Commons Exclosure
Protecting communities from extractive forces, not excluding commoners.
Inverting the Logic of Enclosure
Historical enclosure—the process by which common lands were fenced off and privatized, particularly in England from the 15th through 19th centuries—concentrated wealth by fencing resources out of collective access and into private hands.
The term “commons exclosure” inverts this logic entirely.
Where enclosure fences communities out, exclosure fences extractive forces out—creating protected spaces where self-governed communities can steward shared assets for collective benefit rather than private accumulation.
The boundary exists not to exclude commoners but to exclude the market pressures, speculative capital, and short-term profit imperatives that would otherwise drain value from community and ecosystem alike.
Evidence from Ethiopia
The concept of commons exclosure is not speculative—it has been tested at scale. In Tigray, Northern Ethiopia, communities have established exclosures on formerly degraded grazing lands since the 1980s, closing areas to wood cutting and livestock grazing to promote natural regeneration.
143,000
hectares under exclosure in 1996
895,220
hectares by 2011—a 6x expansion
Crucially, these were governed not by state mandate but by village bylaws (“Serit”) devised and enforced by users themselves.
Top-Down vs. Bottom-Up Governance
The Ethiopian case offers a natural experiment in governance design:
Derg Military Regime (1974–1991)
Exclosures established through top-down authoritarian approaches that disregarded local communities' views. Result: most exclosures established during 1985–1990 were “harvested or destroyed by 1995.”
Community Governance (Post-1991)
Participatory management with locally devised bylaws, democratic decision-making through public meetings, and graduated sanctions enforced by community-appointed guards. Result: exclosures not only survived but expanded six-fold.
The Architectural Insight
The key insight is architectural: profit maximization concentrates wealth precisely because it lacks accountability boundaries. Capital flows to wherever returns are highest, extracting value from communities and ecosystems without obligation to either.
Commons exclosures introduce the boundaries that enable wealth to circulate within communities, building resilience and shared prosperity rather than draining localities to enrich global capital pools.
Digital Exclosures
Regenerative land commons, community land trusts, and tokenized stewardship models are demonstrating that when communities establish clear boundaries, governance rules, and membership pathways, they can protect resources from market pressures while generating surplus that flows to participants rather than distant shareholders.
The Ethiopian exclosures regenerated degraded landscapes by keeping extractive pressures out. Digital commons exclosures can do the same for economic value—creating protected spaces where:
- •Communities govern shared resources according to rules they themselves devise
- •Benefits circulate among participants rather than flowing to external shareholders
- •The boundary between inside and outside is maintained through cryptographic membership and transparent governance protocols
Closer's Approach
At Closer, we build digital exclosures around regenerative communities. Token holders have stakes but within governance structures that embed ecological accountability and collective benefits. The question isn't whether private ownership must be extractive—it's what institutional conditions make ownership regenerative versus extractive.