In reply to Brucecaron.

I do need to more explicitly state what is meant by "evolution" here. I had a go here: http://cameronneylon.net/blog/speculations-abstracting-evolution/ and there was this chapter that starts to tease it apart in a less abstract way: http://cameronneylon.net/blog/portrait-of-the-scientist-as-a-young-man/

But yes, evolution is meant as questions of survival of recognizable entities (yes that begs the question...). So Lamarckian (or epigenetic if you prefer) is just fine. The point ultimately is of course that we can choose to guide it, but only if we accept that it is guiding, not controlling, so learning, applying are all important.

I can't recall whether Ostrom uses the word "evolution" precisely at the moment, but I read the main point of Governing the Commons as being that the theoretical institutional provisioning problem that leads to Hardin's tragedy can be overcome in practice by accepting that these institutions build up over time and gradually accrete the capacity to enable a community to address the collective action problem. That to me is a process of evolution.