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Indigenous peoples have sometimes sought the formalization of their customary territories to demand the enforcement of their borders, which have often not been respected by outsiders or the state. The process of formalization, however, generates new conflicts. This article explores how the recognition of indigenous forest commons is connected to questions about authority. For communal properties in particular, issues of 'authority' are central to shaping how decisions are made, whose opinion or knowledge is taken into account and how access to land and natural resources is determined in practice. The process of constituting collective territories is intimately related to the constitution of authority, as it involves not only the negotiation of physical boundaries but also the recognition of a particular entity to represent the collective. Though an entity that holds leadership powers may already exist, it is likely to be endowed with new decision-making powers and responsibilities; and in many cases a new entity will have to be created. This is not a 'local' process but rather emerges at the intersection of relations between the community, or territory, and the state. Similarly, given that 'authority' implies legitimacy, such legitimacy will have to be produced. Drawing on a comparison of cases of two indigenous territories in Nicaragua and Bolivia and an ancestral domain in the Philippines, this article shows how authority emerges from often conflictive processes of constructing the commons and shapes community rights toand powers over -forests and forest resources.