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Abstract:
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"This paper examines the case of sheep raising in Aragon from the 13th
to the 17th century to explore the political dynamics and social criteria that rural
communities used to manage their common land, and their role in larger economic
and political frameworks. In the line of recent historiography about the commons,
the research connects the strength of rural communities, institutional arrangements
governing access to natural resources, and environmental efficiency. The hypothesis
is that the 'social reproduction' of the community was the aim that defined the
collective action of strong and horizontal communities. They preserved their natural
resources and defended large swathes of common land from foreigners. However,
when these communities acted in a more complex system of transhumance within
the framework of poorly articulated kingdoms, they would tend to predate others
resources and keep others commons open to their free access. The outcome was
the existence of large, but very different, and contested, kinds of commons."
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