs pratiques professionnelles quotidiennes, produit un décalage et de ce fait une sensibilisation aux enjeux. Enfin, cette démarche participative, dont la dimension réaliste est revendiquée, interroge le chercheur sur sa posture d’accompagnement.

The occurrence of natural root grafts, the union of roots of the same or different trees, is common and shared across tree species. However, their significance for forest ecology remains little understood. While early research suggested negative effects of root grafting with the risk of pathogen transmission, recent evidence supports the hypothesis that it is an adaptive strategy that reduces stress by facilitating resource exchange. Here, by analysing mangrove root graft networks in a non-destructive way at stand level, we show further evidence of cooperation-associated benefits of root grafting. Grafted trees were found to dominate the upper canopy of the forest, and as the probability of grafting and the frequency of grafted groups increased with a higher environmental stress, the mean number of trees within grafted groups decreased. While trees do not actively ‘choose’ neighbours to graft to, our findings point to the existence of underlying mechanisms that regulate ‘optimal group size’ selection related to resource use within cooperating networks. This work calls for further studies to better understand tree interactions (i.e. network hydraulic redistribution) and their consequences for individual tree and forest stand resilience.

Cet article explore au moyen d’un modèle en système multi-agent (SMA) les conditions d’émergence et de structuration historique des territoires de production des vins de qualité décrits dans l’œuvre de Roger Dion, et plus particulièrement dans son article intitulé “Querelles des anciens et des modernes sur les facteurs de la qualité du vin” de 1952 (Dion, 1952).