The International Association of the Study of the Commons (“IASC”) is the leading professional association dedicated to research and practice around “the Commons”. The association, founded in 1989, is devoted to bringing together multi-disciplinary researchers, practitioners, and policymakers for the purpose of improving governance and management, advancing understanding, and creating sustainable solutions for commons, common-pool resources, or any other form of shared resource. These resources may be part of the natural world (e.g. forests, water, fish stock, climate systems) or they may be created (e.g. infrastructures such as irrigation systems, digitally stored knowledge, or technologies such as open source software, hardware or blockchain systems).
While our IASC community and IASC biennial conferences have brought active attention to the study and practice of “the Commons” and “Commoning” since IASC’s formation in 1989, it could be argued that bringing awareness to these topics and ideas in all regions of the world has never been more pressing. Moreover, the ideas of Commons and Commoning are more apparent in some IASC regions than others. Arguably, people and policy-makers in the United States are less aware of these concepts compared to our colleagues in regions like Europe, Africa or Oceania, for example. In addition, enclosure of commons continues across all IASC regions, often unabated. That is why our overarching theme of the IASC 2025 conference is entitled: “Regenerating the Commons: Addressing Pressing Concerns Through Learning about the Past and Innovating into the Future.”
