ABSTRACT
Many people see free markets and the environment as incompatible; for them, the very notion of free market environmentalism is an oxymoron. Even many "free marketeers" find themselves on opposite sides of the fence when it comes to governmental regulation of the environment. Serious stresses involving population, resources, and environment is clearly visible ahead." The Nature Conservancy's private land management program offers an excellent example of how free market environmentalism works. Free market environmentalism emphasizes an important role for government in the enforcement of property rights. The theory of free market environmentalism is founded on certain visions regarding human nature, knowledge, and processes. The difference between perceptions of knowledge under centralized, political resource management and free market environmentalism centers on the distribution of knowledge among individuals. Like free market environmentalism, ecology focuses on the information and incentives that reach the members of a species.
