Promoting Stewardship of New Commons: Lessons from WakeNature Partnership

Abstract

Protecting natural areas of landscapes at varying geographic scales of interest has preoccupied activists in the United States for a number of decades. Protected areas typically reside in the public sector of ownership and become a resource common to all members of the populace. They most often have not fit easily the notion of commons as the term is used in European, especially British, contexts. Prior individual ownership of property most typically would preclude utilization of resources and even access by neighbours. Indeed, limitation of use and access may be the factor that has made these properties most desirable for acquisition and protection. Thus, we might call such acquired and protected lands our “new commons.”