In his book “Collapse,” author Jared Diamond observes that while some past societies hastened their own demise by using their natural resources recklessly, others avoided that fate. Sometimes the stewardship initiative came from the bottom up and sometimes from the top down.

That is, sometimes it comes from the people who worked the land and turned experience into survival strategies (bottom up) and sometimes from rulers who imposed discipline (top down) to prevent practices that would have depleted forests and soils on which life depended.

Today, as in history, both approaches are important – citizens recognizing the right thing to do, governments demanding it – but mandates from on high are more likely to provoke resentment among Pacific Northwesterners and other Americans who cherish both natural beauty and individual liberty.

For nearly a century, the Maucieri family has owned some 500 acres of choice, forested land on Lake Coeur d’Alene. Three family members have houses there, but imagine what fabulous sums all that land would generate if it were sliced up for development.

Instead, thanks to the family’s willing denial of economic temptation, the land is going into conservation easement, and a rich segment of Inland Northwest splendor will retain its character.

As Jean Maucieri put it, “We want to preserve it as Idaho, as it was, as we remember it.”

Unfortunately, civic spirit is not universal.

In northeast Washington, a minority of snowmobilers can’t or won’t stay away from sensitive wildlife habitat near Molybdenite Ridge in the Colville National Forest. This winter will be the last in a three-year effort by forest officials to keep the noisy recreational vehicles out of the area where endangered grizzly, lynx and caribou spend part of their time.

The deal was simple: Stay out of areas designated off-limits, and you can keep using Harvey Creek Road for access to decent snowmobiling locations. Otherwise, it will be closed.

Even many organized snowmobilers are appealing to the handful of renegades to knock it off – and to the Forest Service to crack down on them. The remote nature of the area and staffing limitations make it difficult for officials to catch violators in the act.

And while gating off Harvey Creek Road won’t prevent all violations, it will make them more difficult, meanwhile making it easier for officials to locate vehicles and take down license numbers.

However, such a step will impose an undeserved hardship on law-abiding recreationists who have used Harvey Creek Road responsibly.

For centuries, as author Diamond observed, there have been those who took care of the resources they were given and those who squandered them. Things haven’t changed much.