Common Land - Global Development

Global Development

Joachim Radkau assumes the treatment of the commons in the scientific literature of the 18th and later centuries as politically motivated to hasten the Enclosure Movement. The omnipresent examples of "Klapprige Allmendekühe" (thin cows of the Commons) in the writings of early agricultural scientists were used to modernize existing common land rule towards a more capitalized and ownership based agriculture. In Germany, based on the English experience, Albrecht Thaer suggested a similar approach. The Allmende or Commons were used to establish experts rule in agriculture, which had before been based on an empiric and practical approach without much interference of trained staff. Radkau assumes that the real Commons estate - meadows and grassland are not at all exhausted but very rich from an ecological standpoint. Neither the old or new use of the Tragedy of the Commons, e.g. of Garrett Hardin who used the example to ask for management of global common goods (asking for an 'Ökodiktatur', ecodictatorship) were in line with the state of real "Commons". The latter are useful examples of sustainable agriculture and not a failure at all.