The Bloomington Workshop: multiple methods, interdisciplinary research, and collective action.

This paper examines the tradition of interdisciplinary research developed in the 40-year history of the Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis. In the late 1960s, Vincent and Elinor Ostrom began to plant the seeds for a teaching and research environment that would promote deliberation, contestation, and collaboration among their colleagues and students at Indiana University, Bloomington. Based on their experiences of working with a master woodworker in Bloomington, they envisioned a 'workshop' setting. From a simple tradition of voluntarily organized weekly colloquia with their colleagues across campus, they crafted an academic environment in which students, visiting scholars, and colleagues from diverse disciplines interacted daily, studying issues of institutional analysis and collective action. This paper examines the historical foundations of the research center created by the Ostroms. Particular focus is placed on the evolution of inquiry that led to the path-breaking research on collective action in the 'commons.' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]