What Shapes Subnational Policy Implementation in the Global South? A 17‐year Study of Implementing India's Forest Rights Act

ABSTRACT Over the past two decades, global debates among policymakers and conservationist organizations have recognized the existence of Indigenous and local communities' rights to their customary forests. However, emerging forest tenure reforms have been severely criticized by scholars and practitioners for their slow implementation. Moreover, the literature resolving this puzzle and identifying how rights have been recognized is sparse. Responding to this neglect, I study India's federally enacted Forest Rights Act. Using public documents and informal interviews, I analyze subnational action prescriptions to recognize community forest resource rights in India's Maharashtra state for 17 years. Contributing to practice, I show that subnational action prescriptions setting claim recognition targets, providing supporting human resources, and directing field‐level mission‐mode approaches are associated with better titling of customary forests. Contributing to debates on implementation theories, the study finds the key role of bottom‐up theory, arguing that the exercise of subnational discretion aimed at resolving communicated field‐level problems is likely to lead to better implementation.