Take a look at some of the work by Edward Barbanell on managing western water rights. 

You have a successful example implemented in Southeastern Tunisia within PRODESUD Project where all aspects you mentioned have been tackled

True Ali, I am looking for other cases or examples to compare methodology. You can always learn something new by sharing and networking. But I fully agree with you  about the good example of PRODESUD.

Mounir, check out the fasrm prosperity report on my page.  It is exactly what you are looking for.  The report includes a decision tool.  Have a look and then let me know if you have any questions.  

That was to be Farm Prosperity!

Mounir, There are many examples reported in ICARDA documents concerning many countries in WANA. You can also contact the Haut Commissariat au Développement de la Steppe in Algeria, they can help you on the concepts used in Algeria to establish many successfull projects since 19992. Good luck.

Can't you ask something either? - Don't count on recipes that can be transfered from one location to another. Ideally there should be a firm and sensible legal frame-work, but for management within a reasonable time-frame we have to take the present legal framework as a given, even if it may facilitate  rangeland degration (free access, no limit for number of animals, no fee)

In Switzerland and other alpine countries there are reasonably successful traditional regulations being documented in writing for several centuries. Here the ingredients are: clear demarcation of land and people having pasture rights, a fixed number of animals or animal units that a person (farm) is allowed to summergraze, sometimes laws that regulate inheritance and possible sale of pasture rights, contributions of right holders to  maintenance of pastures and infrastructure, so pasture acess is not free and of course sanctions if people don't comply with regulations. And of course, general economic development is also important (presently European summer pastures tend to be undergrazed rather than overgrazed, because intensive, modern dairying is not feasible on summer pastures). - The key is that regulations are acepted by rangeland users and this points strongly to what is called participatory development approache, not a top down approach. Pasture access should also not be free. 

You have to check if a limitation of animal numbers makes sense. It does make a lot of sense there the equilibrium succession theory can - more or less - explain what happens with the vegetation, but if pasture yields (and precipitation) vary greatly between years then the equilibrium theory cannot explain vegetation dynamics. If you can't limit animal numbers, time restriction might work. 

In semiarid/arid regions access to water is crucial but this has been mentioned already. So much for now

Wolfgang