RESEARCH ARTICLE Distant political‐economic forces and global‐to‐local pathway to impacts on forests of Ejido landscapes across Yucatán, México Ted J. Lawrence 1 | Stephen J. Morreale 2 | Richard C. Stedman 3 1 Field of Natural Resources, Fernow Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA 2 Department of Natural Resources, Fernow Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA 3 Cornell Center for Conservation Social Sciences, Department of Natural Resources, Fernow Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA Correspondence T. Lawrence, Fernow Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA Email: tjl222@cornell.edu Abstract Indigenous community land tenure in many locations worldwide is shifting towards individually parcelized and privatized systems. Among the drivers of this shifting land tenure are distant political‐economic forces and commodity markets, from local to global. Accompanying the observed land tenure changes are shifts in livelihoods, away from subsistence‐based and toward market‐oriented activities. These changes can ultimately impact land use, land cover, and biodiversity conservation. We investigated a global‐to‐local causal pathway, from agriculture, livestock, and forestry production for distant markets, extending through shifting land tenure and liveli- hoods, to impacts on forest cover within ejidos (a type of community landholding) across Yucatán, México, where Maya people are the primary land managers. To reveal this causal pathway, we conducted exploratory data analysis, using ordinary least squares regression, mapped variables, and variographic analyses to assess spatial pat- terns and correlations. We further explored relationships among variables using spa- tially explicit simultaneous autoregressive models. We found that commodity production for distant markets is strongly related to parcelized ejido lands, which in turn are often deforested. Conversely, community‐managed lands, which traditionally involve subsistence‐based agroforestry, are much more likely to be densely forested. Overall, we conclude that recent deforestation of ejido lands across the State is, at least partly, the result of shifting land tenure and livelihoods due to the increasing presence of commodity markets. Moreover, we conclude that community‐managed lands and associated subsistence livelihoods can attenuate deforestation and poten- tially advance forest and biodiversity conservation across México and elsewhere. KEYWORDS commodity markets, forest cover, land tenure, land use, livelihoods 1 | INTRODUCTION Indigenous community‐managed land tenure systems in many locations worldwide are shifting towards individualized and privatized systems (Grimm & Lesorogol, 2012; Kelly et al., 2010; Loehr, 2012). Accompanying shifts in land tenure are changes in livelihoods, away from subsistence‐based and toward market‐oriented activities (Pereira, Simmons, & Walker, 2016). Distant political‐economic driving Received: 6 June 2018 Revised: 4 June 2019 Accepted: 26 June 2019 DOI: 10.1002/ldr.3400 Land Degrad Dev. 2019;1–12. © 2019 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/ldr 1