This panel seeks to understand how the governance of lands, public goods, and common resources changed throughout the course of the 18th and 19th centuries in different world regions. Until the 18th century, political discourses regarding access to land and the use of public goods and common resources was tied to the idea of (governance) good government, based on notions of common good and public utility of the Kingdom but also at the local level, with respect to the natural right of self-government of local communities, trade groups, and, even, families. The 18th and 19th centuries are considered pivotal moments of transformation in which the notion of good government turned to more centralized and abstract notions of administration and efficiency. While this shift has traditionally been explained from a framework centered on European developments such as the French Revolution, the process of legal codification, and modern state- and nation-building, this panel seeks to move beyond these narratives by showing how juridical and institutional innovations in the government of land, public goods, and common resources occurred through local legal practices, such as mediation processes based on local customs, norms, and procedures that are observed and enforced within a particular local community or jurisdiction. By looking into case studies from the Habsburg, Portuguese, and Spanish Empires, the aim of this panel is to illustrate the concrete questions and conflicts involved in the definition of these governance practices. Were there generalized processes of disentailment? What kinds of corporations and communities were affected? Were there shifts in access to common lands and resources? Were collective and/or unoccupied lands or resources transformed into public or private property?