About
The Land Reunion Commons is a living library and open knowledge commons devoted to the many pathways of reuniting people and place - including rematriation, reparations, stewardship, and beyond. This was created as an offering to serve a growing movement that is rediscovering how to live in right relationship with land, guided by values of reciprocity, reverence, and repair.
This Commons honors multiple worldviews and centers cultural reunion, kinship relations, and Indigenous-led leadership, while uplifting the experiences of Black, Brown, and other systemically oppressed communities who are shaping new ways of belonging to land. It recognizes that there are many pathways into reunion, all each rooted in unique cultural, spiritual, and practical traditions.
The Commons gathers stories, frameworks, maps, and practice tools that support both land seekers and land holders in their journeys of reconnection, return, and shared stewardship. It exists to harvest and amplify what is already being imagined and enacted across the field: the models, teachings, and collaborations that embody ethical, culturally affirmative, and regenerative land relations.
Our Approach
The Land Reunion Commons serves as a living field guide - advancing the emerging ecosystem of ethical land transitions and transformations.
The Commons aims to be:
An open knowledge commons that strengthens and connects the still-constellating field of land access and land reunion.
A living collage featuring maps, inspiring stories, evolving practice tools, and interconnected networks.
A comprehensive guide where land seekers can access resources and tools at every stage of their journey.
A resource suite for land holders exploring pathways of ethical return, divestment, and shared stewardship.
A repository of case studies that uplift successful models of rematriation, collective ownership, and community land care.
The Commons is not exhaustive - it is designed to evolve, adapt, and grow in relationship with the communities and movements it serves.
Our Values
The Land Reunion Commons is guided by a set of shared values that shape both its content and its creation:
Transparency in how the Commons is built, curated, and shared.
Collective stewardship, ensuring the Commons is shaped by many hands, perspectives, and lineages.
Evolution and learning, recognizing that this work is alive and will continually change.
Multiple worldviews, honoring Indigenous, Black, Communities of Color, and diasporic ways of knowing alongside allied practices.
Open access, ensuring the knowledge within remains a shared resource, freely available to all.
Together, these principles form the foundation for a commons-based, collaborative approach - one that resists commodification and reaffirms the sacredness of creation.
Origin Story
The Land Reunion Commons emerged through the journey of the Kalliopeia Foundation and the Center for Humans & Nature, who convened a Land Reunion Learning Circle to deepen support for their grantees engaged in land-based regenerative work.
Through regular gatherings and dialogue, the Learning Circle surfaced a collective need: to document, map, and connect the growing body of resources supporting land reunions. Participants envisioned a shared platform that could serve both practitioners and newcomers to this field - one that could weave together stories, frameworks, and tools from diverse approaches and worldviews.
Recognizing deep alignment, the Center for Ethical Land Transition joined in collaboration with Kalliopeia to help bring this vision to life. Center for Ethical Land Transition’s field-building work - centering ethical, cultural, and relational dimensions of land return - offered a natural home for the Commons to take root.
Since then, the Land Reunion Commons has continued to evolve through the guidance of many advisors, collaborators, and practitioners who hold wisdom from across movements - ensuring that the Commons remains dynamic, participatory, and alive.
Collective Offering
The Land Reunion Commons is a shared offering - an invitation to learn, contribute, and dream together. It grows from the belief that land reunion is not just a logistical or legal process, but a cultural and spiritual return to belonging.
Brought to life by the Center for Ethical Land Transition, the Kalliopeia Foundation, Caitlin Brune, Armando Davilla, Mari Shibuya, and many advisors and collaborators who continue to shape its unfolding.