., Vandana

Within the existing scholarly work on commons and commoning, there has been limited engagement with the challenges posed by the rise of neoliberal governance models. Focusing on forests as commons, this study departs from the dominant analytical framework that poses community resource management in opposition to the logic of the State or capitalist market. There is a need to study the commons as influenced by the expansion of government-controlled forest areas, government-recognized common property areas along with the expansion of private property rights under neoliberalism. In India, the Forest Rights Act 2006 grants tenure rights to communities, giving them greater control over forest resources. Our research is based on one such site in Kangra district, Himachal Pradesh, wherein 28 revenue villages secured community forest rights in 2020 through the Forest Rights Act 2006. Through findings based on in-depth interviews and group discussions, our paper addresses two questions: one, how has the process of securing tenure rights changed the management of land use and community rights over the extraction and sale of forest produce? And two, how has community ownership altered social relations within the community, and what are its social justice implications? We find that despite the legal acknowledgement of rights, the collective struggles to define itself and the village community and sustain forest-based livelihoods. While there was substantial local participation in the movement to achieve community rights, the momentum has waned after the legal recognition. The federation formed in the process is struggling to expand its functioning while the powerful state department and erstwhile market traders continue with their earlier roles. Our paper opens the discussion on the transformative potential of community rights obtained under the Forest Rights Act 2006, a process underway across India.