I respond to a recently published article in Ecology and Society, namely "Can the center hold? Boundary actors and marginality in a community-based natural resource management network" (Snorek and Bolger 2022). I provide additional information for three dimensions of this article: (1) historical context regarding the different and varied roots of contemporary marginalization of peoples along the !Khuiseb River, (2) the positioning and framing of the article in the context of Namibian community-based natural resources management (CBNRM), and (3) the authors’ representation of early ethnographic research with inhabitants of the !Khuiseb valley. Keywords: CBNRM, ethnography, Namibia, national parks, representation.