Using the commons as a cesspool does not harm the general public under frontier conditions, because there is no public, the same behavior in a metropolis is unbearable.
In politics, they found there were not enough females in the House of Commons, so they came up with the idea of shortlists having to have women on them.
What distinguishes a commons is that it is not private property, does not have a price, and is oriented towards 'use value' rather than 'exchange value.' It does not exist to generate profits.
Think of a public library, worth more for those who cannot afford numerous books. Think of a public waterway or fishing ground. All types of commons have imputed monetary value that together comprise a source of social income. As such, the commons reduces economic inequality and insecurity in society.
Magna Carta only came into being in 1217, when the wording had been changed and parts of the original were extended in the Charter of the Forests. This complementary charter covered liberties granted to the common man, including rights to the commons, grazing, fishing, water, and firewood, and was perhaps the first ecological charter in history.
A rich and diverse commons lowers the cost of living for those who use it. And throughout history, it has been those on low incomes who gain most from the commons.
Using political power, the elite can induce local authorities to facilitate enclosure and privatisation of land, water, and other hitherto public amenities. And they can pressurise public administrations to cut taxes, reducing financial resources for maintaining the remaining commons.
When I was 14, I told my mother I intended to be in the House of Commons in the morning, in court in the afternoon and on stage in the evening. She realised then a fantasist had been born.
Universities are some of the few places left where a struggle for the commons, for public life, if not democracy itself, can be made visible through the medium of collective voices and social movements energized by the need for a politics and way of life counter to authoritarian capitalism.
They say that the commons of England would first destroy the king's friends and afterward himself, and then bring the Duke of York to be king so that by their false means and lies they may make him to hate and destroy his friends, and cherish his false traitors.
