Law Commons^™

Common Property And Natural Resource Management: A Michigan Perspective, Michael Anthony Lawrence

Michael Anthony Lawrence

In the thirty years since the publication of Garrett Hardin’s classic essay, The Tragedy of the Commons, academics have debated how to overcome the problems created for the environment by overpopulation and overtaxed natural resources. This essay discusses how one state – the State of Michigan – has dealt with the issues posed by the “the tragedy of the commons.” Through state legislative means (with, e.g., the Wetlands Protection Act and the Sand Dune Protection and Management Act), through local legislative means (zoning), and through judicial interpretation of common law and the United States and Michigan Constitutions, a body of …