This article is intended as a contribution to this body of work. Its focus, however, is not so much on the role institutions play as on their foundations. Under what conditions are societies able to maintain or construct institutions capable of directing and supporting economic development? We pursue our inquiry through the comparative analysis of three American Indian cases. Three Apache reservations in the southwestern United States exhibit different development patterns. Our argument is that these patterns reflect, in part, sociohistorical factors and their consequences for institutional efficacy.