important to develop an adequate understanding of the process of program 

 development and implementation, as well as the organizations that participate 

 in both. 



le 



Third, a number of recent research efforts have brought attention to th 

 crucial nature of preassessment techniques for resolving resource problems 

 One of these research efforts has focused directly on the need for institu 

 tional analysis as a first step towards defining and understanding a problem. 

 Institutional analysis is a general term that refers to attempts to understand 

 and explain "those legal, political, and administrative processes and 

 structures" through which public policy decisions are made (Ingram et al . 

 1982:323; Cortner and Marsh 1986:1-2). This includes rigorous definition of 

 the problem itself and the context in which it will be resolved. Since the 

 determination of water resource decisions and their subsequent implementation 

 involves the active participation of a wide range of organizations, profes- 

 sions, and interests (Bovee 1982), it is important to understand the context 

 in which these groups work, and to understand and plan for the ways in which 

 interactions will occur. Thus, the more rigorous the analysis, the more 

 likely that potential barriers and constraints to instream flow program imple- 

 mentation will be identified. Institutional analysis is most useful, however, 

 when it takes the analyst beyond traditional surveys of the relevant laws and 

 institutions to the assessment of alternative solutions and the development of 

 concrete strategies to achieve desirable results (Daneke and Priscoli 1979; 

 Ingram et al . 1984). Some sort of analytical framework is needed then, and 

 the Legal Institutional Analysis Model (LIAM) has been developed to meet this 

 need. 



LIAM is a computerized analytical procedure designed to accomplish four 

 goals. First, it provides a systematic method to diagnose a conflict. The 

 analyst is able, by using LIAM, to answer such questions as: What type of 

 conflict is this likely to be? Will it be an ideological dispute — or a 

 procedural one? Who is likely to dominate the negotiation--and what type of 

 negotiation styles are likely to emerge? In whose favor is the outcome likely 

 to fall? 



Second, the model allows an analyst to plan for participation in a 

 negotiation. Here, one could answer such questions as: Where can influence 

 best be exerted? What are the concerns of the various sides to this conflict? 

 What are the likely areas of agreement? Where are alliances likely to form? 

 What types of power does each organization have at its disposal — and to what 

 degree? What communication and negotiation strategies will be most suitable 

 in thi s context? 



Third, the model predicts organizational behavior. Here the analyst can 

 answer such questions as: What is organization "x" likely to do? What is the 

 mix and distribution of organizational types? How likely is compromise among 

 them? Is litigation a possibility? How can compromise be facilitated? To 

 what types of information will organization "x" be most receptive? Given a 

 change in the environment, what will happen to organization "x"? How are the 

 other organizations likely to respond? 



