Shared concern for nature can be a way of transcending national, ethnic, religious, and cultural boundaries, yet conservation efforts often pit the interests of historically rooted or indigenous peoples against the state and international environmental organizations, eroding local autonomy while “saving” rural land for animals and tourists. Wild Sardinia's examination of the cultural politics around nature conservation and the traditional Commons on an Italian island illustrates the complexities of environmental stewardship. Long known as the home of mouflon sheep, magnificent eagles, rare old oak forests, and fiercely independent shepherds (often typecast as rustics, bandits, or eco-vandals), the town of Orgosolo has for several decades received notoriety through its local opposition to Gennargentu National Park.Interweaving rich ethnographic descriptions of highland central Sardinia with analysis grounded in political ecology and cultural critique, Wild Sardinia illuminates the ambivalent and open-ended meanings of many Sardinians' resistance to environmental projects. This groundbreaking case study of the tensions between living cultural landscapes and the emerging ecological imaginaries envisioned through policy discourse and new media—the “global dreamtimes of environmentalism”—has relevance far beyond its Mediterranean locale.