View slideshow below
The word enclosure has many open-ended meanings, yet the general concept points to a lack of open ends, to the closing up of space. Historically, enclosure has been applied to land. The ‘Enclosure of the Commons’ allowed wealthy landowners to partition common resources traditionally managed by local communities. The privatization of communal land persists globally and perpetuates a pattern of disenfranchisement affecting all but a privileged few. Colonial takeovers, land grabs, forced migrations, and habitat loss all occur as access to nature and the ‘common treasury’ becomes narrowed and less equitable. Read more…
