The governance of ecosystem services (ES) is currently mainly thought in terms of market-based or state-based instruments. Only few authors consider governance mechanisms based on collective action among local users and managers of resources. And yet, trade-offs among ES can be seen as social trade-offs among diverse people with competing claims, and therefore as social choices that need to be made in an explicit and concerted way. This paper questions the theoretical and practical relevance of concerted and collective action for the management of ES. To do so, we suggest a framework that stresses social interdependencies underlying ES dynamics (between providers and beneficiaries, among beneficiaries and among providers of ES). We focus on social interdependencies because increased awareness of being interdependent is considered as a necessary step towards collective action. Used to highlight social interdependencies among people, could the ES concept foster concerted management of natural resources?