| Abstract | This paper considers how the involvement of multiple donors affects the implementation of a major local resource-management reform. The discussion is based on Nepal's experience in transferring all of its forestland from the central government to local communities by creating local groups of forest users. The scale of this massive institutional change has required funding and assistance from multiple sources. It is revealed that some of the donors are more active in creating forest user groups and that these donors generate groups with physical characteristics (number of participants, physical area) different from those of groups created by less active donors. Thus, donors can have a large effect on how new community institutions are created even when a single institutional reform does not envision such heterogeneity. |