ABSTRACT
Can public forests and national parks be considered commodities? If we approach this question solely in terms of the opposition between State and market, the matter is rather quickly settled, as there is no question of any real commodification of these natural spaces (they are removed from the market and all it entails), and only their economic valuation remains subject to debate. However, this is not the end of the matter, as the State’s ability to effectively guarantee the protection of nature is not a given. The opposition between public and private, that is to say between State and market, does not exhaust the possibilities: we must take into account the commons, which cannot be reduced to either of those two poles, and which offers other solutions. The question then arises of whether we can continue to speak of natural spaces in terms of resources at all.
