“The cost of doing business”: Private rights, public resources, and the resulting diversity of state-level forestry policies in the U.S.

• DOI: 10.1016/j.landusepol.2023.106792
• Publication Date: 2023-06-22T04:28:32Z
• Authors: Brita Goldstein; Mindy S. Crandall; Erin Clover Kelly
• Keywords: Certified wood; Stewardship; Public land; Sustainable Forest Management

In the U.S., combination of federal, state, and local forest rules programs create policy environment in which private landowners manage their land, turn impacts quality conservation ecosystem services produced. While previous studies provide overviews policies impacting at moments time, they lack depth perspective needed to describe political context policies, including mechanisms underlying this diversity: how why particular policies. This study fills that gap by utilizing interviews with experts from 12 case-study states investigate range present U.S. We also explored perceived trade-offs between protection public trust resources property rights on lands states, key actors (groups) influencing changes over time. Overall, strong role United States was consistent across although most indicated a balance protecting rights. The variability tools employed among suggests many avenues achieve balance, are created through market-based rather than state (i.e., certification). found local-level regulations contributed diversity and, times, conflict confusion within states. Finally, landowner stewardship is not tool, we implicitly explicitly relied knowledge values protect resources, strategy some participants agreed fostered its landowners.